Political Science 1020E Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Athenian Democracy
1 Dec 2017
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> every citizen should have the right to an equal say. Indirect: voters choose representatives who then make decisions. More direct is more democratic but not necessarily better. Extreme lack of accountability: representatives elected for life. Our system: retrospective recall -> votes get opportunity to pass judgement of current rules, and throw them out if they want to. Democracy aims for equal capacity of citizens to process information relevant to decision making. Watch for the impact of economic inequality on citizens" opportunity to participate in politics. Two ways to limit the scope of democracy: by appealing to the democratic ideal, by assigning the issue to the private sphere. Decisions made by majority vote in an assembly of all citizens. Open debate, subsidized participation and public spirited citizens (polites) Exclusionary: only a tenth of population had citizenship, women were not allowed to vote, slaves could not vote. More democratic than ours -> everyone who was allowed had a say.
