Introduction

We begin with three late-fifth-century comments on democracy. In 411, two years after an Athenian army perished in Sicily, a group of elite Athenians succeeded in persuading the assembled citizens to abolish democracy in favor of an oligarchy. The historian Thucydides emphasizes that this was possible only because the people were terrified by a conspiratorial terror campaign, convinced that crucial Persian assistance in the war against Sparta could be secured only by changing the constitution, and certain that this decision could be reversed at any time (Thuc. 8.53-4). Even so, and although some highly intelligent and astute politicians were involved, Thucydides writes, it ‘‘was no easy matter about 100 years after the expulsion of the tyrants to deprive the Athenian people of its liberty - a people not only unused to subjection itself, but, for more than half of this time, accustomed to exercise power over others’’ (Thuc. 8.68.4, trans. Warner (Penguin)). When the oligarchs initiated peace negotiations with the Spartan king Agis, he too did not believe that the Athenian ‘‘people would give up their ancient liberty so quickly’’ (Thuc. 8.71.1).

Probably in the 420s, an anonymous Athenian opponent of democracy wrote a pamphlet on the Constitution of the Athenians (Athenaion politeia), which is preserved among Xenophon’s works and thus commonly attributed to ‘‘Pseudo-Xenophon’’ or the ‘‘Old Oligarch.’’ His purpose is to explain why democracy, in his view the worst possible political system, is so successful, ‘‘how well they preserve their constitution and handle the other affairs for which the rest of the Greeks criticise them,’’ and why under present circumstances the chances of overthrowing it are minimal (Pseudo-Xenophon Ath. Pol. 1.1; cf. 3.1; trans. Moore 1975). His main objection concerns the right of every citizen who wants (ho boulomenos) to serve in the council (boule) and to speak in the assembly (ekklesia) and, in doing so, to advance the interests of the likes of himself rather than those of the ‘‘better ones,’’ the elite (1.2-7):

A city would not be the best on the basis of such a way of life, but the democracy would be best preserved that way. For the people do not want a good order (eunomia) under which they themselves are slaves; they want to be free and to rule. Bad order (kakonomia) is of little concern to them. What you consider not eunomia is the very source of the people’s strength and freedom. If it is eunomia you seek, you will first observe the cleverest men establishing the laws in their own interest. Then the good men will punish the bad; they will make policy for the city and not allow madmen to participate or to speak their minds or to meet in assembly. As a result of these excellent measures the people would swiftly fall into slavery. (Pseudo-Xenophon Ath. Pol. 1.8-9; trans. Bower-sock (Loeb), modified by Raaflaub)

In the fall of 431, the Athenians buried those who had died in the first year of the war against the Peloponnesians in a solemn ceremony in the public cemetery (Thuc. 2.34). Perikles, the foremost leader of Athens at the time, was chosen to give the traditional Funeral Oration (epitaphios) honoring the fallen soldiers. Thucydides is likely to have heard this speech. In the condensed version he includes in his History (2.35-46), Perikles focuses not on wars, battles, and the exploits ofancestors and contemporaries, traditional subjects familiar to all, but on ‘‘the spirit in which we faced our trials and also our constitution and the way of life which has made us great’’ (2.36.4). He says:

Athens’ constitution is called a democracy because it respects the interests not of a minority but of the whole people. When it is a question of settling private disputes, everyone is equal before the law; when it is a question of putting one person before another in positions of public responsibility, what counts is not membership of a particular class, but the actual ability which the man possesses. No one, so long as he has it in him to be of service to the state, is kept in political obscurity because of poverty. And, just as our political life is free and open, so is our day-to-day life in our relations with each other. . . We are free and tolerant in our private lives; but in public affairs we keep to the law.. .We obey those whom we put in positions of authority and the laws themselves, especially those which are for the protection of the oppressed, and those unwritten laws which it is an acknowledged shame to break. (Thuc. 2.37; trans. Warner (Penguin), modified by Raaflaub)

These passages illustrate how deeply democracy was entrenched among the Athenian people, how profoundly it was despised by its opponents, and how positively it could be viewed by its supporters. Democracy, as it existed in Athens from about the midfifth century, was, in the landscape of Greek polis constitutions, a unique and truly revolutionary system that realized its basic principle to an unprecedented and quite extreme extent: no polis had ever dared to give all its citizens equal political rights, regardless of their descent, wealth, social standing, education, personal qualities, and any other factors that usually determined status in a community. As a result, democracy was both tremendously exciting and offensive; it unleashed among its citizens enormous enthusiasm and energy, it elicited unheard-of levels of civic involvement, and it shaped the lives and mentalities of individuals and community alike. The Athenians developed a primary political identity and a collective character that distinguished them from other Greek polis citizens and especially from their perennial opponents, the Spartans (Thuc. 1.70-1). As contemporaries observed, in a democratic polis not only laws and politics but the entire way people lived and interacted with each other and with the outside world differed radically from those in an oligarchic community. Democratic Athens was, as its supporters liked to stress, a model for others (a ‘‘school for Hellas’’ - paideia tes Hellados - Thuc. 2.41.1) but with its aggressive, interventionist policies it also represented a constant threat to others. It did not allow anyone to remain passive, and intellectuals of all stripes and colors (tragedians, comedians, historians, political theorists, and philosophers) felt challenged to cope with it in their works.

All this raises a number of questions. How did this system work on a day-by-day basis? What were its origins and how did it develop? Even if the Athenians called it a democracy, to what extent does it correspond to modern conceptions of democracy, and does this matter? To what extent was it really unique, and in what ways did it differ from other democracies? What exactly did this system offer the Athenian people and why were they so supportive of it? Who exactly were ‘‘they’’ in this context, who were their opponents, and what were the latter’s motives and goals? In other words, what were the differences, politically and ideologically, between democracy and oligarchy, and what role did this contrast play in Athenian politics? To what extent were constitutional and ideological differences recognized, formulated, and discussed, and what did political theory contribute to this? How is all this reflected in political terminology? What was democracy’s impact on Athenian society, not least the nonpolitical classes (women, resident aliens called metics (metoikoi - ‘‘settlers from abroad’’), and slaves), religion, law and the judicial system, culture, economic life, warfare, foreign relations, and other aspects of Athenian life and politics? And finally, what are the sources that inform us about this system and its working, and how reliable are they? These are the main questions to be examined in this chapter.

So far we have only mentioned Athens. For various reasons, Athens probably produced the most fully developed form of democracy. But this form emerged out of earlier types of polis constitutions that were broadly egalitarian (‘‘isonomic’’ from isonomia, ‘‘equality before the law’’ or ‘‘equality of distribution, participation,’’ hence ‘‘political equality’’) and fairly widespread by the late sixth century (Robinson 1997). Partly imposed and often influenced by Athens, partly independently, democracies emerged during the fifth century in various parts of the Greek world (e. g., in Argos and Syracuse), although they probably always remained a minority (O’Neil 1995; Robinson (forthcoming)). Indeed, as Aristotle’s systematic analysis in Politics, based on broad empirical research, shows, both democracy and oligarchy existed in many versions, and the most moderate forms of each overlapped considerably (Dolezal 1974; Robinson 1997: 35-44; see also Ober 1998: ch. 6). Moreover, institutions, values, and customs were often closely related in communities with both types of constitutions (Kurke 1998; Morris 1998; Rhodes 2003). Unfortunately, for very few other democracies (or oligarchies) does sufficient evidence survive to permit a substantial reconstruction. However much we would prefer to break the Athenocentric pattern, for most questions that interest us in this chapter only Athenian evidence offers reasonably clear answers.