American Representative Democracy finds its beginnings and roots in the Athenian experiment of Ancient Greece. However, though the two stem from similar original ideas — such as equality and giving citizens a voice — the dissimilarities are too egregious to reconcile the ideas as alike. Representative and Direct democracies both contain advantages over one another, but when it comes to the most successful form of governance, Representative Democracy is the better of the two.

In the beginnings of America and in the writing of the Constitution, the founders sought to give as many people a relevant voice as possible. Though each individual can have a voice equal to everyone else’s, a voice may as well be inaudible if it is shouted down by a collective number of voices. These collective voices are expressed by James Madison in Federalist No. 10 as “factions”.

Factions in Athens formed as easily and readily as they do today, following human nature, of course. This is what America’s founders would have called “mob rule”, but which the Athenians would have called the best form of “democracy”. In theory, every citizen had equal say in the Athenian assembly. However, any faction — such as the Thrasybulans, the Periclean Democrats, the Solonian Aristocrats, or the Followers of Socrates — threatened to outshout any persons or groups hedged against them, ignoring perhaps the indispensable needs of smaller factions in favor of their possibly short-sighted, ill-natured agenda. In other words: Rule of Athens fell into the hands of whatever “mob” happened to be in control at the time, leaving the administration of one of the world’s most powerful city-states at the whims of the “mob”.

Factions are an inevitability of human nature. Like-minded people will converge into symbiotic relationships, forming ever-expanding groups that threaten all other opinions and ideas. There are two means of countering factions, as James Madison elaborates on in Federalist No. 10: “the one, by removing its causes; the other, by controlling its effects.”¹ The founders recognized factions as inevitable, and since the possibilities for removing them — destroying liberty or giving every citizen the same opinion (e.g., 1984) — are as impractical as they are impossible, it then became the best course of action to control their effects.

In order to control the effects of a “mob rule”, the founders introduced a system of governance that far more successfully gave citizens a voice in the direction of politics than an Athenian Direct Democracy ever could. The bicameral legislature, the Great Compromise, offered a remedy to give states a proportional say as well as an equal say, thus, California cannot so easily enact policy detrimental to Wyoming. The executive branch provides a central figurehead to unify America and chart its course. The judicial branch administers the closest form of fair rulings in criminal and civilian cases the world has seen.

No system of government is perfect. Human nature prevents this. However, when given the opportunity to prefer Direct or Representative Democracy, Representative Democracy — especially its American incarnation — is the best selection available.

¹Madison, James. Federalist no. 10 (1787) 2009.

In 2019 it is simple to criticize the ancient Greek democracy that was established over 2,400 years ago. It is a bit more challenging to obtain the perspective of the ancient Greeks and their creation of the first democracy. Society back then was a lot different, to include their views on women’s roles in society along with the slaves. We can critique them for not including women in their assembly but there is no value in that from a 2019 perspective because that is just the way that society was and how it evolved to the way that is now. With the evolution of democracy and the law-making criteria, it is obvious that today’s representative model of democracy is a better way to govern than the original and direct Athenian model.

            People will argue that today’s democracy is not a true democracy because not every citizen have a say in every proposed law and decision in the government. This is true but does not make our democracy an inferior system. A true democracy where every citizen has a say in the decisions made, would be far too inefficient. One major difference between current democracy and ancient Greek’s was that they had citizens selected at random to sit in an assembly and vote on the topics that day. The major flaws in this method are that it is inefficient and allows some uneducated people to vote while the educated do not. This led to illogical and harsh decisions that can truly effect ones’ life, for example, in their direct democracy they “voted on whether or not they believed there was someone in the city who was becoming so popular as to threaten the democracy… they selected one man to exile from the city for ten years” (27)[1] With only a limited amount of people voting on this cause, one uneducated person has a significant influence of the outcome. In today’s democracy, we elect representatives to make decisions for us. This is efficient because it saves time for our citizens and allows law-making decisions faster and smoother of a process. There are, just like any other form of governments, its flaws. “Since the 1970s, voter participation in the United States has been around only 50 to 60 percent. Voter participation from households earning $30,000 or less has been even lower, at about 30 percent”[2]. These statistics show that the citizens are not as involved in the government as today’s democracy was meant to be. The poor are not voting, most likely because they are not educated enough to vote. Therefore, the rich are benefiting from democracy because they are voting more due to their education level. This is something that the ancient Greeks were attempting to fix by creating a democracy, and we in America after all these years have still not figured out.

