Polis

Abstract

Abstract“Polis” is the name for a unique social order in which ancient Greeks lived and exercised autonomous power, from ca. 650 bce (Sparta) or ca. 594 bce (Athens) until they were overwhelmed by Macedonian or Roman military power from the late fourth to the early second centuries bce. The Athenian polis occupied an area about the size of the American state of Rhode Island, the smallest of the 50 states of the USA. At the height of its population, before the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War in 431 bce, Athens contained nearly 400 000 persons, about one sixth of whom were full citizens (i.e., adult males). Although there were monarchical, oligarchical, and democratic poleis, the institutional character of the polis was conducive to active, deliberative citizenship, which, in turn, was facilitated by democracy. Mid‐twentieth‐century classicists such as Victor Ehrenberg claimed that democracy was the telos of the polis. While that claim overreaches, the polis surely provided a nourishing social order for democracy, for democracy was established during the historical growth of the Athenian polis,between 508–7 and 462 bce. The Athenian polis, which was paradigmatic for Plato's relatively critical and Aristotle's relatively sympathetic account of political relations – retained its democratic character, except for two brief interludes lasting for barely a year, until Alexander and the Macedonians replaced its constitution with a regency in 323 bce. Athenian democracy was stable for most of the fifth and fourth centuries – unlike the portrait of it commonly painted by its antidemocratic interpreters. The idea of “the political” stems primarily from the relatively equal, not always harmonious, active exercise of authoritative citizenship by Athenians in the fifth and fourth centuries bce. Beginning in the nineteenth century but particularly after World War I, the term “political” has been used to highlight deficiencies in the modern state.