Here is a short, tendentious
and very simplified description of the evolution of the political
system in ancient Athens. But first two important reservations:
Firstly: Historians are not always
sure when exactly a particular element of political system was
invented. A good example here is ostracism.
Secondly: We have very limited
information about Athens before Solon. So, for example, I couldn’t say
when exactly Athens became populistic. We can only be sure that Athens
was populistic under the rule of the tyrant (tyran) Dracon, who in 621
BC introduced the very restrictive law codex (Draconic laws).
At first populistic
Athenian city-state was an oligarchic
state ruled by aristocratic families. There were a few state offices:
archont - kind of
president with a one year tenure
basileus - this name of
office means “a king”, but he was only responsible for organizing
religious ceremonies
polemarchos - the chief
of Athenian army, great commander
6thesmothetai -
officials responsible for creating new laws (have legislative power)
After some time all the officials mentioned above were called “archonts”. Former city-officials
(archonts) formed some kind of council called Aeropagus.
The country was divided into 4 districts called phyle (pl. phylae).
This type of polity is typical for many oligarchic
populistic states. Renaissance Venice could be a very good example of a
similar political system.
Solon was an aristocrat politician (and poet) who was elected
for the archont office for the year 594/593 BC and reformed the
polity of Athens. His reforms were a compromise between aristocrats
protecting their privileges and other Athenians fighting for a more
righteous political system. The poorer citizens of Athens also argued
for a reduction of debts.
So, Solon cancelled some of the debts, took the personal dependency
from dependent peasants, introduced the new law codex, and gave the
Athenian citizenship to many of the previously dependent peasants and
immigrants living in Athens.
But he also introduced a completely new political system:
He created the Council of 400
- a parliament of Athens with 400 members<
Introduced Heliaia -
court (or courts) - which consisted of jurymen, an important protection
from law abuses
He also defined four social classes organized according to the
annual income of citizens:
pentakosiomedimnoi -
the richest people with an annual income over 500 bushels, as the name
states (probably mainly former aristocrats).
hippeis - “horsemen”
with an annual income over 300 bushels (rich citizens).
zeugitai - “hoplites”
(members of heavy infantry) with an annual income over 200 bushels,
Athenian “middle-class”.
thetes - all other
citizens with a lower income.
There were also two other political classes in Athens with no
citizens privileges:
metoikoi - immigrants
(sometimes quite rich).
slaves
From this time onwards political privileges depended on the
income of a citizen (each of the four classes elected a 100 members of
the Council of 400). And there was still the council of Aeropagus, and
still usually only the richest citizens were elected for city offices.
A political system of this kind is common for many populistic
states
(for example in XIXth century France or Germany
we could observe very similar systems where political and voting
privileges depended on a citizen’s income). That kind of populistic
system is the result of a political alliance between rich citizens and
middle-income citizens.
It is also useful to note similarities between these social classes and
the classes in the early Roman republic, and similarities between the
Athenian Council of 400
and the Roman comitia centuriata.
In ancient times social classes were often organized according to the
role of citizens in a city-state army, because war was in those days a
very profitable kind of “state-investment”.
In the last decades of VIth century
BC Athens were ruled by the tyrant Pisistratus
and his sons. The
rule of Pisistratus wasn’t so oppressive, but his sons weren’t so wise.
After a serious upheaval, a politician named Cleisthenes introduced (508/507
BC) a completely new organization of political institutions,
that was called democracy
(the rule of common people).
New territorial
organization of the state. Now there were 10 phylae
and three regions: the sea coast, the interior, and the city.
Each region was divided into 10 segments. Three segments: one from the
coast region, one from the interior region and one from the city
region made one phyle. Second segment from the coast region, second
from the interior region and second from the city region made another
phyle and so on. Moreover, segments that made one particular phyle
could
not border with each other. Very strange, right?
No so strange indeed. Phylae were voting districts. Here
Athenians elected the members of the Council and local officials. Such
fragmented districts reduced the political power of aristocrats,
because great families of land owners usually had many political
clients in the vicinity of theirs lands. After the reform aristocrats
could no longer easily win elections in rural phylae, so the reform
enhanced the political chances of not so rich citizens.
