(The thesis of Platonic isomorphism in contemporary material cities: history of Latin America and the current case of San Miguel de Tucumán)

Abstract

The present work aims to relate the structural isomorphism of the city with the citizens who live in it proposed by Plato in Republic, with the cities founded in Latin America in general and with the city of San Miguel de Tucumán – Argentina, in particular. Although the Platonic proposal refers to an ethical – political city, it is considered pertinent to extrapolate these notions to the physical city, its urban building fabric, while the urbanization of a region is a reflection of the existing social ties. The latter will be what the work will focus on analyzing from the field of philosophy with a hermeneutical – critical methodology of texts, understood in a broad sense. A brief historical tour of the urban landmarks in the cities established in Latin America from their origins to the 20th century will be carried out, with the intention of showing a basic parallelism between the physical city, from its foundation and its transformations and the urban societies that have inhabited them over time, the historical occurrence in them coming to play. Following Tatarkiewicz (2015), beauty has been one of the three supreme values in the West and, on the other hand, the original Greek concept of beauty has a broad meaning, which includes moral beauty, that is ethics and aesthetics. For this reason, it will be considered how the classical notion of beauty in Plato’s work is the basis of his foundations for an ideal city and the possibility of adapting these notions to the contemporary cities will be considered.
Finally, the normative value of the Platonic ideal city, as a guiding horizon will be reworked in a current practical use, understood as the need to build physical cities in which all its inhabitants can fulfill themselves and achieve dignified living standards.