The Democracies Of Athens And Syracuse
The Democracies Of Athens And Syracuse
Many scholars of the past have brought forward the view that the democracies that were in practice in Athens and Syracuse differed in a number of ways. The method by which the administrators chose to administer justice and governance were so different. In this paper, the nature of these differences is critically observed. The democracies at the time in each of these countries will be dealt with bit by bit in order to identify these differences.
A very concise description of the democracy practiced in Athens is explained in the following account. The fifth and fourth centuries witnessed what can be termed as a totally imperfect democracy. Despite this, it still was considered good if not the best and superior to all the other democracies that the conservative and old nations practiced. It was the best practice of democracy at the time. The entire acknowledgement is of course accorded to the Cleisthenes who made sure that reforms were introduced to change Athens from an oligarchic to a total democracy.
The most significant factor that brought up democracy comes from the restructuring of the socio-political scenario of the Athens and Attica. At the time there were only four tribes that lived in Athens. They were to be later substituted by some other ten tribes (phylae) that had not been there before. They later split in threes (trittyes). Each one of the thirds was situated in the other three regions of Attica. This was how the city had been planned before. These were viewed as the core of the entire city, coast and the regions past the hilly areas. The trittyes were further subdivided into 140 boroughs (demes) of different proportions.
The legislative body (ecclesia) was open to the males. It converged four times monthly. This meant in essence that in a single year they met forty times since the Athenian calendar had ten months. There were debates on pertinent issues of the government such as foreign policy and legislative matters. Results of the decisions arrived at were encrypted in stone carvings and placed at popular spots of the city such as the market centers (agora). The assembly normally had a very huge membership probably in thousands. This made the situation terrible since the house could at times be very noisy and disorderly. Any person that wanted to raise an issue was allowed. However only those who were great orators had their way in the assembly. There was an annual event that entailed a vote on a single person that should be banished from their midst. It was popularly known as Ostracism. Such a vote required the legislators to write the name of the individual chosen on some art of pottery. If a person was picked on he would face banishment for a period not less than ten years. This however did not mean that he would lose his rights as a citizen or on property. After the ten years he would be allowed back into Athens.
The first people who were chased away from Athens belonged to the associates and acquaintances of the tyrant Pisistratus. To date, these deeds remain among the most remembered in the history of democracy in Athens. In spite of this fact, just only a few individuals were actually ostracized. Amongst such people are the Areistedes, Kimon, Themistokles, Thucydides, Alcibiades and Hyper Bolus. One might think that such acts were just plain tyranny on people but it really achieved its true calling. So many people became afraid of being banished and hence those with ideas of being too aggressive had to think twice and suppress their ambitions.
There existed a council that was mandated with the privilege of selecting the important issues to be debated on. It had a membership of 500 individuals. Each of the ten tribes contributed ten members to the council. These members were selected from their municipalities. After their tenure this members would not be allowed to serve until a period of ten years ended. There also was an executive council that had nine members. It had a chairperson and a secretary and it always ensured that all the activities of the council were carried out in an efficient manner. The legislative assembly is still known as the Bouli.
There was a chief magistrate who was titled Archon eponymous. His main tasks included the following; scrutiny in legal issues especially those that pitted the state. The task of taking care of orphans and apparent heiresses who lacked a unit called family lay squarely in his hands. Religious events and festivities were also to be planned and scheduled through his authority. The tenure ship of this office however was to last only a year after which fresh mandate should be sought. To be a holder of such an office the esteemed council of elders was to hold a caucus and pick a deserving candidate. It is also worthy to note that this council was composed of those people who had previously been holders of the office.
There also was an archon basileus that was a unit mandated with religious matters. It was not arbitrarily set up but rather depended on elective pattern. Issues regarding killings and murders also lay in this office. This was considered terrible since denying another individual an opportunity to live was a criminal offence. According to the religious beliefs of the time, a person’s life was always considered sacred. This meant therefore that the act of taking another persons life was an undoing in the eyes of the gods.
