1.1 Democracy
Today we often take public participation in state management and decisions for granted, but in European history this has simply not been the case for almost two millennia. If we want to find evidence for collective participation in state affairs, we must go back to the age of city-states like Athens and Rome between the 5th and the 1st centuries BCE, a period of tremendous cultural, political and social transformation. But despite some similarities, ancient democracies were very different from our modern, constitutional democracies. Understanding how they worked can help our understanding of how ancient political thought influenced and shaped modern legislative systems and the society we currently live in.
EPQ Suggested questions
In your EPQ project you may want to focus on one of the following questions:
- What is democracy? And how far did ancient notions about democracy influence the way we look at democracy today?
- How did the Roman republic differ from Athenian democracy?
- How far did Greek and Roman material culture reflect ideas about public participation in state management and decisions?
Sources: Ancient debate on Greek democracy
- Aristotle, Constitution of Athens
- Aristotle, Politics, Books 4 and 6; 1302b
- Pseudo-Xenophon, Constitution of Athens
- Demosthenes, Against Timocrates 149-151
- Herodotus, The Histories 5.78
- Plato, The Republic, Book 8
- Plato, Protagoras 319c-d
- Plutarch, Life of Alcibiades 7.4-5
- Plutarch, Life of Pericles
- Plutarch, Life of Solon
- Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War 2.35-46
Sources: Ancient debate on the Roman state
- Polybius, Histories 6.11-18
- Cicero, On the Laws (particularly 3.3-4)
- Cicero, On the Republic
- Cicero, In Defence of Caecina 33.96 - 35.101
- Cicero, On Canvassing for the Consulship
- Tacitus, Annals 1.1-15
- Cassius Dio, Roman History 53.17-19
- Florus, Epitome of Roman History 1.47
- Appian, Civil Wars 1.1-2
Sources: Greek and Roman material culture
Artefacts
- Greek ostraka (fragments of pottery) were used as a means of registering votes in various parts of Greece. Check the following links:
- Building dedication slab from Risingham, Northumberland mentioning a series of officials in Roman provincial administration (1.1 Risingham ).
- Pinakion (allotment ticket) for the selection of jurors or magistrates. Great North Museum, Shefton Collection (1.1 Pinakion).
- Inscription to the god Antenociticus set up by Tineius Longus (Great North Museum, Shefton Collection (1.1Benwell).
Architecture
- The setting for public debates in the Greek world: search entries like: bouleuterion and pnyx in The Grove Art Online (open link)
- Search for the transformation of key buildings (Forum, Curia, Comitia and Rostra) in the Roman Forum throughout the centuries: Digitales Forum Romanum website (open link)
Inscriptions
- Law against tyranny (IG II3 1 320)
- Dedication of statue of the Tyrannicides (IG I3 502)
- Athenian decrees in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
References
Greek and Roman political thought
- Balot, R.K. ed., 2012. A Companion to Greek and Roman Political Thought. John Wiley & Sons.
- Balot, R.K., 2008. Greek Political Thought. John Wiley & Sons.
- Rowe, C.J., Schofield, M., Harrison, S. and Lane, M. eds., 2000. The Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Political Thought. Cambridge University Press.
- Cartledge, P., 2009. Ancient Greek Political Thought in Practice. Cambridge University Press.
- Gagarin, M., Woodruff, P., Geuss, R. and Skinner, Q. eds., 1995. Early Greek Political Thought from Homer to the Sophists. Cambridge University Press.
- Lane, M., 2014. Greek and Roman Political Ideas. Pelican.
- Sinclair, T.A., 2013. A History of Greek Political Thought (Routledge Library Editions: Political Science Volume 34). Routledge.
Greek democracy
- Kagan, D., 1990. Pericles of Athens and the Birth of Democracy. Secker & Warburg.
- Lang, M., 2004 The Athenian Citizen: Democracy in the Athenian Agora. American School of Classical Studies at Athens.
- Osborne, R., 2010. Athens and Athenian Democracy. Cambridge University Press.
- Robinson, E.W., 2011. Democracy Beyond Athens: Popular Government in the Greek Classical Age. Cambridge University Press.
- Forsdyke, S., 2009. Exile, Ostracism, and Democracy: The Politics of Expulsion in Ancient Greece. Princeton University Press.
Roman democracy
- Beard, M. and M.H. Crawford, 1999. Rome in the Late Republic. Gerald Duckworth & Co.
- Brennan, T.C., 2004. ‘Power and Process under the Republican “Constitution”’, in H.I. Flower (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Republic. Cambridge University Press: 31-65.
- Hölkeskamp, K.J., 2010. Reconstructing the Roman Republic: An Ancient Political Culture and Modern Research. Princeton University Press.
- Lintott, A.W., 1999. The Constitution of the Roman Republic. Oxford University Press.
- Patterson, J.R., 2000. Political Life in the City of Rome. Bristol Classical Press.
- Sandberg, K., 2001. Magistrates and Assemblies: A Study of Legislative Practice in Republican Rome. Institutum Romanum Finlandia.
- Millar, F., 1998. The Crowd in Rome in the Late Republic. University of Michigan Press.
- Mouritsen, H., 2001. Plebs and Politics in the Late Roman Republic. Cambridge University Press.
- Lintott, A.W., 1993. Imperium Romanum: Politics and Administration. Routledge.
The art of public speaking: rhetoric
- Connolly, J., 2009. The State of Speech: Rhetoric and Political Thought in Ancient Rome. Princeton University Press.
- Morstein-Marx, R., 2004. Mass Oratory and Political Power in the Late Roman Republic. Cambridge University Press.
The setting for public speaking: Greek and Roman meeting halls
- Camp, J.M., 2016. Bouleuteria and Odeia, inMiles, M.M. ed., A Companion to Greek Architecture (Vol. 114). John Wiley & Sons: 342-359.
- Millar, F., 1989. Political power in mid-Republican Rome: curia or comitium?. The Journal of Roman Studies, 79, pp.138-150.
Democracy, gender and status
- Neils, J., 2011. Women in the Ancient World. British Museum Press.
- Bauman, R.A., 1994. Women and Politics in Ancient Rome. Routledge.
- Blundell, S., 1995. Women in Ancient Greece. Harvard University Press.
- Wiedemann, T., 2003. Greek and Roman Slavery. Routledge.