Athenian Democracy

4th Century Carving at Agora of Athens Museum

With an unusually early start to our Presidential campaign, U.S. voters seem to be ready to shake things up in Washington.

The top three Republican candidates have never served in public office, but they're solidly thrashing a dozen or more professional politicians with established government track records.

View of Athens from hilltop near Pnyx where Ekklesia met.

Real estate magnate cum reality TV star Donald Trump has been ridiculed, vilified and then reluctantly accepted to be a serious contender by political pundits, despite his enormous gaffes that made us laugh, because beneath his non-politically correct rhetoric, many everyday Americans have found underlying truths that slick politicians choose to ignore.

Successful Fortune 50 CEO Carly Fiorina and world class brain surgeon Dr. Ben Carson round out the top three despite some impressive opponents with public service experience.

Wes at the Hephastion in Agora

On the Democratic side, insiders still rule the roost, but the two leading candidates don't have credentials traditionally associated with ideal Presidents.

An unapologetic socialist, Senator Bernie Sanders has unexpectedly risen to be a serious challenger to the presumed nominee, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, whose primary qualification is fundamentally that she's the woman married to a popular former President rather than any actual accomplishments during her own public service.  The Democratic debate on October 13 seemed to be a contest to see who could promise the most free stuff to supporters.

Following a song line of Jimmy Buffett ("I ran away from politics.  It's too bizarre at home."), Julie and I recently found ourselves in a Mercedes taxi in Athens.  The native Greek driver who picked us up at the airport, it turns out, is also concerned about politics in his country. 

He asked, "Can you believe in the birthplace of democracy, my fellow citizens just re-elected a communist as President?"

Oddly enough, we can.  Many people seem to have forgotten the lessons of history and are now willing to cede hard won freedoms to a stronger central government that promises to meet all of their needs by theoretically getting someone else to pay.

Athens Parliament Building, a setting for recent drama.

A case in point is the Greek financial crisis which has played out on the streets of Athens.

How did we get here?

As our driver said, the Greek city-state of Athens introduced many of the foundations of Western Civilization, including democracy, a radical idea that replaced rule by an elite aristocracy with rule by the citizens, a government "of the people, by the people and for the people," as American President Abraham Lincoln famously framed it in his Gettysburg Address about 150 years ago.

Cross-beam at the Hephastion

Athenian Democracy laid many foundations of government structure that the United States has adapted into our current system, including separation of powers between branches of government, representative democracy where we select representatives to vote on our behalf, and trial by jury of one's peers.  You might be surprised to learn, however, that the only elected officials in ancient Athens were generals, who were selected based primarily on their ability to organize and motivate their troops to victory on the battlefield. 

Ancient artifacts in Agora of Athens Museum

Voters were primarily members of the army and navy whose lives and livelihood depended to a great extent on the wisdom of generals.

The soldiers actually divided their time between home lives as farmers and marching into battle for Athens, so it is logical that they would choose generals they believed would lead them to victory with competence, valor, integrity and loyalty, allowing them to return home alive, hopefully not maimed and with greater prosperity.

Aphrodite statue, 4th Century BC

As you may have guessed, women were not allowed to vote, but like men they were considered citizens of Athens if both of their parents had been Athenian citizens.

At the birth of Democracy in 507 B.C., there were about 100,000 citizens in Athens, and logically since some soldiers inevitably died in battle, women were the actual majority of citizens.  Voters also had to be at least 18 years of age, which was the age at which they became soldiers and therefore had a direct stake in who would be in charge.

In addition to citizens, there were 10,000 metoikoi (foreigners) and 150,000 slaves in Athens, none of whom had voting rights, so citizens (male and female combined) didn't make up the majority of residents.  

As an aside, please note that the pernicious institution of slavery did not start in the United States and had been in existence for thousands of years before we became colonies of Great Britain.  Slavery in essence was an alternative punishment to death or imprisonment for being on the losing side of wars, as most of us learned in Sunday School.

Hephastion in distance beyond ruins of Bouleterion.

Not all slaves received equal treatment.  Some slaves worked in silver mines, for example, laboring through short, brutal lives. Whereas, in Athens proper, it was sometimes hard to tell the difference between slaves and citizens when they mingled at the Agora marketplace, although, slaves, of course, served at the behest of citizens (as field workers, maids and even in professional positions like teachers) and could not vote.

With the Boule, or Council of 500, Athens introduced the concept of representative democracy. The 50 representatives from each of the 10 tribes of Athens served for one year, during which time they were relieved of their military duties. 

Statue of Triton

Along with the generals, the Boule acted essentially as the executive branch, overseeing day-to-day management of city services, handling military logistics and meeting ambassadors from other city-states.

Unlike our Congress, the Boule members were selected by lottery rather than by election.

The logic behind this was that the Boule was supposed to be selected entirely by chance in order to prevent establishment of a permanent class of rulers, but in practice mostly wealthy and influential families held the positions, whether because of bribes, greater interest or simply having more free time available for such pursuits.

Much like our House of Representatives, the Ekklesia represented the common man, but in Athenian Demokratia, any male citizen could attend the Assembly at the Pnyx, a large auditorium on a hill west of the Acropolis.  They met 40 times a year.  Rule was by simple majority vote.

The Acropolis

About 5,000 men would generally attend these sessions, where they voted on foreign policy and laws.

Interestingly, while they passed laws, there was not a police force as such to enforce the laws.  The citizens themselves brought charges against lawbreakers.

Citizens would bring the accused before the Dikasteria, a jury pool made up of 500 male citizens over age 30 who were selected by ramdom lottery each day. 

The jurors decided each case by simple majority rule.

Farmer's Market Street of Athens Center Square Hotel

Back to our recent vacation, our taxi driver couldn't takes us all the way to the door of the Athens Center Square Hotel, because it is smack dab in the middle of a farmer's market walk street.  The hotel turned out to be a great place to stay at a modest price, with clean, bright accommodations and a tasty complimentary breakfast.

The location, as promised, was close to the monuments, including a stop for the Hop-On, Hop-Off bus that we used to see the highlights of Greece, including the locations where democracy started.

Julie with Hostess Maria at ACS Hotel

While Western Civilization has progressively revised Athenian foundations of democracy, Americans seem to be somewhat fed up with the status quo, whether they interpret the problem to be a political class which over the decade has incrementally supplanted the vision of our Founding Fathers of a citizen government, in which successful people would ideally take a break from busy lives to serve for a term or two, or a desire to have a stronger central government to provide more free stuff.

Could we be ready for a new era of Demokratia?

Maybe.

Great Choices at included Breakfast Buffet at ACS Hotel

In the mean time, wouldn't you rather be enjoying a wonderful cruise vacation than fretting in front of your TV?

You can escape to the sunny Caribbean or Mexican Riviera.

Or visit lands where history unfolded and continues to shape the world today.

Either way, better service leads to better trips!