ABSTRACT
“The common good in Aristotle and Aquinas” (Kevin L. Flannery, S.J.). This article argues that, although certainly both Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas attribute a certain priority to the common good as distinct from the good of the individual, this does not mean that “central government” (however that is to be understood) trumps individual rights. The argument develops in three phases. It is maintained, first of all, that the priority assigned to the common good in a passage in the first book of the Nicomachean Ethics is circumscribed and so limited by other remarks in the same work. The second phase of the argument considers an interpretation of Aquinas to the effect that for him the common good is (for the most part) a merely instrumental good and so at the service of individuals. It is argued rather that what Aristotle (followed in this regard by Aquinas) says about the relationship between phronēsis (or prudence) and political science provides sufficient protection for individuals. The third and final phase of the argument has to do with remarks in Aristotle’s Metaphysics where he associates the common good with the good of the universe as overseen by God (the “first unmoved mover”). In evidence here are not only the limits that Aristotle would put upon political powers but also the self-transcendence that attachment to the common good entails.
