Peter Jones

Greek justice and Vicky Pryce

issue 16 March 2013

Every ancient Greek juror would have warmed to their descendant Vicky Pryce, when she admitted in court that she wanted revenge on her faithless husband. Revenge, in other words, did not just happen in Greek myth. It was a splendid reason for going to law.

In Plato’s Republic, ‘justice’ was defined as ‘rendering to every man what he was owed’, taken to mean ‘doing good to your friends and harm to your enemies’.

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