Public Spending And Democracy In Classical Athens

Author : David M. Pritchard
Publisher : University of Texas Press
ISBN 13 : 029277205X
Total Pages : 161 pages
Book Rating : 4.52/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Public Spending and Democracy in Classical Athens written by David M. Pritchard and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2015-07-01 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In his On the Glory of Athens, Plutarch complained that the Athenian people spent more on the production of dramatic festivals and “the misfortunes of Medeas and Electras than they did on maintaining their empire and fighting for their liberty against the Persians.” This view of the Athenians’ misplaced priorities became orthodoxy with the publication of August Böckh’s 1817 book Die Staatshaushaltung der Athener [The Public Economy of Athens], which criticized the classical Athenian dēmos for spending more on festivals than on wars and for levying unjust taxes to pay for their bloated government. But were the Athenians’ priorities really as misplaced as ancient and modern historians believed? Drawing on lines of evidence not available in Böckh’s time, Public Spending and Democracy in Classical Athens calculates the real costs of religion, politics, and war to settle the long-standing debate about what the ancient Athenians valued most highly. David M. Pritchard explains that, in Athenian democracy, voters had full control over public spending. When they voted for a bill, they always knew its cost and how much they normally spent on such bills. Therefore, the sums they chose to spend on festivals, politics, and the armed forces reflected the order of the priorities that they had set for their state. By calculating these sums, Pritchard convincingly demonstrates that it was not religion or politics but war that was the overriding priority of the Athenian people.

Author : David M. Pritchard
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780292772045
Total Pages : 191 pages
Book Rating : 4.41/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Public Spending and Democracy in Classical Athens written by David M. Pritchard and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 191 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : George C. Bitros
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000097129
Total Pages : 338 pages
Book Rating : 4.22/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Democracy and Money written by George C. Bitros and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-07-12 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The authors of this book argue that post-war fiscal and monetary policies in the U.S. are prone to more frequent and more destabilizing domestic and international financial crises. So, in the aftermath of the one that erupted in 2008, they propose that now we are sleepwalking into another, which under the prevailing institutional circumstances could develop into a worldwide financial Armageddon. Thinking ahead of such a calamity, this book presents for the first time a model of democratic governance with privately produced money based on the case of Athens in Classical times, and explains why, if it is conceived as a benchmark for reference and adaptation, it may provide an effective way out from the dreadful predicament that state managed fiat money holds for the stability of Western-type democracies and the international financial system. As the U.S. today, Athens at that time reached the apex of its military, economic, political, cultural, and scientific influence in the world. But Athens triumphed through different approaches to democracy and fundamentally different fiscal and monetary policies than the U.S. Thus the readers will have the opportunity to learn about these differences and appreciate the potential they offer for confronting the challenges contemporary democracies face under the leadership of the U.S. The book will find audiences among academics, university students, and researchers across a wide range of fields and subfields, as well as legislators, fiscal and monetary policy makers, and economic and financial consultants.

Author : David Pritchard
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 110700733X
Total Pages : 265 pages
Book Rating : 4.38/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Sport, Democracy and War in Classical Athens written by David Pritchard and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explains why the democracy of classical Athens generously sponsored elite sport and idolised its sporting victors.

Author : David M. Pritchard
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1108422918
Total Pages : 313 pages
Book Rating : 4.18/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Athenian Democracy at War written by David M. Pritchard and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-11-29 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Studies all four branches of the Athenian armed forces to show how they helped make democratic Athens a superpower.

Author : Josiah Ober
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 1400828805
Total Pages : 363 pages
Book Rating : 4.07/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Democracy and Knowledge written by Josiah Ober and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2008-09-15 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When does democracy work well, and why? Is democracy the best form of government? These questions are of supreme importance today as the United States seeks to promote its democratic values abroad. Democracy and Knowledge is the first book to look to ancient Athens to explain how and why directly democratic government by the people produces wealth, power, and security. Combining a history of Athens with contemporary theories of collective action and rational choice developed by economists and political scientists, Josiah Ober examines Athenian democracy's unique contribution to the ancient Greek city-state's remarkable success, and demonstrates the valuable lessons Athenian political practices hold for us today. He argues that the key to Athens's success lay in how the city-state managed and organized the aggregation and distribution of knowledge among its citizens. Ober explores the institutional contexts of democratic knowledge management, including the use of social networks for collecting information, publicity for building common knowledge, and open access for lowering transaction costs. He explains why a government's attempt to dam the flow of information makes democracy stumble. Democratic participation and deliberation consume state resources and social energy. Yet as Ober shows, the benefits of a well-designed democracy far outweigh its costs. Understanding how democracy can lead to prosperity and security is among the most pressing political challenges of modern times. Democracy and Knowledge reveals how ancient Greek politics can help us transcend the democratic dilemmas that confront the world today.

