Athens, Sparta, and Persia

2020 ◽  
pp. 61-70
Author(s):  
Matthew Kroenig
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
North Africa ◽  
Direct Democracy ◽  
Ancient World ◽  
Persian Empire ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Naval Power ◽  
International Power ◽  
City States ◽  
Open States

This chapter considers the rise of Athens in the ancient world and its competitions against its rivals, Persia and Sparta. It argues that its democratic institutions were a key to its success. Athens was the world’s first democracy, and it rose to become the leader of the Greeks, with an empire that stretched from North Africa to Crimea. It was a major trading and naval power and forged a formidable alliance of Greek city-states to defeat the mighty Persian Empire. It then fought a legendary series of wars against its oligarchic rival for ascendancy in Greece, Sparta. In the end, Athens’s form of direct democracy and decision-making through tyranny of the majority was its undoing. But not before Athens reigned as a liberal leviathan for nearly a century and showcased an enduring model for how other open states could acquire international power and influence.

Exploring Intercommunity Political Activity in Fourth-Century Greece

2018 ◽  
pp. 405-432
Author(s):  
Peter Liddel
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Political Behaviour ◽  
City States ◽  
Cultural Structure ◽  
Inter State

It might seem reasonable to take the view that the study of ancient Greek political behaviour could plausibly focus upon exchanges that went on inside the polis: after all, the word ‘politics’ derives from the Greek politika (‘polis affairs’). However, the concerns of ancient Greek polis-communities were not merely introspective: communities (regardless of size or military clout) were obliged to face the consequences of the decisions and activity of other communities. Human representatives of city-states performed necessary interactions with outsiders: they fought as soldiers, and staked political or ideological claims as ambassadors and politicians. On their return to their home communities, these individuals proclaimed to their audiences the significance of their activity away from home. Furthermore, the overlaps in social and cultural structure of different Greek city-states, as well as the existence of shared modes of decision-making, might lead us to anticipate the value of trans-community forms of political activity. At the heart of this question, therefore, is an overall debate about the degree of ‘unity’ of Greek political institutions and behaviour, a debate explored in this chapter with particular reference to the contested transferability of the decree (psephisma) in Greek inter-state politics of the fourth century.

Direct Democracy Practices of Local Authorities in Turkey

2022 ◽  
pp. 67-90
Author(s):  
İhsan İkizer
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Local Governments ◽  
Direct Democracy ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Representative Democracy ◽  
Early Form ◽  
Ancient Athens ◽  
Local Residents ◽  
City States ◽  
Local Levels

Direct democracy, an early form of democracy, which was applied in city states of ancient Athens, is at the agenda of politics again, especially at local levels due to the limitations of the representative democracy. People do not want to voice their ideas about the cities or countries where they live just once in four or five years by casting their votes in the ballot box. They desire to be involved in decision-making mechanisms, at least for relatively more important issues that might have direct effect over their lives. Today, more local governments are applying direct democracy tools in line with the expectations of local residents and as a requirement of the local governance principle of participation. Of course, as it is the case in representative democracy, direct democracy, which aims civic engagement for each significant decision, has some limitations. This chapter will explore the implementation of direct democracy by municipalities in Turkey, with all its variation, sources of motivation, opportunities, and challenges.

From Simonides to Isocrates: The Fifth-Century Origins of Fourth-Century Panhellenism

2000 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. Flower
Keyword(s):  
Fourth Century ◽  
Fifth Century ◽  
Persian Empire ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Common Cause ◽  
Greek Poetry ◽  
Historical Texts ◽  
Political Program ◽  
City States ◽  
Political Disputes

This article attempts to gather the evidence for panhellenism in the fifth century B.C. and to trace its development both as a political program and as a popular ideology. Panhellenism is here defined as the idea that the various Greek city-states could solve their political disputes and simultaneously enrich themselves by uniting in common cause and conquering all or part of the Persian empire. An attempt is made to trace the evidence for panhellenism throughout the fifth century by combining different kinds of evidence: that is, both poetic and historical texts, as well as the testimonia for monuments which are no longer extant. Any thought of a panhellenic crusade was impossible before the Persian invasions, but such an expedition, under the dual leadership of Athens and Sparta, was espoused by Cimon. After his death it remained an item of popular talk for the rest of the century and this talk intensified during the second half of the Peloponnesian War. The paper has six parts: the first finds hints of panhellenist ideology in the fragments of Simonides' Plataea elegy and in Aeschylus' Persians. The second part attempts to explain several puzzling passages in Herodotus in terms of his reflecting contemporary panhellenist discourse, especially in his account of Aristagoras of Miletus at Sparta. Part three reconstructs Cimon' s belief in dual hegemony and his plans for a joint Athenian-Spartan expedition against the Persian empire. Part four connects an anecdote about Miltiades with the Cimonian monuments and argues that the artistic program of the Stoa Poikile was intended to support Cimon's panhellenist aspirations. Part five discusses panhellenist sentiments in late fifth-century Greek poetry, and dates the Olympic Oration and Funeral Oration of Gorgias to the period 408-405 B.C., Finally, part six relates the panhellenist writings of Isocrates to earlier developments.