Introduction of Bule.
New Athenian Council (also called the Council
of 500). Members of the Council were chosen randomly (using
an “ballot-box” with black and white balls) from the candidates elected
in each phyle. New Council of 500 was no longer a parliament like
Council of 400, but rather a bureaucratic and court machine. For every
1/10 of the year members elected in one particular file worked as
officials paid from the country budget, then members from the second
phyle took over the presidency and so on.
The method of election again promoted the organized
faction of “democrats” and was against the aristocrats, who now had a
very limited chance to become a member of the Bule (because of the
random mechanism of the election).
Meeting of all citizens (Ecclesia). Following the reforms,
the meeting of all citizens of Athens was responsible for the most of
the political decisions. But several thousands of people could not
effectively carry out the function of parliament. There were too many
people to legislate laws, control the state budget, and solve other
more sophisticated problems. Actually the meeting was easy to control
by a charismatic leader, a well-organized political faction or a
skillful demagogue - as with every large crowd of people.
Here is an
example of how unstable and easy it was to dominate the
meeting. In the times of the Athens Sea Union one of the allied cities
on the isle of Lesbos rebelled against Athens. Athenians sent soldiers,
who pacified the rebellion. Then the Athenian meeting deliberated, how
to punish the rebelled city. At first, stirred up by populist
demagogues, the meeting decided to kill all adult men and sell all
children and women as a slaves. But the next day, calmed by some more
rational politicians, Ecclesia changed that cruel decision, and the
city survived.
Isegoria, isonomia, isotimia, isocratia.
Cleisthenes’s reforms introduced some basic rules of the political
system. Every citizen had freedom of speech (isegoria),
every citizen had equal rights in law (isonomia),
every citizen had equal rights to be elected into city offices (isotimia),
and every citizen formally had equal political power (isocratia).
It was a significant progress compared to the times before Cleisthenes,
when different groups of citizens had different political rights.
It is not obvious if these equalities were more
populistic slogans (like liberté, égalité,
fraternité slogans, we know from the Great French Revolution)
used by the faction of “democrats”, or if they were the real guaranties
of the political rights of citizens (isotimia probably was, at least
for some time). But they started the idea of political equality, and
thus created the ideological basement for modern European democracies.
Ostracism. Probably also
introduced by Cleisthenes. Once a year citizens of Athens had the
privilege of pointing out the politician who was a threat to democracy
(tried to become a tyrant). They wrote down the names of politicians on
broken pieces of pottery. The politician, who got the majority of such
votes (and no less than 6000) was banished from Athens for 10 years
(but his property wasn’t confiscated).
A true democratic country does not need such a
“protection”. A stable balance between different GPIs (groups of
political interests) plus institutions that are protecting individuals
against state abuses (passive protections) are the best shield against
tyranny. That kind of “active protecting” political tools are very
dangerous, because they can easily be used against political opposition
(while passive protections cannot).
It is informative to look at the names
of politicians who were banished in this way: Themistocles,
Thucydides, Kimon, son of Miltiades
(political opponent of Pericles), Alcibiades the Elder, etc. Ostracism was
a very nice tool to eliminate the most prominent politicians, sometimes
men with great personal honesty. Let’s imagine that Winston Churchill
or Franklin Delano Roosevelt were eliminated from politics that
way.
Board
of 10 strategi.A kind
of “government” of Athens. Each strategus (Greek: strategos), elected
by Ecclesia, was at the same time a political leader responsible for
politics of Athens, and an army commander. The tenure of strategus was
one year, but a politician could be elected as strategus many times (as
Pericles was).
