Athenian Democracy and Human Chattel


Athenian democracy from the 5th to the 4th century BCE has been regarded as the model of modern democratic systems. Equal political rights, freedom of speech, participation in politics and governance all came from ancient Greece. Rather than doomed to oblivion, its three branches of government - the Citizens' Assembly, the Senate, the Executive Committee, and the courts have become the norms all over the world. When visiting Greece in 2016, President Obama lauded Greece "for the most precious of gifts: the truth, the understanding that as individuals of free will, we have the right and the capacity to govern ourselves." Even non-democratic regimes have a semblance of separation of power and citizens' representation and "guarantees" political rights and freedom of speech. 

But Athenian democracy is far from perfect. Although its flaws are well-known, modern democratic leaders tend to deemphasize them while glorifying its political achievements. The truth is that Athenian democracy, besides excluding women, was based on large-scale slavery and could not have functioned without it. To reflect the reality then, the Athenian democracy should be called a human-chattel democracy and should be treated as such.

Slavery

Of all the city-states in ancient Greece, Athens had the most slaves. It is estimated that there were 80,000 to 100,000 of them in the 5th and 6th centuries. One in four Athenian inhabitants was enslaved. Each of these male and female, young and old, made the democratic system possible. Thanks to them, free male citizens could actively participate in politics and governance, enjoy debating and conducting their business in the Agora, a public space and meeting ground lying under the northern slope of the Acropolis, serve as jurors, and attend theater performances. 

Deprived of civic rights, slaves toiled in the households, fields, stone quarries, mines, construction sites. 

According to historians, owning slaves then is like owing cars today. Free citizens took a male slave anywhere they went and had a female slave do household chores. Well-to-do families owned an average of three or four domestic slaves. Even poor peasants owned several slaves. The famous philosopher, Plato had five slaves at the end of his life, and stated that the very rich possessed 50 slaves.

In the classical period, when the arts and philosophy flourished, slaves were employed in agriculture and produced the foodstuffs that sustained the city-state. Larger estates could employ dozens of enslaved common laborers or foremen, whose legs were shackled in irons at night.  

Slaves were also the major source of labor in mines and quarries. According to historical records, three wealthy citizens leased out 1,000, 600, and 300 slaves, respectively, to the silver mines of Laurium in Attica. It is estimated that 30,000 slaves worked in the Laurium mines and in the ore-processing mills.

Even the Athenian state owned slaves. They built the famous structures that modern tourists admire in awe: The Parthenon standing at the top of Acropolis, the Temple of Olympian Zeus at the center of Athens, and the Temple of Hephaestus overlooking the Agora, to name a few. Demosthenes's father had 32 slaves employed as cutters and 20 as bedmakers.

Implications

Western democracies have used Athenian democracy to propagate their ideology of freedom. However, as the historical facts show, the democratic system, lauded and copied all over the world, is a system based on the selling and buying of slaves and the exploitation of its slave labor. 

From a human rights point of view, Athenian democracy is a disaster. Stripped of any human or civil rights, slaves were tortured and beaten by their owners at will, forced to engage in sex without consent, and bought and sold like properties. 

To those who find Athenian democracy a source of pride, then we should ask them this question: If Athenian democracy is an acceptable regime, why would we reject the apartheid system in South Africa from 1948 to the early 1990s? That South African democratic regime was also run by and for free white citizens while Africans provided the cheap labor and were forced into segregated communities. Why is the human-chattel democracy a model of Western democracies whereas the apartheid democracy in South Africa is reviled by them?

In the same vein, we need to stop accepting the brainwashing campaigns that Uncle Sam has been waging. The US touts itself as the beacon of democracy and promotes its system throughout the world. The fact is that from the founding of the Republic in 1776 to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, only white citizens enjoyed the freedom. For 188 years after the declaration of independence, the US democratic system was run on slavery in the South until the end of the Civil War in 1865 and then on nationwide segregation of Africans and other minorities until 1964. The US has been a democracy that extends political and human rights to all citizens for only 57 years. 

Most importantly, the US Congress ended the Jim Crow laws, which discriminated against Africans and other minorities, only after African Americans spent a decade organizing a civil rights movement for equality and justice. Without the civil rights movement, the US democratic system led by free white citizens and for free white citizens would have kept on excluding non-whites. 

Athenian democracy was built and run on the back of slaves. It is about time for us to stop revering Athenian democracy and using it as a tool of propaganda. There is nothing to glow with pride about a political system in which most free citizens owned slaves and whose functioning depended on slavery.

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Read these other articles:

Enough With Moral Imperialism

Picasso and Columbus: What They Have In Common

The Democracy Trap: Ballot Box vs. Industrialization


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