Book excerpt: Two important criticisms of contemporary liberalism turn to Aristotle''s political thought for support that which advocates participatory democracy, and that sympathetic to the rule of a virtuous or philosophic elite. In this commentary on Aristotle''s politics the author explores how Aristotle offers political rule as an alternative to both the rule of aristocratic virtue and an unchecked participatory democracy. Writing in lucid prose, she offers an interpretation grounded in a close reading of the text, and combining a respectful and patient attempt to understand Aristotle in his own terms with a wide, sympathetic, and argumentative reading in the secondary literature.