            It is clear that both ancient Greek’s direct democracy and our current representative democracy have their flaws. With the context of today’s society versus the Greek’s, it is apparent that their government was more corrupt. We have allowed all of our legal and of-age citizens the ability to vote regardless of their ethnicity or education level. Although the Greeks had more flaws, they are still the government that shaped ours today. It was due to their failures that allowed our government to be more successful although there is still room for improvement.

-Kevin Semma

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[1] Ober, Josiah, et al. “The Threshold of Democracy: Athens in 403 BCE (4th Edition).” Reacting to the Past, reacting.barnard.edu/curriculum/published-games/athens.

[2] Moyo, Dambisa. “America’s Decaying Democracy.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 7 June 2018, http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/theworldpost/wp/2018/06/07/american-democracy/?utm_term=.e128d14381d7.

I believe the Athenian form of government is greater than American democracy. American democracy represents the people of the United States. On November 6th, 2018, United States citizens have a right to vote for whom they want to represent them. Each state has a certain number of delegates based on the population, this is so the American people can be fairly represented in Washington D.C. However, when voting for President, the electoral system and the popular vote do not always constitute the same result. There have been times when a president has lost the popular vote but still won because of the electoral system.
In the Athenian government, the citizens of Athens were not always represented for what they wanted, but instead for the needs of the country as a whole. The Athenian official government positions were shared among all the citizens and it did not require advances training to run the meetings (“Models of Democracy: 6 Models”). “Any citizen could speak to the assembly and vote on decisions by simply holding up their hands. The majority won the day and the decision was final. Nine presidents (proedroi), elected by lot and holding the office one time only, organized the proceedings and assessed the voting”( “Athenian Democracy”). The Athenians focused on equality for all people and held the law above everything else. Since Athens focused heavily on equality, all citizens were able to be included in the decision and rulemaking process. When I write all citizens, I mean all male citizens. The Athenians also believed in “Ruling and being ruled in turn” (“Models of Democracy:6 Models), it was equality based solely on numbers. There was a checks and balances system to make sure the government did not get too powerful and to stand for equal representation.
I believe to make policy and decisions for one’s country, one should be thoroughly educated and for the people. They must be fit for the job. It should not be based on one’s own personal agenda. With the Supreme Court case of Brett Kavanagh, it is clear that there are political motives behind the case, rather than a fair trial. “As we have seen, only male citizens who were 18 years or over could speak (at least in theory) and vote in the assembly, whilst the positions such as magistrates and jurors were limited to those over 30 years of age. Therefore, women, slaves, and resident foreigners (metoikoi) were excluded from the political process” (Athenian Democracy).
I do not like the fact that women do not have a say in the Athenian government, but in this day and age, they do. Based on the reasons I have done above, I still believe the Athenian democracy is a better way to govern than the direct American model.

Sources:

http://www.politicalsciencenotes.com/democracy/models-of-democracy-6-models/835

https://www.ancient.eu/Athenian_Democracy/

Given James Madison’s differentiation between the ancient and modern democracies in The Federalist, the current model of democracy is a better way to govern. This is true because the modern model of democracy retains many of the great things mentioned in Pericles’ Funeral Oration, while also making improvements in its overall effectiveness.

In his Funeral Oration Pericles describes what makes democracy great, “still although we have equality at law for everyone… we do not let our system of rotating public offices undermine our judgments of a candidate’s virtue” (Pericles’ Funeral Oration 40). Pericles’ statement that the best men are given power in democracy based on merit remains true today, with the inclusion of women. Similarly, the modern model of democracy follows the same mindset in preparing for war. “We leave our city open to all; and we have never expelled strangers in order to prevent them from learning or seeing things that… might give an advantage to the enemy… our enemies train to be men from early youth… we live a more relaxed life and still take on the dangers as great as they do” (Pericles’ Funeral Oration 41). Our modern immigration policy has never turned away any of those seeking shelter, even if we were at odds with their country. And unlike the Spartans, our current military is made up of volunteers who have lived relatively relaxed lifestyles versus those countries where service is mandatory, and we still remain the victor.

