Arguments In Favour Of Athenian Democracy

Athenian democracy was the first form of governance where the dēmos (people) had the ability to develop legislations. It has inspired the democracy we have nowadays in most countries. Some people such as Pericles may argue that not participating in politics is considered useless, due to Athenian democracy being reliant on the votes of the male citizens. Philosophers such as Plato and Socrates, however, would criticize democracy as a form of governance. This essay will conclude that those who don’t participate in democracy are useless, but they are not doing something vicious, because they might not want to participate in a corrupt regime.

Firstly, it can be argued that people in Athenian democracy voted for their own interest, instead of in

This idea is challenged by Plato’s claim, through the idea that pleasures that are corresponding to parts of the soul, where he says that “…we called it the appetitive part, because of the intensity of its appetites for food, drink. Sex and all the things associated with them, but we also called it the money- loving part, because such appetites are most easily satisfied by means of money” (Plato 1992, 251). Therefore, it can be said that according to Plato, appetite for money is part of people’s souls and hence, we can say that voting against the wealthy as a poor citizen would be the result of the intentions of the soul. Therefore, people that were poor and didn't participate in a democracy were avoiding being vicious, as their vote would have not benefited the state as Pericles claims but as a benefit for themselves

This is because every male citizen was seen as equal, regardless of their social class or other categorizations. The lot system, which allowed selecting random candidates in politics created egalitarianism in Ancient Greece. Here, Pericles claims that “Our constitution is called a democracy because power is in the hands not of a minority but of the whole people” (Thucydides 1972, 145). With this, he shows the equal power that was given, which allowed anyone to have a high rank in politics through random picking of candidates with the lottery. It also avoids the concentration of power due to collective decision-making. If not, everyone was to vote for the legislation and actively participated, they could be considered useless because it could give certain groups more power as the value of their votes would increase. This cluster could therefore be avoided if every male citizen would follow their duties. When legislations were created, different interests and perspectives were represented, which could have led to the avoidance of the idea of tyranny by Socrates. Correspondingly, it can be said that the idea of male citizens being useless if they won’t vote is true and by contributing, they are not vicious but using their power and promote