Author : Nicholas F. Jones
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0195352831
Total Pages : 364 pages
Book Rating : 4.32/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Associations of Classical Athens written by Nicholas F. Jones and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1999-02-04 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jones' book examines the associations of ancient Athens under the classical democracy (508/7-321 B.C.) in light of their relations to the central government. Associations of all types--village communities, cultic groups, brotherhoods, sacerdotal families, philosophical schools, and others--emerge as fundamentally similar instances of Aristotelian koinoniai. Each, it is argued, acquired its distinctive character in response to particular features of the contemporary democracy. The analysis results in the first integrated, holistic institutional reconstruction of Greece's first city.

Author : Christopher Carey
Publisher : Bristol Classical Press
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 128 pages
Book Rating : 4.54/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Democracy in Classical Athens written by Christopher Carey and published by Bristol Classical Press. This book was released on 2000-12-14 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For two centuries classical Athens enjoyed almost uninterrupted democratic government. This was not a parliamentary democracy of the modern sort but a direct democracy in which all citizens were free to participate in the business of government. Throughout this period Athens was a cultural centre of Greece and one of the major Greek powers. This book traces the development and operation of the political systems and explores its underlying principles. Christopher Carey assesses the ancient sources of the history of Athenian democracy an evaluates criticisms of the system, ancient and modern. He also provides a virtual tour of the political cityscape of ancient Athens, describing the main political sites and structures, including the theatre. Aimed at the general reader, as well as students at school and undergraduate level, this second edition is a generously illustrated and concise guide to a political system that continues to capture the modern imagination.

Author : Johann P. Arnason
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
ISBN 13 : 1118561678
Total Pages : 506 pages
Book Rating : 4.76/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Greek Polis and the Invention of Democracy written by Johann P. Arnason and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2013-04-29 with total page 506 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Greek Polis and the Invention of Democracy presents a series of essays that trace the Greeks’ path to democracy and examine the connection between the Greek polis as a citizen state and democracy as well as the interaction between democracy and various forms of cultural expression from a comparative historical perspective and with special attention to the place of Greek democracy in political thought and debates about democracy throughout the centuries. Presents an original combination of a close synchronic and long diachronic examination of the Greek polis - city-states that gave rise to the first democratic system of government Offers a detailed study of the close interactionbetween democracy, society, and the arts in ancient Greece Places the invention of democracy in fifth-century bce Athens both in its broad social and cultural context and in the context of the re-emergence of democracy in the modern world Reveals the role Greek democracy played in the political and intellectual traditions that shaped modern democracy, and in the debates about democracy in modern social, political, and philosophical thought Written collaboratively by an international team of leading scholars in classics, ancient history, sociology, and political science

Author : Loren J. Samons
Publisher : Univ of California Press
ISBN 13 : 0520251687
Total Pages : 328 pages
Book Rating : 4.87/5 ( download)

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Download or read book What's Wrong with Democracy? written by Loren J. Samons and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2007-04-23 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This is unlike any recent work I know of. It offers a challenging, often refreshing, and what will certainly be a controversial assessment of classical Athenian democracy and its significance to modern America. Samons is willing to tread where few other classicists are willing to go in print. He reminds readers that the Athenian democracy offers just as many negative lessons as positive ones, and topics like the popular vote, the dangers of state payments to individual citizens, the naturally acquisitive foreign policy of democratic governments, and the place of religion in democracy all come up for discussion and criticism. Samons has written an original and very provocative book."—James Sickinger, author of Public Records and Archives in Classical Athens "Professor Samons' lively and challenging account of ancient Athens raises important questions about democracy, ancient and modern. It will surely arouse keen interest and debate."—Donald Kagan, author of The Peloponnesian War "In this elegantly written, carefully researched, and perceptive book, Samons presents a penetrating analysis of ancient Athenian democracy's dark sides. His book is as much about the errors and weaknesses of our own political system as it is about those of ancient Athens. Whether or not we agree with his critique and conclusions, this book is not merely thought-provoking: it is annoyingly discomforting, forcing us to re-examine firm beliefs and to discard easy solutions."—Kurt A. Raaflaub, author of Discovery of Freedom in Ancient Greece "In this marvelously unfashionable book, Samons debunks much of what passes in the current-day academy as scholarship on classical Athens, demonstrating that it is an ideologically-driven apology for a radically defective form of government. In the process, he casts light on the perspicacity of America's founding fathers and on the unthinking populism that threatens in our own day to ruin their legacy."—Paul A. Rahe, author of Republics Ancient and Modern: Classical Republicanism and the American Revolution "We are in the greatest age of democracy since antiquity and in the most need of guidance about the wisdom of government by majority vote. Precisely for that reason Professor Samons offers a bold and unbridled look at the nature and history of democracies, ancient and modern. He reminds us that we are capable of doing as much evil as good when constitutional protections and republican oversight are not there to moderate the instant desires of the majority. This is an engaging, provocative, and timely study of ancient Athens and modern America that should serve as a cautionary reminder to both romantic scholars and zealous diplomats."—Victor Davis Hanson, author of The Other Greeks