Posted on 02/28/2005 11:59:26 AM PST by Destro
Athenian democracy an imperfect system that led to mob rule, says classics prof
By Brian Fitzgerald
The word democracy comes from the Greek demokratia, a combination of demos, meaning people, and kratos, meaning power.
Democracy: power of the people. It’s the ideal form of government, isn’t it? Loren J. Samons says no — not the way it was practiced by Athens in the fifth and fourth centuries B.C. Athenian democracy was remarkably direct, rather than being representative, he says, and America’s founding fathers regarded this form of government as “unstable and dangerous.”
Most Americans generally believe that we live in a democracy, but the United States government was designed instead as a representative republic, in part “to shield elected leaders from the sometimes volatile public will,” writes Samons, a CAS associate classics professor and associate dean, in his recently published book What’s Wrong with Democracy? From Athenian Practice to American Worship ( University of California Press, 2004).
Samons says that over the course of the past 200 years, Americans have increasingly — and erroneously — applied the words democracy and democratic to our form of government, “in which a people express their sovereign power through elected representatives, under a Constitution that ensures individual rights.”
So, many citizens were in for a rude awakening during the protracted period following the 2000 presidential election, when candidate George W. Bush won the number of Electoral College votes necessary for victory, but had a minority of the popular vote. People were astonished to realize that we don’t live in a “true” democracy. There were calls for election reforms and the abolishment of the Electoral College.
But the Electoral College is still in place, and that’s the way the creators of the American regime intended it. They didn’t trust the masses. They certainly didn’t want to emulate the voting system in ancient Athens, where a citizen assembly made policy decisions. “There were 30,000 to 40,000 citizens eligible to vote,” Samons says, “but no more than about 6,000 would meet in an assembly. Measures were put before them, and they voted by literally holding up their hands.” As for public officials, a council of 500 was chosen by lot to serve administrative purposes and put measures before the assembly, but final decisions rested with the assemblymen themselves. “Policy questions such as, ‘Should we go to war with Sparta?’ were put before the people — that’s how decisions were made,” he says.
In 431 B.C. the Athenian general Pericles persuaded the assembly to provoke war with Sparta, leading to Athens’ defeat in the Peloponnesian War.
“The great irony to me is that in the last 15 to 20 years, some modern historians of ancient history have begun to look to Athens as a model for the theory and practice of modern politics,” says Samons. “A lot of their works paint an overly optimistic picture of Athenian democracy. To me, if we’re going to use Athens to study America, the first question we ought to ask is, ‘Did Athens succeed?’ One thing we know about Athenian democracy is that it didn’t last. During the nearly two centuries of Athenian democracy Athens suffered oligarchical revolutions twice.”
Samons points out the Athenians also waged rash imperialistic wars. “They lost virtually every war they fought against major Greek powers,” he says. “They were pretty good at bullying little Greek states, and they were successful against the Persians, but not against Sparta or Syracuse. Before we begin to look to Athens to better understand — or even alter — our own government, we should look at how well Athens succeeded.” Indeed, at the conclusion of the Peloponnesian War, in 404 B.C., the Athenian empire was not only humbled, but also overthrown. He notes that Athens foolishly refused to make peace early in the war, even when offered favorable terms by Sparta.
Samons says there is much to admire about Athens: its literature, art, architecture, and philosophers; but its experiments with democracy led to many mistakes and failures. After all, an Athenian jury of 500 citizens even voted to execute the great philosopher Socrates.
Despite the publicity the Electoral College received in 2000, Samons says, many Americans still believe that our country is a democracy and look to Athenian democracy as something we should strive for.
“I think we talk about our regime now as if it’s a democracy,” he says. “You hear politicians, for example, trying to align themselves with ‘what the American people want.’ This inspires a view that this is the best thing for the country — majority rule. After the 2000 election, I heard more than one politician talk about ‘the will of the majority’ instead of discussing why the Electoral College exists, and what the reasons are for a distance between the immediate will of the people and political action in the American system.”
