The principles of the Athenian democracy, including citizen participation, equality and free speech, are still what we need the most.

What is the difference between representative government and the government in ancient Athens? In a representative government, there is no institutional role for the assembled people. However: ...

Log-in to bookmark & organize content - it's free! American University History Professor Valerie French discusses the ancient Greek empire, its rise, and its impact on Western civilization. This ...

Over 2,400 years ago, during the time of the Peloponnesian War that engulfed Greece, the leader of the Greeks, Pericles, delivered his famous ‘Funeral Oration’ to commemorate the soldiers who died in ...

A drumbeat of hard realities echoed through the halls at this year’s Athens Democracy Forum, where participants noted trends ...

No one should base ideas of democratic reform on the belief that ancient Athenian “democracy” was an ideal form of government (5 October, p 32). Athens hardly invented democracy: there were very large ...

This is not the right time for a pandemic. Not that there is a right time for a pandemic, but some times are definitely the wrong one. And no time is worse than when a nation is already in crisis, ...

Plato, one of the earliest thinkers and writers about democracy, predicted that letting people govern themselves would eventually lead the masses to support the rule of tyrants. When I tell my college ...