scholarly journals Playing with Peace: Solomon as the Man of Peace and Rest, and the Temple as the House of Rest

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 2
Author(s):  
Louis C. Jonker
Keyword(s):  
International Politics ◽  
Diplomatic Relations ◽  
Persian Empire ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Royal Inscriptions ◽  
International Discourse ◽  
City States ◽  
The Temple

It is well-known that the notions of peace, rest and order belonged to the royal Achaemenid ideology, particularly from the time of Darius I onwards. This can be witnessed in Achaemenid architecture, iconography and royal inscriptions. However, although the relations between the Persian Empire and the Greek city-states were never completely peaceful, the diplomatic relations between Persia and particularly Sparta emphasised the value and importance of peace for international politics. How did this international discourse influence the literature formation in Yehud at the same time? In addition, can one read the Chronicler’s portrayal of King Solomon of old as playful (and undermining) irony and polemic against the imperial masters? In this article, I revisit an earlier study in which I have started investigating the rhetorical locus of the Chronicler’s portrayal of this king.

After Adam

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Kenneth Galbraith
Keyword(s):  
Interest Rates ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Ancient Greece ◽  
Economic Life ◽  
Ancient World ◽  
Roman Law ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Basic Industry ◽  
History Of ◽  
City States

This chapter discusses some economic questions during the time of the Greek city-states and the Athenian Empire and later in the age of Rome. The basic industry of both ancient Greece and Rome was agriculture, and the use or consumption of goods was infinitesimal for all but a small governing minority. Aside from the elementary character of economic life in this period, the most important reason that ethical questions were addressed to the exclusion of economic ones in the ancient world was the existence of slavery. The chapter considers the issue of capital, wages, and interest rates in the ancient world, taking into account the ideas of Aristotle on subjects such as money, coinage, and moneymaking, as well as Plato's inclination to communism. It also examines the contribution of the Romans to the history of economic ideas, especially Roman law and private property.

scholarly journals Channels of Electoral Representation in Advanced Industrialized Democracies

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcus Kreuzer
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Social Control ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Direct Democracy ◽  
Electoral Systems ◽  
Control Function ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
Complex Relationship ◽  
Wide Range

Electoral systems and political parties not only are at the core of a wide range of representational mechanisms (others being lobbying, direct democracy, corporatism) used in modern democracies to project societal interests into the formal, legislative decision-making process, but also they vary greatly in their respective make-ups. Political parties differ in their internal decision making, membership size, funding, links with interest groups, and ideology. Electoral systems, in turn, are differentiated into systems of proportional representation (PR), single-member district (SMD), or first-past-the-post electoral systems (FPTP). Despite all these differences, parties and electoral systems are the two primary mechanisms for aggregating and then translating the preferences of private individual citizens. They also are the oldest, most widely studied, and arguably the most democratic channel of political representation. Parties and electoral systems certainly are important, but they are still only intermediary mechanisms that interact in complex ways with other factors, such as actors’ preferences, resources, other representational mechanisms, and the larger constitutional context. This complex interaction makes it intriguing to study how they affect political representation and explains why they are studied from so many different angles, methodologies, and theoretical perspectives. The following bibliographic suggestions are intended to reflect this diversity in the literature. The literature points out that parties and electoral systems function not just as mechanisms of political expression, through which voter preferences are bundled, articulated, and electorally weighted, but also as mechanisms of social control. The social control function becomes apparent in the ability of parties and electoral systems to contain the risks of overly expressive and potentially anarchic forms of direct and, hence, unorganized participation (i.e., protest, extremism, violence) as well as their potential to integrate individual citizens into the political order by creating political identities crucial for social order. Thus, parties and electoral systems have an as yet little understood but also fascinatingly complex relationship to popular sovereignty because they are indispensable for it while at the same time they give politicians the ability to mute and manipulate that sovereignty. In large part, the literature on parties and electoral systems tries to untangle this complex relationship by studying how their cross-national and historical variations influence the extent to which they have facilitated or distorted political representation.

The Athenian Reconciliation Agreement of 403 bce and its Legacy for Greek City-States in the Classical and Hellenistic Ages

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Joyce
Keyword(s):  
Civil Conflict ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Political Forgiveness ◽  
The Law ◽  
City States ◽  
Robust Procedures ◽  
Greek World

This chapter surveys amnesty agreements throughout the Greek world in the Classical and Hellenistic ages and argues that in many the principle of political forgiveness was both important and necessary when reconciling communities in the aftermath of civil conflict. The most successful amnesties were those which made use of the law and prohibited the revisiting of old grievances which led to or stemmed from a period of internal strife. Where and when exceptions were made to this rule they normally had to be spelled out in the terms of a treaty. The methods by which individual cities put this principle into effect varied widely, but the most famous and enduring example, the Athenian amnesty of 403 BCE, illustrates that a community could only successfully reconcile if its citizens were willing to forgo vindictive instincts which otherwise would have destabilised it. Robust procedures were put in place to restrain vengeance and protect the rights of individuals.

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