Athenian Democracy Wasn’t Really That Great

Athenian democracy was one of the earliest well-documented governments of its kind in human history. It is hard to convey how radical and amazing it was in the context of the ancient Mediterranean world. Unfortunately, as a result of the significance it held in its historical context, today, people often misguidedly regard it as the ideal, original democracy that all modern democracies should strive to imitate. We should admire Athenian democracy as one important early step in the development of democratic government, but we should also recognize that it was not totally unique even in the Greek world for its time and that it was deeply flawed in ways that are, unfortunately, often overlooked in modern panegyrics of its greatness.

Contrary to popular belief, Athens was not the first Greek polis (i.e., city-state) to adopt a democratic constitution. Moreover, the vast majority of the Athenian population was formally excluded from participating in the democracy. Democratic Athens was also aggressively imperialistic and routinely sought to dominate and oppress other Greek poleis and, on multiple occasions, it even committed outright genocide. Finally, Athenian democracy was much shorter-lived than many people realize.

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Is the United States a Democracy or a Republic?

There is considerable debate among people in the United States over whether this country is supposed to be a democracy, a republic, or both. Generally, liberals and progressives tend to argue that the United States should be both a democracy and a republic, while conservatives tend to argue that it should only be a republic.

In this article, I want to examine the history of this debate, look at the etymologies and definitions of the words republic and democracy, and decide which of these words best describes the form of government that exists in the United States.

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