All 8 books, from the household to the music room — the complete arc of Aristotle's political science.
Politics is structured as eight books of unequal weight. Books I–II build the foundations and clear the ground of Plato. Book 3 is the theoretical core: citizen, constitution, the six regime types. Books IV–VI are applied science: varieties of democracy and oligarchy, causes of revolution, practical remedies. Books VII–VIII are the ideal: the best city and the education that makes it possible. Read Books I and III first. The rest will fall into place.
The city by nature. Critique of Plato and the Spartans.
Aristotle builds the city out of households and builds households out of three pairs: man and woman, master and slave, parent and child. The genetic argument culminates in the claim that man is by nature a political animal. Then the hard part: the defense of natural slavery.
Aristotle tears apart Plato's community of property, wives, and children, then examines the constitutions of Sparta, Crete, and Carthage. Every proposal has something to teach; none is adequate. The critique clears the ground for Aristotle's own political science.
Who is a citizen? What are the six forms of government?
The theoretical core of Politics. Aristotle defines the citizen, classifies the six forms of government (three sound, three corrupt), and argues that distributive justice — giving to each in proportion to what they contribute — is the ground of legitimate constitutional rule.
Varieties, causes of revolution, practical remedies.
Four types of democracy, four of oligarchy, and the argument for polity as the best practicable constitution. Book 4's central claim: cities are stabilized not by any ideal design but by a large middle class that has enough not to envy the rich and too much to join the poor.
Why do regimes fall? Book 5 surveys the causes of revolution across all constitution types — the desire for equality, disproportionate class growth, election manipulation, foreign intervention — and then examines what preserves each form of government. The section on tyranny is the most realist passage in the Politics.
The practical manual. Book 6 works through how democracies and oligarchies should organize their institutions — assemblies, courts, magistracies, military offices — to be as stable as possible without becoming either extremist democracies or tightly controlled oligarchies.
The ideal regime and the education that forms its citizens.
Book 7 begins with the good life and works outward to the best city. Happiness is virtuous activity. The best city is one sized for genuine community, governed by citizens who take turns ruling and being ruled, and aimed at the life of peace and virtue rather than the life of military conquest.
The best city educates its citizens for virtue and leisure, not just for war and work. Book 8 argues that education must be public and liberal — with music given unexpected prominence as the discipline that most directly shapes character and trains citizens for the proper use of free time.