Comparison between Democracy in Ancient Greece and United States
The Influence of the Greeks on American Democracy "Tyranny is the rule of one man to the advantage of the ruler, oligarchy to the advantage of the rich, democracy to the advantage of the poor." -Aristotle Democracy: a form of government that makes political decisions directly exercised by the whole body of citizens, under procedures of majority rule. This type of democracy is know as a direct democracy, however the form of government that citizens exercise the same right not in person but through elected representatives is known as a representative democracy. Today in the United States of America we have a representative democracy in which we appoint "representatives" through election. The founders of democracy in Athens exercised decisions through a direct democracy in which all male citizens were allowed to have direct influence on the decisions. Although in the United States today we accept democracy as a form of life it had its early beginnings in the city-states of Ancient Greece. The form of government known as democracy had its early roots in Ancient Greece but its influence has a direct connection with the type of government we have today in the United States. The Greek city-states of antiquity did
Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993. (Strauss, 4) Athens and American both prize equality and freedom. If this was not achieved, the government would be run "not only by the elite but in the interests of the elite. An oligarchy is the rule of the city-state by a selected few usually consisting of wealthy landowners. These representatives made decisions based on their own ideals without the consideration of the people. Two idealistic tyrants were Croesus and Polycrates whom were above their fellow people with their extreme amount of wealth. However, unlike the Athenian democracy the power of the judicial system is in favor of the poor and the ordinary person. Unlike the democracy of Athens, the idea of giving power to the poor was rejected. However an important difference between these two democracies is the amount of people in the US. While his influence was at its height, he could only hope for continued approval of his policies expressed in the people's vote in the Assembly. Although today our democracy is different than that of the Athenians or fundamental priority still remains the same. Although the Greeks are often credited with the discovering of democracy, people often overlook their direct connection with formulation of politics.
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