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Athenian Democracy
Modern Mythmakers and Ancient Theorists
Brief Description
Athenian Democracy provides innovative readings of ancient theorists to reveal both the complexity of democracy's achievements and its limits.In this classic work, noted political scientist Arlene W. Saxonhouse offers fresh and provocative explorations of ancient political theorists, lending new insights about democracy's foundations and principles. These...
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Athenian Democracy
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Description
Athenian Democracy provides innovative readings of ancient theorists to reveal both the complexity of democracy's achievements and its limits.
In this classic work, noted political scientist Arlene W. Saxonhouse offers fresh and provocative explorations of ancient political theorists, lending new insights about democracy's foundations and principles. These insights are more relevant than ever in a moment when the viability of democratic regimes is under scrutiny. Saxonhouse provides an in-depth discussion of the modern mythmakers (Hobbes, Paine, Hamilton, Mill, and Arendt, among others) who, in praising or excoriating Athenian democracy, have in fact distorted it to support their own assessments of democracy. She then offers detailed reinterpretations of the writings on democracy of four ancient theorists who had directly experienced life in the first democratic regime: Herodotus, Thucydides, Plato, and Aristotle.
Saxonhouse argues that the mythmaking that often attends our views of Athenian democracy—whether as a flawed, slaveholding regime that fostered factions and oppressed women or as an ideal regime of egalitarian and participatory democracy—blinds us to the deeper understanding of democracies that these ancient theorists can offer.
Book Details
INFORMATION
ISBN: 9780268210717
Publisher: University of Notre Dame Press
Format: Paperback / softback
Date Published: 27 February 2026
Country: United States
Imprint: University of Notre Dame Press
Edition: With a New Introduction
Audience: Tertiary education, Professional and scholarly
DIMENSIONS
Spine width: 11.0mm
Width: 140.0mm
Height: 216.0mm
Weight: 250g
Pages: 198
About the Author
Arlene W. Saxonhouse is the Caroline Robbins Collegiate Professor of Political Science, Emerita, at the University of Michigan. She is the author of numerous books and articles dealing with ancient Greek political thought, including Free Speech and Democracy in Ancient Athens and Fear of Diversity: The Birth of Political Science in Ancient Greek Thought.
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