Samons, who has written or edited three other books on ancient Athens, including one on Athenian democracy, says that he wrote What’s Wrong with Democracy “to get people to recognize and accept nondemocratic aspects of our regime.” He also wants readers to realize that we shouldn’t rely on our political system to improve society. “Many Americans tend to think that there is a political solution to every social problem,” he says. “This reflects a misplaced faith in the political process — a faith sometimes spawned by the modern idealization of democracy.”
America’s founders weren’t as foolhardy, according to Samons. “They clearly recognized the dangers of having a mass of citizens make policy decisions on the spot,” he says. “They were familiar with classical Athens, and the ancients proved that majority rule can devolve into mob rule.”
4 February 2005
Big news. Aristotle and Plato said as much 2400 years ago.
This idea is not particularly new. Plato studied philosophy to discover what was going wrong with Athenian democracy.
"You must remember, Octavius, I only control the Senate. The Mob controls your life."
I'm not so sure it worked all that well. Look at Alcibiades and his instigation of the disastrous Sicilian Expedition. He fired up the mob and got the vote to authorize an ambitious expedition to Syracuse, which was subsequently annihilated. Athens never recovered from this defeat.
Someone said that if the Athenian polity had consisted only Socrates's, it still would have been a mob.
"...Aristotle said the same thing over 2300 years ago. The least they could have done is mentioned him in this piece...."
I also would venture to say that the depiction of the great Pericles in this piece borders on slander. Pericles actaully tried to steer a middle course between the Athenian doves (who were anti-democrat aristorcrats who sympathized with Sparta) and the radical war party, led by the duplicitous scoundrel and demogogue (he practically invented the term) Alcibiades. Pericles wanted to use judicious force and military/naval strength to convince the Spartans to modify their war-like behavior vis-a-vis Corinth and other city states that bristled under Athenian suzereignity. He thought this would avoid war without endangering Athenian democracy and the remnants of the democratic-oriented Delian League. He was no warmonger by any means.
Having said this, there are many leassons for the U.S. to learn from the demise of the Athenia empire. Certainly the ill-fated war over Sicily (here referenced as the battle against Syracuse) was key to the eventual end of the empire. The U.S. must be certain not to make the same mistake in its effort to bring democracy, however we define it, to the world.
I supose in the modern (bastardized) definition we would be called a "representive democracy", but in the classical definition as used by the founders, no, we are not a democracy and there actually are no democracies anywhere in the world.
Of course, under classical definitions, I'm a Liberal, not a Conservative.
Chap named Aristotle said it 2000 years earlier.
Hard to talk about democracy in Athens where their economy was tied to slavery.
Not-so-fast! The FF expected the pols to follow the Constitution, provide for our security, etc. When 85% plus want the borders secured what type of representation is this?
......a republic is a sheep and three wolves voting on what's for dinner.....only the sheep HAS A GUN!
"The government which governs least, governs best." - Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson quotes (US 3rd US President (1801-09). Author of the Declaration of Independence. 1762-1826)
Let's use the LIBs logic.
Since they believe that Jefferson believed in the absolute seperation of Church and State lets remind them that he is also against Democracy.
It's all about rights.....do we ever want a "mobocracy" where someone's rights are dictated by a majority or a republic as in our case where our rights are unalienable and cannot be violated by unscrupulous bureaucrats, etc. In a democracy rights are turned into privileges (for a fee).....that's why so many of our gov't entities are now corporations (operating in commerce)......a democracy is a corporate form of governance.
Thats not accurate at all. This is modern day America hatred and hatred of Bush and Republicans trying to cloak itself in classic history. Athens, did in fact, win most of its wars. The word "imperialistic" is used to attack America.
The part about the Syracuse Expedition and the 2nd Pelopenesian War (this professors leaves out that there was a 1st Pelopenesian War) is true. But liberals have been comparing that to Vietnam for decades now.
Oh yeah, and Athens did not pick on little states like this professor claims. Cities like Corinth and Thebes were not small. Its navy defeated the Persians at Salamism, which this hate-America professor sweeps under the rug.
bump
Not only a bad idea, but literally impossible.
How do you scale a 30,000 to40,000 population to one 10,000 that size?
Pure democracy works ideally as a tribal form of government. Which we ain't.
There are, but they don't last. They come and go. Once they have achieved their aim, they are replaced by political organization.
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