Paragraph added - 3 December 2004
To recapitulate: Cleisthenes’s reforms eliminated the true parliament and
introduced the bureaucratic offices (financed from the state treasury)
used to reward citizens who supported the leaders of “democrats”. All
important projects were prepared by a small group of people and then
voted upon by the meeting of all citizens, where no one could really
control introduced projects. Very similar quasi-democratic political
systems (where bureaucrats employed by the state offices are the
political clients and supporters of party leaders) were created for
example by the PRI party in Mexico or the Congress Party in India.
Well, I am exaggerating a
little. Most of the time there wasn’t any organized structure of a
“democratic” faction in ancient Athens. The political system was not so
different from real democracy (except the ostracism, and the lack of
parliament). Newly legislated laws were controlled by the
Aeropagus, and there was still a law system that was respected, so
politicians had no absolute power.
However Cleisthenes reforms
did not introduce a real democracy
but another form of a populistic
system. With no oppressive institutions, because the overall economic
conditions were good and there were no serious social conflicts. The
political system was stable, because of the alliance between
middle-income citizens (zeugitai) and low-income citizens (thetes, led
by charismatic leaders) against the aristocracy that cemented the new
political institutions. <>To
the top
Evolution of Athenian
“democracy” before the
Peloponnesian War
Until the Peloponnesian War the quasi-democratic system in Athens
worked quite well. The main reason was the economic prosperity:
Firstly Athens took over the trade across the Aegean Sea,
when the rich Greek city states from Asia Minor fell under the
dominance of the Persian Empire.
Then, just before the Persian Wars, very rich deposits of
silver (483 BC) were discovered in the Laurion Mountains, giving
Athenians an extra income from the export of precious metal and money
minced from that silver.
Thirdly, after the Persian Wars (about 454 BC when the
treasury of Sea Union was moved from Isle Delos to Athens) Athens
gained the domination over other smaller states of the Athenian Sea
Union, and forced them to pay large sums of money to the Athenian
treasury (that money was called collections for common defense, but
finally became nothing more than a tribute).
Before the Peloponnesian War two important modifications of the
political system were introduced:
Since 487 BC, the Aeropagus members were elected (to be more precise
were randomly chosen from the candidates elected in local
administrative districts).
Secondly,
since the Efialtes reform in 462
BC Aeropagus prerogatives (area of
authority) were further restricted. Since then Aeropagus was no longer
privileged in controlling the legality of new laws.
Both reforms mentioned above eliminated the last
institution that could control the laws legislated by a Meeting of all
Citizens (Ecclesia), and thus there was no longer a way to control new
laws promoted by charismatic politicians.
A long Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta that
started in 431 BC ended the period of economic prosperity in Athens
and launched some changes in the relative power of different GPIs
(groups of political interests):
The rise in prices pauperized some of the middle-income
citizens (zeugitai).
Many middle-income citizens died in land battles (the heavy
infantry of Sparta was most of the time undefeatable).
The important role of the fleet increased the political
power of low-income citizens (thetes), who were the sailors and oarsmen
on Athenian warships.
Generally, thetes were interested in war and zeugitai in
peace.
And every year of the war the middle-income citizens GPI became weaker
and Athenian politics and politicians became more populistic.
Finally this resulted in political trials (a kind of “ witch
hunt”) of the “enemies of democracy”. A good example was the
elimination of the political faction led by Alcibiades. Then, after the
unfortunate expedition against city-state of Siracuse, the war went
very badly, and the political struggle became much more brutal. There
were a few coup d’etat, mass executions of political opponents, even a
civil war. Finally, defeated by Sparta, the Athenian Empire collapsed.
A very good test
to find out if a country is really democratic is
to observe, how well its political system behaves, when the country is
put thorough the mill. True democratic
systems survive serious
conditions (there are numerous examples from the history of Great
Britain or ancient Rome), but populistic
quasi-democratic countries
usually turn into a true populistic state.
When Athens was freed from the domination of Sparta, the
political system was reconstructed to the form more or less the same as
before the disaster (maybe a little more conservative). But I am not
going to describe these changes here, because I have not any good
resources at hand, and don’t want to offer you information that I can’t
verify.
Warsaw, March 2004 Text revised and
corrected by Christopher Jolley:(June 2005)