POLSCI 3VV3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Hoplite, Trireme
6 Feb 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Demos + kratos (the people have the power). Throughout the middle east, societies had organized their societies democratically for several hundred years before. If you wanted to give a birthplace to democracy, it would be somewhere in syria or iraq. If you say that democracy is that the people have power, all kinds of societies fall under this description. If you don t have a standing army, the people are going to have the power, because there s no possibility for tyranny. The western tradition of democracy begins in athens, but it s a problematic starting point. Don t just say democracy was invented in athens. General outline of what happens here is important: After a period of immense social conflicts, where athens has been under kings or dominated by wealthy families, athens begins to democratize. Increasingly, ordinary athenians come to acquire more and more political power.
