What City Is Considered the Birthplace of Modern Art

One of the most common clichés the media uses when talking about Greece is the label 'birthplace of democracy'. Along with reminders that words like tragedy and crisis are Greek later on all, the cliche is repeated without whatsoever context. There'due south rarely a mention of what this celebrated label refers to and information technology can exist used to give a hint of historical legitimacy to the current system of government. Every bit we're all told the ancient Greeks were the smartest, most intelligent group of people which e'er existed, and then if our political system tin trace itself back to those clever folks it must be practiced, correct?

If we take a quick look at the historical events to which the cliché refers it's hard to see whatever connexion spanning the millennia. The word commonwealth of form, like and then many others, comes from Greek. But the demokratia (δημοκρατία) of the ancient world had a completely different origin, theory, and practice to what is called democracy today. Demokratia as information technology was lived in the Athens of the 5th and quaternary centuries BC has very few similarities with mod parliamentary systems. When speaking of ancient Athens I will retain the word demokratia to distinguish it from modern democracy.

"In a demokratia the poor should have more ability than the rich, being the greater number; for this is one aspect of liberty which all framers of demokratia lay down every bit a criterion of that country; some other is, to alive as every one likes"(1)

Ancient Athenian demokratia was born out of a revolution after a long catamenia of social tension. This Athenian model required the active participation of each of its members rather than the passive placing of periodic Xs on a slice of newspaper. An open loma acme where any could speak was the master site of action instead of a fence-ringed and police-garrisoned palace. Whilst I've no intention of praising the society of classical Athens a cursory expect at its history and idea of democracy would exist useful.

Of course I'm not nigh to say that ancient Athens was some sort of glorious example to emulate. For all that classical Athens had a radical political construction information technology was an extremely bourgeois and restrictive order. The demokratia was open just to citizens and to be a citizen you had to be a male person pure- born Athenian. Foreigners were excluded and a mass of slaves exploited. For women Athens was one of the about repressive places to alive in the ancient world, even oligarchic and fanatically militaristic Sparta was a better place for women. Athens was imperialist and terrorised the Aegean world in gild to impose its own interests.

At no signal during the centuries of demokratia was individual property or the privileges of the rich elite challenged. The rich and aloof had their political ability curtailed but were left to live a life of luxury. Whilst the blueblood lounged on couches at lavish dinner parties and discussed dear and the good life the poor built their wealth. In many means ancient Athens is an example which shows that a radical political organisation will not necessarily lead to radical social changes for the poor and oppressed.

In short the Athenian demokratia was an attempt to organise the political life of the territory along direct democratic lines. This experiment functioned successfully from 508/7 BC until the 320s BC. For nearly two hundred years the largest territory in the Greek world had no continuous representative leaders and no judicial or bureaucratic class. It was remarkably stable at a time when the residual of the Greek city-states frequently underwent dramatic and bloody social conflicts. Only twice in its lifetime was the demokratia overthrown. In 411/10 under the force per unit area of a roughshod war and after a huge military disaster an oligarchic coup briefly dissolved the demokratia. The only other break was in 404/3 when later defeat in war a brief foreign backed aristocratic authorities was imposed. It was only the rise of the despotic Macedonian monarchy and the superpower politics of the postal service-Alexander the Great earth that finally crushed demokratia in Athens.

The demokratia of Athens was born out of the world of the Greek Polis. What is now the territory of the Greek country was divided into a myriad of metropolis-states. Each metropolis was cocky-governing and fiercely independent. The 7th and 6th centuries BC were times of great change in these city-states. Social life was growing and so were social tensions. With Greece beingness a predominately agricultural society land was of paramount importance but with the territory beingness largely mountainous good land was limited. The tension between those who had land and those who didn't led to conflict within the city-states. One consequence of this was emigration, landless Greeks fix colonies all across the Mediterranean. Another outcome was political strife. Often i man was able to use the discontent of the disadvantaged to gear up himself upwardly as a tyrant. In other cities the rich ruled as an oligarchy.

Toward the end of the sixth century the family of tyrants which had ruled Athens for ii generations was overthrown past a mixture of internal agitation and foreign intervention. 2 aristocratic factions rose to prominence in the wake of the tyranny. Later on a few years of political strife between these aristocratic factions the people of Athens rose upward supported past the aristocrat Kleisthenes. They surrounded the partisans of Isagoras and the Spartan troops on the acropolis before forcing them out. At this point the Athenian people set out a new way of governing which would become the demokratia. The 'constitution' which followed is sometimes referred to as Kleisthenic due to the fact that the uprising was in support of Kleisthenes. However this leader of the people quickly disappears from the historical tape and very little is known about him.

"The demokratia has fabricated itself master of everything and administers everything past its votes in the assembly and by the law- courts"(ii)

The constitution which the Athenians created and evolved after the revolution in 508/7 BC was based on the idea that the people were sovereign and this sovereignty was expressed through the mass participation of the denizen body in a popular assembly and the law courts.