Authority concerning military affairs was placed in the office of the polemarch. He was an individual that was required to provide optimum security to the borders of Athens at all times against negative subjugation by the enemies. He was the ultimate commander in the chief in Athens. Despite all this the real authority did not actually lie with him but with generals (strategoi) who were chosen electively from all the representative ten tribes. He still possessed given judicial mandates to supervise all the alien workers in Athens who were also referred to as the metics. Among other positions in Athens that were focused on by the citizens included the posts of the tax men and market supervisors who monitored the Agora so as to ensure that traders were being very true.
At the time, courts of law abounded. They were composed of six judges who possessed less power. These courts were referred to as the Thesmothetae. The reason behind the judges having very little powers can simply be explained by the fact that most Athens nationals thought that it was important to involve many people in the act of looking at trials. The number of those people involved in suits definitely mattered with the complexity of the issues at hand. Cases pitting one individual against another normally consisted of 501 people. Those that consisted of state representatives normally had a jury of at least 1001. If a very huge number of people were involved possibly over 1501 members then the case might have been so serious such as treason. Voting by the members of the jury was always by secret balloting.
The democracy in Athens was an astonishing feat of its time. It established the conception of natural justice, equal rights to the people and the idea of responsibility by consistently probing administrators and also establishing a system where no individual or faction could turn out to become more influential than the other. The main purpose of the administration of the time was to warrant impartiality and justice at all times to the Athenian citizens. This was a very radical notion of the time. The yearly alternation of power, the division of power and the actuality that individuals participated in the processes of making decisions attained the intention of destroying the control that aristocrats had earlier placed on the Athenian civilization. It also introduced a system of governance that has been bettered with time. In this perspective it has actually given women the right to participate in voting. There are those that argue about democracy not being the best system of governance. Despite this we should all understand that it stands to remain the best form of government.
Historians term Athenian democracy in a rather subtle way. To them one had to actually take it as a fulltime job. This essentially meant that only individuals with free time could dedicate their vigor to such operation. This aspect points to such an important aspect in history. This is the issue to do with slavery. It is worth noting that if there were no slaves in the history of Athens then there would never have been such a thing as democracy. This is best demonstrated by the idea that even the poor Athenians afforded slaves to do duties for them while they attended the debating forums. This is actually what came to be presumed as a really free democracy. This enabled male individuals in Athens to do whatever they thought was necessary in their undertakings. If affluence was to be the determinant about who had to attend the assemblies certainly the rules would have been pretty lots different. This allusion does not intend to tolerate the practice of slavery. It is only a basic fact that without it attainment of democracy in Athens would have probably been impossible.
To further differentiate the natures of the constitutions in Syracuse and Athens, the nature of the constitution and governance in Syracuse is discussed. Different scholars have come up with very varying suppositions about the nature of the constitution that abounded in Syracuse. There are those that are of the view that actually some sort of democracy was practiced in Syracuse while there are others who totally differ with that argument. There are those that accept the old democratia type even though still attesting to the fact that Syracuse had more of an aristocratic practice than Athens.
The current scrutiny into the kind of democracy in Syracuse at the ending of the fifth century actually puts it into two perceptions. In the first perspective we seek to delve into proofs of there having been some direct constitution practiced at the time. There are accounts provided by various conservative scholars that there was a constitution created through some forms of revolution or legislation. It is this evidences that have made various intellects to decide to carry out studies to confirm the statements. The kinds of evidences offered are very ambiguous. While there are suggestions of an existence of the practice of democracy, there are some other instances that bring to mind the confusion of what really was the well-liked form of governance. The fact Syracuse practiced good democracy is not an arguable fact but this is only after other oblique arguments are also taken into account. These arguments exist in the forms of the kind of acts and deeds practiced by the demos in their day to day rulings and the practice of the daily rhetoric. The study of the above brings to the front the idea of an existence of a powerful democratic practice that can be comparable to that which existed in Athens in the periods lasting the fifth and the fourth centuries.
