Abstract

Aristotle’s thoughts on economic matters are included in his inquiry into the nature of politics. They are certainly ancillary to his thoughts on the education requisite for excellence. Yet this ranking should not cause one to overlook Aristotle’s contributions to the field of normative political economy. To appreciate these contributions, it is helpful to look to the scholarship on Aristotle’s political economy. In this essay such an inquiry is approached through categorizing the scholarship into three stages or waves of interpretation: 1) ‘Aristotle’s Economic Thought’, 2) ‘Aristotle’s “Political” Economy’,, and 3) ‘Aristotle on the Best Possible Political Economy’. The overall goal of this essay is to provide an account of the stages by which it might be useful to think through Aristotle’s political economy.