The assembly (ekklesia/ἐκκλησία) was the physical gathering of the citizen body in one place in order to debate and vote. All citizens had the right to attend the assembly which took identify on the loma of the Pynx shut to the Athenian acropolis and met roughly every ten days. Payment was introduced to encourage participation in the associates. In this open space thousands gathered(estimates range from 6-13,000) and all decrees of the land had to be ratified here. In add-on to voting on public policy the citizens of the assembly besides elected the generals and could act equally a police force court.

Meetings of the assembly would begin with the question 'who wishes to speak?' and anyone in attendance had the right to address the oversupply. Debates were held on policies which had been proposed by citizens and afterwards listening to speeches for and against, those assembled would vote. Whilst confident and articulate speakers held an advantage in the associates no political parties as we have them today were formed. The Athenians voted for policies non parties. For the denizen of the demokratia the possibility existed that their vocalism and opinion could exist heard on a regular basis.

Citizens came together in a mass to course the Athenian courtroom organisation also. There were no judges or lawyers in these courts. The prosecutor and defendant put their respective cases directly to their fellow citizens gathered every bit a jury. Juries were made upward of a randomly selected group of citizens with numbers varying from a depression of 201 to a high of 2,500 depending on the type and severity of the example. As with the associates payment for participation on the juries was introduced to support those who participated. These juries listened to both sides and and so voted yes or no to a guilty verdict. If the vote was guilty then the accused and prosecutor came dorsum and each suggested a suitable punishment which the jury then voted on. There was never a detailed law code in Athens and the juries were expected to apply general laws in specific cases in line with the best interests of the Athenian people. To the Athenians "consummate articulation of the police was a denial of the commonage wisdom of the masses"(3). In the law courts nosotros can come across again the idea of the people as sovereign.

These 2 institutions, assembly and courts, were the methods the Athenians used to make group decisions. The day to day administration of Athenian territory was too handled by the denizen body. Councils and committees were formed to handle all the needs of the largest city in Greece. The poorest Athenians were initially barred from some of these positions but it seems this rule was afterward ignored and participation was thrown open to all. These committees and councils were manned by a randomly selected grouping of citizens. A council (Boule/βουλή) of 500 randomly called citizens oversaw much of the administration and prepared legislation for the assembly to contend. Since citizens were chosen at random and the membership changed every twelvemonth there was a practiced run a risk that most citizens served on this quango at some indicate in their life.

Other committees were created to run the infrastructure of the city. From the council of 500 downwardly to the committees, participation of a maximum number of citizens was ensured past having term limits for office holders and random choice by lot. For only a few posts would there be a direct vote for 1 item person, the most of import of these posts being the ten generals. As elections favour the rich the Athenians mostly avoided them. Since membership of the councils and committees was decided by random lot no professional civil service or bureaucracy adult in Athens. The largest of the ancient Greek cities and the largest metropolis in Europe at the fourth dimension was essentially run by amateurs.

Demokratia extended across the city of Athens to be practised across the whole of Attika. Athenian territory was divided into demes which were substantially small villages. Physical distance from the associates and constabulary-courts in the city could be compensated for by local demokratia. Indeed "democracy at deme level was an of import feature of Athenian life"(4). Selection for membership of the council took identify in the demes and each had its own assembly equally well equally a political officer chosen by lot. Police courts too existed at local level.

Whilst Athens had no continuous official leaders individuals did rise to prominence. Often these prominent individuals were from the rich elite. With their abundant leisure time and admission to education and military experience the wealthy retained a favoured position which they could turn into influence. There has been a tendency to view the history of the demokratia through the histories of these prominent aloof individuals. In part this is a event of the historical tape. Even modern histories can read as a succession of (aristocratic)leaders Kleisthenes-Kimon-Perikles-Demosthenes. The historians of ancient Athens, and historians in general, were themselves from the wealthy elite and and then they focused their studies around members of their own class and ignored the rest. When a non- aristocratic denizen rose to prominence the historians and philosophers despised them as demagogues who had let the thought of republic go to their heads and forgotten their proper station in life.

If an aristocrat could train themselves to speak well in the assembly and had a level of military machine experience they could gain a position of influence. Still no individual was able to transform this influence into outright dominance as there were no political positions which could give them command of the city. At each turn an individual had to persuade the associates or law- courts to back their ideas. Fifty-fifty the virtually influential of these individuals, Perikles, at times found himself unceremoniously ignored when his advice and policies had failed. The demokratia also had a congenital-in safety guard should whatever individual become likewise powerful. Every year the Athenians held a vote for ostracism. If whatsoever ane private was deemed too dangerous they could exist exiled from the metropolis for x years past popular vote.