Conservative historians, philosophers and other intellects that existed in the fourth and fifth centuries actually arrived at some sort of caucus about how democracy had to be practiced in Syracuse. In the control and administration of the state the demos had to be totally independent in nature. This independence was at most times achieved through the legislative assembly which converged to deliberate and decide on pertinent issues relating to the state policy matters. The legislative assembly had a membership of nearly all the male citizens in Syracuse. Note that this has a very vivid connection and resemblance with the Athenian assembly. The issue to do with ownership and affluence did not arise for an individual to gain membership to the assembly. There were magistrates who had to work for really short periods and their accountability still remained with the demos. Banishment just like in Athens was effected in Syracuse. For this to occur there was to be some sort of voting on the decision to be arrived at before anybody could be ostracized. The state had to pay all its officers a certain amount of money for the services rendered to the government. In the discharge of their duties the officers in Syracuse had to adhere to the concept of natural justice and offer freedom and justice to all.
To further provide evidence about the development of the Syracuse constitution, the histories of Diodorus bibliotheke, Aristotles politiks and Thucydides history are given. Diodorus explains that at the time Deidomenid dictator Thrasibulus ascended to leadership, he proved to be a very oppressive ruler of the time. His brother Hieron had not been so bad like him. Thrasybulus actually killed and banished so many of the Syracuse citizens and even had so many mercenaries to seal his control and authority on the people. The citizens of Syracuse could not stomach any more mistreatment. They decided to forge a war front against their ruler and oust him out of power. Thrasybulus was defeated and forced to retreat. According to Diodorus the entire city started to enjoy a lot of peace, sanity and stability until such a time that another tyrant rose to power.
This previous experience in Syracuse created a platform for a number of reforms to be effected. They decided to reinstate democracies in all the other existing cities in Syracuse which had at one time or the other experienced some form of tyranny. Various meetings were scheduled in Syracuse in which the citizens discussed matters that affected them. Other events and ceremonies to take place had always to be voted on before they could actually occur. Another democratic act of the moment was in the decision to have all those seeking legislative positions prove that they had been there before the Deinomenid oppression. This was because during his reign he had actually converted many mercenaries into Syracusian citizens and most of the original inhabitants in Syracuse did not believe at all in the presence of the thousands of mercenary citizens.
Diodorus further explains another account for the pushing of a new democracy in Syracuse the period following 454. There was a man called Tyndarides who tried to forge a coup. This was actually followed by some other series of attempted coups though they were not so successful. It is from these occurrences that Syracuse decided to actually put in practice the idea of ostracism for such people. The main idea of this was to actually negate the notion of oppression by headedly tackling the conjecture and manipulation of those individuals considered more the most potent than the others. Those in leadership positions could also be ostracized through a simple voting process that only required a simple majority to effect. Considering the ten years that Athens actually banished people. Five years was all that was required to actually finish a banishment period in Syracuse. It actually did not take a very long time before the syracusians decided to really stop this act. Diodorus argues that in Syracuse, the practice of petalism or rather ostracism actually made the people considered as popular and well known distance themselves from seeking high offices in the land. This actually enabled the less people in society with lots of incapacities to rule the land. However this did not last for long as it was repealed just as Athens decided to repeal theirs after some several decades.
One of the greatest scholars of all time Aristotle seems to agree with Diodorus premise of there having being a democratic form of revolution in 466. This great philosopher actually states that the death of Gelons oppression in Syracuse was a perfect example of change from a life of oppressive rule to a more advanced form of democratia. Evidences suggest that the administration in the years up to 413 a very successful demo in Syracuse actually converted the administration from a politia to a very strong democracy. This is an implication of an existence of mixed elements of governance. These elements existed in oligarchic and democratic forms.
It is probably a very fascinating reality that very many scholars of all time argue that the explanations above about the Syracuse administration fell short of the practice of democracy after the end of the Deinomenid oppression. It was only until the changes pushed by Diocles many years later at around 412 that actually changed the situation. Many intellects in history have for some time come to agree with Aristotle’s assumptions that Syracuse actually transcended from a polity to a democratic state.
In conclusion therefore it is worth noting that the kind of democracies in Syracuse and Athens did not actually differ from each other in big ways. In any case, most practices were so common to each other. However, many scholars still believe that Athens had a more perfect democracy than Syracuse which experienced quite a number of oppressive rulers in history.
Bibliography
Berger, S. “Democracy in the Greek West and the Athenian Example.” Hermes 117 (September1989): 304-313.
Kagan, Donald. The Peloponnesian War. New York: Viking, 2003.
Krentz, Peter. The Thirty at Athens. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982.
