Trace the development of democracy in Greece, from Draco’s harsh laws to Kleisthenes’ establishment of the Council of Five Hundred. Then, consider: what elements of ancient Greek democracy remain in contemporary democracies like that of the United

Question

States?

Please provide the best answer for the statement.

Answer 1

1. Early in the sixth century BCE, a reformer statesman named Solon (ca. 630–ca. 560 BCE) overturned a severe code of law that had been instituted about one century earlier by an official named Draco. Draco’s law was especially hard on debtors; Solon addressed the most painful of these provisions. He deemphasized the agricultural basis of the polis and encouraged trade and commerce, granting citizenship to anyone who would come and work in Athens. He also formed the Council of Four Hundred, which comprised landowners selected by Solon himself. This group recommended policy, which a general assembly of all citizens voted on and over which it had veto power. By the end of the fifth century, Athenians had come to view Solon as the founding father of Athenian democracy.
2. When Pisistratos (r. 560–527 BCE) assumed power, any further advance toward democracy was stymied. Pisistratos ruled as a dictator, without consulting the people, exiling aristocrats who did not support him, and often keeping a son of a noble family as a personal hostage to guarantee the family’s loyalty.
3. Pisistratos’ son Hippias became the ruler of Athens in 527 BCE. Pisistratos had been a tyrant, but Hippias was harsher still, exiling more nobles and executing many others. In 510, the exiled nobles led a revolt, with aid from Sparta, and Hippias escaped to Persia.
4. In 508 BCE, Kleisthenes instituted the first Athenian democracy by reorganizing the Athenian political system into demes, small local areas comparable to precincts or wards in a modern city, made up of citizens (male landowners and merchants, for the most part—women and slaves were excluded from citizenship). Kleisthenes then grouped the demes into ten political “tribes,” whose membership cut across all family, class, and regional lines, thus effectively diminishing the power and influence of the noble families. Each tribe appointed 50 of its members to a Council of Five Hundred, which served for 36 days (yielding ten separate councils per year). No citizen could serve on the council more than twice in his lifetime, but virtually all did serve at some point across their lifetimes.
5. Answers comparing ancient Greek democracy to modern democracies will vary, but students might be expected to contrast definitions of citizenship and the notion of the Council, which has largely been replaced by various forms of elective office.