Abstract

This study has considered the various claims of the relationship between politics on the one hand and philosophy and its teaching on the other. Realizing the importance of social and political beliefs and the impact it can have on philosophical scholarship and teaching as performed by philosophers, the study has focused on an analysis of the relationship between philosophers' political beliefs and their perceptions of the ideological implications of philosophy and of the teaching of philosophy. ;For this study, four types of variables were collected and analyzed. They are as follows: Political Self-Characterization--relevant variables that describe the political beliefs and the voting attitudes of philosophers; Social and Political Variables--variables that express the philosophers' acceptance or rejection of the existing social and political establishments; Philosophical Variables--variables dealing with the ideological nature of philosophy as perceived by philosophers; and Pedagogical Variables--the philosophers' perceptions of the present status of schooling and their attitudes with regard to some of the educational issues related to teacher/student relationship and responsibilities in classroom situations. ;A questionnaire designed for this study was mailed to a random sample of 500 active members of the American Philosophical Association. Of these, 72 percent responded and 60.4 percent were useable for analysis. ;Major findings were: There was a statistically significant difference in mean perception of the existing social and political institutions among the philosophers who characterized themselves as conservatives, liberals and radicals. There was a statistically significant difference in mean perception of the ideological implications of philosophy among the three political groups of philosophers. There was a statistically significant difference in mean perception of the ideological implications of the teaching of philosophy among philosophers who categorized themselves as conservatives, liberals and radicals