Some would argue that today there is little to no representation in areas where selected representatives fail in completing policies promised while they were running for office. To this I would agree, but I would argue that it is the exception rather than the rule. Though this comes at a sacrifice to some, the system of elected representatives allows for organized discussion, versus the unorderly mess that sometimes was Athenian assemblies. In an excerpt from The Old Oligarch, it argues that it is better for assemblies to allow the worst, least credible people to speak, because it will fall on deaf ears due to their unreliability. This is no longer the case today, with the world of social media and the rapid expansion of the nation, one’s credibility cannot be solidified by the majority of people. Baseless accusations are taken seriously in the same way that serious credibility issues are lost in the confusion. Overall the advantages of the ancient government reside in the modern model, containing only changes that “[are] managed not for a few people, but for the majority” (Pericles’ Funeral Oration 40).

On one of my all-time favorite television series, Gilmore Girls, a common scene is the weekly town meeting. During these town meetings, there is usually a set agenda of what must be discussed, but it is also seen as the time and place where people can address their own grievances. Anyone can attend and vote at these meetings. In a way, these weekly town meetings are a present-day form of the direct democracy founded in Ancient Athens. In Athens, there were no elected representatives as there are in the United States, and in a Gilmore Girls town meeting, everyone represents themselves. In both of these democracies, constituents never had to worry about disagreeing with how their representative votes—instead, they just cast their own vote.
For as great as the direct democracy on Gilmore Girls may seem, the town meeting scenes are generally comedic. Town members can never agree with each other, and the meetings become so chaotic from so many opinions, that the initial issue often becomes misconstrued and never resolved. For example, in one town meeting, the issue of whether or not a newcomer can sell produce from a table in the park (instead of a kiosk) is resolved with the vote “Say aye if you agree that you would not like this man to open a bookstore. We’re all in agreement? Meeting adjourned.” In this fictional case, a direct democracy is so unorganized, and inefficient that it is comedic. Similarly, while the success of democracy in Athens is no laughing matter, in terms of organization and efficiency, it falls short of today’s representative democracy.
Today, many people complain that representative democracies fail to truly represent the views of constituents. Politicians in power are often tasked with the difficult decision of voting based on their own beliefs (or the beliefs of the party that they wish to receive support from as they run in elections) in mind, or based on the beliefs of the majority of their constituents (who elected them into office) in mind. We might raise the argument that this would not be an issue in a direct democracy like Athens. In a direct democracy, each eligible individual can solely vote with their own beliefs in mind. However, this does not mean that one may not find themselves in the position of potentially compromising their values in a direct democracy. When we did the Reacting to the Past, my character, Rhinon, was an indeterminate. As such, my beliefs were not really going to be heard very well in the assembly. I did not have the support of other votes from members who shared my beliefs (I was not a faction member). In order to make my voice heard, I had to make compromises with other factions that would support some of my positions, if I was willing to do the same. Similarly, compromises were even made between factions. On the last issue, that is the payment of assembly-goers, the Radical Democrats and Moderate Democrats had to compromise with each other to pass the measure, even though they opposed each other greatly on the issue of what to do with supporters of the Thirty Tyrants.
Regardless of whether or not it’s a democracy where you represent yourself, or where others represent you, compromises are going to have to be made to bring about change. One does not need to fully compromise their own values, but they do have to understand that if each individual perspective on an issue was heard, an accurate vote would never be cast. It would be like the Gilmore Girls’ town meetings, where people spend too much time arguing over an issue than actually voting on it.
This does not mean that one has to be a diehard supporter of their elected representatives. While there are only 535 seats in Congress, you do not have to sit in one of these seats to bring about change. On a local level, be active in politics. Contact legislatures who have views that you feel do not represent the views of their constituents, and inform them of this—they are going to have to listen to your voice if they want to be elected again. Support candidates who you believe will accurately, and fairly represent the views of their constituents once elected. And if your representatives fail to represent you in office, this does not mean that you cannot still have a voice on the issue—protest, or join a march if you believe that an important issue is not getting the attention and action that it deserves. With representative democracies, there maintains the necessary organization to allow for an efficient government, but it still allows for people’s voices to be heard.
Final word count: 780

Citation for quote:
Sherman-Palladino, A. (Executive Producer). 2003. Gilmore Girls [Television series]. Burbank, CA: Warner Bros. Studios