Week 4 wednesday

Was Athens really a 'democracy'?


A democracy is"government by the people; a form of government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system." (dictionary.com) From this definition Athens was sort of like a democracy. They voted to kick people out of Athens though and not to elect leaders. They also had the power to vote for whatever they wanted
But when you really think about it, i believe Athens was a democracy. We honestly shouldn't even be able to say whether they were a democracy or not. They were there first and were one of the first if not the first culture to succesfuly use a democracy system to govern their people. All we did was improve upon it. Without their version of a democracy we would not even have a democracy. We would still be ruled by dictators and emperors. Our citizens wouldn't be able ot vote and veto laws and our emperor would be in complete control. Egypt for example was not very well controlled. They would have one very good ruler but then the kingdom would get passed down to a son who may not be such a good ruler and the country would be in chaos. This is not a good system of government. Before Athens had a democracy they were ruled like this too. Athens at first was completely run by the citizens because the rulers were so worried they were going to get overthrown. They would vote on everything. In america we just vote on our president and senators and ect. and then they vote for the bills for us. This is simpler. I actually disagree with my first answer and consider Athens a democracy.