"Athens is an case of a direct republic that achieved genuine, long term, stable methods of conclusion making past the masses and that was not co-opted by the growth of an internal ruling elite"(v)

The basic applied primary of the demokratia was participation. At every level a citizen was expected to participate in the organisation of the city. They fabricated the major decisions collectively in the associates. Those decisions were interpreted and acted on past the citizens making up the juries in the law courts. Athenians from all walks of life carried out the administration of the city on a day to day basis and many would for a twenty-four hours even take been the titular head of state. At some point in their life, and for many on a abiding basis, an Athenian citizen would accept played a direct role in the political life of their customs whether by debating in the assembly, sitting in the law courts or involvement in an administrative committee. To the Athenians demokratia meant "the government in which the demos [the people] gains a collective capacity to event modify in the public realm"(6).

This commonage and participatory nature is distinctly dissimilar from the reality of modern commonwealth. If the original concept of democracy was that the public has the ability to debate, decideandmakethingshappen(7) then conspicuously modernistic parliamentary systems fall far brusk of this. For the vast bulk of modern populations the only political participation in their life is a uncomplicated vote in an ballot, they are asked only who will practice their talking for them non whether they wish to speak themselves. Political parties and professional politicians as well as a professional bureaucracy and judiciary were completely absent from the demokratia.

If nosotros look at the foundation myth of modern democracy the difference between ancient and modernistic becomes clear. The foundation myth of modern democracy took place in an unremarkable spot called Runnymede. Parliamentary democracy, in its English variant at least, traces its historic roots to the signing of the Magna Carta back in 1215. Supposedly this document marked the bespeak when the English rejected the unlimited ability of the king and demanded a say in their community. In reality the Magna Carta was a deal exacted out of the king by his rebellious blueblood nobles desperate to secure their own privileges. The document itself was written in Latin then was doubly distanced from the illiterate English speaking person. Equally representative democracy started so it connected. Parliaments started and evolved as an human action of negotiation and power sharing amid the elite which gradually broadened out. The people, once fully enfranchised, were to accept a say in who governs but were never to govern for themselves.

"Mod republic did not develop out of admiration for Athenian democracy"(eight)

As parliaments and representative democracy adult from the 18th century the example of the Athenian demokratia was non in the minds of the ruling classes. After the revolution of 508/7BC the Athenians stripped power from individual positions of authority, gave the administration to the denizen body and attempted to include all citizens in the decision making process. Representative republic vests the bulk of ability in the easily of a small-scale group with minimal participation of the residue of club. When a small proportion of the citizen trunk has the power to direct society the ancient Greeks called this oligarchy. Indeed for many of the founders of mod democracies the oligarchic regime of Sparta was a more than likely source of inspiration than Athens.

"parliament and representative government are, in democracies, merely executive organs of the suburbia"(9)

The gap between modern and ancient democracy is non merely a thing of time. The two systems are unlike concepts of gild. In the modern world democracy means, at all-time, the people having some limited say in who exercises political power. The levers of ability are still retained past an aristocracy and only by working with or joining that aristocracy tin can a denizen play a function in politics.

In the aboriginal world democracy meant the people exercising political power through mass participation in the executive, legislative and judicial organisation of the social club. The people of Athens took control of their society from the aristocracy through revolution. Whilst an elite still retained its wealth privileges it lost its ability to control the society for its own benefit. Decisions regarding the life of the community and the day to day management of a large urban center were carried out collectively with the active participation of each citizen. With its mixture of open assemblies and rotating randomly selected councils Athens offers an example of how a large group of people can organise without needing leadership or full-time bureaucracy.

"a demokratia is a government in the hands of men of no nascency, poor circumstances and mechanical employments"(x)

The clichés about Greece equally the birthplace of republic hide the origins of the current organisation of regime dominant in the western globe. A look at the historical example behind the cliché has shown that these current governmental systems practice non fit with the original meaning of democracy. Republic should be used to draw a situation in which a person actively takes office in the life of their community. The members of a commonwealth will each have an equal position in their society and will reach decisions together with the twenty-four hours to 24-hour interval assistants and justice managed collectively. When viewed as a whole order (not merely the exclusive citizen body) ancient Athens failed to live up to its ideals. That doesn't mean we should ignore their try to create something new. For those not happy with the electric current situation the experiences of past generations may be useful.

— Κανένας

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Terminate notes:

i. Aristotle, Politics
2. Aristotle, The Athenian Constitution
iii. J.Ober, Mass and Aristocracy in Democratic Athens, Princeton Academy Press, 1989
4. J.Thorley, Athenian Commonwealth, Routledge, 2004
5. J.Ober, Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens, Princeton University Press, 1989
6. J.Ober, The Original Meaning of Democracy, Stanford Academy, 2007
vii. J.Ober, The Original Meaning of Democracy, Stanford University, 2007
8. J.Thorley, Athenian Democracy, Routledge, 2004
ix. Organisational platform of the Full general Union of Anarchists, 'Delo Truda' group, 1926
x. Aristotle Politics, 1928

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