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Democracy is either aspired to as a goal or cherished as a birthright by billions of people throughout the world today - and has been for over a century. But what does it mean? And how has its meaning changed since it was first coined in ancient Greece?Democracy: A Life is a biography of the concept, looking at its many different manifestations and showing how it has changed over its long life, from ancient times right through to the present. For instance, how did the 'people power' of the Athenians emerge in the first place? Once it had emerged, what enabled it to survive? And how did the Athenian version of democracy differ from the many other forms that developed among the myriad cities of the Greek world?Paul Cartledge answers all these questions and more, following the development of ancient political thinking about democracy from the sixth century BC onwards, not least the many arguments that were advanced against it over the centuries. As Cartledge shows, after a golden age in the fourth century BC, there was a long, slow degradation of the original Greek conception and practice of democracy, from the Hellenistic era, through late Republican and early Imperial Rome, down to early Byzantium in the sixth century CE.For many centuries after that, from late Antiquity, through the Middle Ages, to the Renaissance, democracy was effectively eclipsed by other forms of government, in both theory and practice. But as we know, this was by no means the end of the story. For democracy was eventually to enjoy a re-florescence, over two thousand years after its first flowering in the ancient world: initially revived in seventeenth century England, it was to undergo a further renaissance in the revolutionary climate of late eighteenth century North America and France - and has been constantly reconstituted and reinvented ever since.
Preface and Acknowledgements
Timeline
ACT I
1: Introduction: Lost in Translation?
2: Sources, Ancient and Modern
3: The Emergence of the Polis, Politics, and the Political
4: The Emergence of Ancient Democracy in Archaic Greece I
5: The Emergence of Ancient Democracy in Archaic Greece II
6: Athenian Democracy I: Theory
7: Athenian Democracy II: Practice
8: Athenian Democracy III: Culture
9: Democracy in Credit and Crisis
10: Democracy on Trial: Trial of Socrates 399
ACT II
11: Democracy Renewed: The Golden Age of Greek Democracy (c.375-50)
12: How did the 4th-century BCE Athenian Democracy Work in the 'Age of Lycurgus'?
13: How did the 4th-century BCE Athenian Democracy Work in the 'Age of Lycurgus'?, Part II
14: Classical Greek and Athenian Democracy: a Retrospect
ACT III
15: Hellenistic Democracy I
16: Roman Republic: a sort of Democracy? I: Polybius's Roman Constitution
17: Roman Republic a sort of Democracy? II: the 'Millar Thesis'
18: Democracy Denied: the Roman and Early Byzantine Empire
19: Democracy Eclipsed: Late Antiquity, European Middle Ages & the Renaissance
20: Democracy Revived I: England in the 17th Century
21: Democracy Revived II: France in the late 18th and early 19th Centuries
22: Democracy Revived III: the United States in the late 18th and early 19th Centuries
23: Democracy Reinvented I: 19th-century Britain
24: Democracy Reinvented II: Tocqueville's America
25: Retrospect and Prospects
Notes
References and Further Reading
Index
Description
Democracy is either aspired to as a goal or cherished as a birthright by billions of people throughout the world today - and has been for over a century. But what does it mean? And how has its meaning changed since it was first coined in ancient Greece?Democracy: A Life is a biography of the concept, looking at its many different manifestations and showing how it has changed over its long life, from ancient times right through to the present. For instance, how did the 'people power' of the Athenians emerge in the first place? Once it had emerged, what enabled it to survive? And how did the Athenian version of democracy differ from the many other forms that developed among the myriad cities of the Greek world?Paul Cartledge answers all these questions and more, following the development of ancient political thinking about democracy from the sixth century BC onwards, not least the many arguments that were advanced against it over the centuries. As Cartledge shows, after a golden age in the fourth century BC, there was a long, slow degradation of the original Greek conception and practice of democracy, from the Hellenistic era, through late Republican and early Imperial Rome, down to early Byzantium in the sixth century CE.For many centuries after that, from late Antiquity, through the Middle Ages, to the Renaissance, democracy was effectively eclipsed by other forms of government, in both theory and practice. But as we know, this was by no means the end of the story. For democracy was eventually to enjoy a re-florescence, over two thousand years after its first flowering in the ancient world: initially revived in seventeenth century England, it was to undergo a further renaissance in the revolutionary climate of late eighteenth century North America and France - and has been constantly reconstituted and reinvented ever since.
