I ask this because I have read books by David Gress&Fergus Millar on just how much more we owe Rome than they get credit for.
2006-12-05 05:39:10 · 6 answers · asked by Epinions Reviewer. 6 in Arts & Humanities ➔ History
Athens was a true democracy. Any male citizen could cast a vote on a particular issue. This led to some very bad policy at times. In a true democracy where anyone can vote, you can rest assured that all of the people aren't educated on the issue at hand.
The Roman Republic resolved this problem by assigning elected representatives to focus on the issues at hand and make decisions on behalf of the people. Much of the free world follows this form of government and it works much better than a true democracy.
2006-12-05 05:50:30 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Athens had more of a Democracy. The citizens of Athens had more of a vote than did Roman citizens. In the Roman Republic, Senators did the voting for the people. In Athens, the people voted for just about everything, including war. This is why a true Democracy has problems existing. It would be hard for to vote for every law and every ordinance. This is why the U.S. is not a true Democracy. It is a Republic with strong Democratic ideas.
2006-12-05 05:55:26 · answer #2 · answered by kepjr100 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The Roman Republic was more of a representative republic than Athens. In practice, it was similar to the US, you elect someone to represent you but once elected you have no control over them until the next election comes around. A democracy allows everyone to vote and speak on everything which is plainly impractical. Even Athens would elect a 'tyrant' to run day to day things but retained the ability to exile him if he annoyed enough people. Athens is the closest that anywhere has come to a true democracy and the experiment proved that it was too cumbersome to ever work in practice.
2006-12-05 05:57:56 · answer #3 · answered by Elizabeth Howard 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Unfortunately, my understanding is that Roman senators weren't elected by the people, but more or less chosen because of social-economic status. If that's the case then Rome wasn't much of a democracy.
2006-12-05 06:11:22 · answer #4 · answered by Daniel A: Zionist Pig 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
My understanding is that democracy came from Ancient Greece, so therefore Athens.
2006-12-05 05:41:26 · answer #5 · answered by Andastra 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Definitely Athens... Rome had consuls who would purge the senate whenever things didnt go their way....
2006-12-05 08:59:11 · answer #6 · answered by llcoolj38 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