Aristotle's Politics: Oligarchy and Democracy

Many of these factions try to gain popularity for a candidate who wants a position in the government; this is a simple and fair way to win. Also in today's world you don't hear much about factions having conflicts with each other, since the government is big enough and pays attention to everyone.

Aristotle’s society in The Politics, is that of a realistic society, a city of man. Aristotle defines a citizen as a political animal, which means that for man to optimize the society in which he lives in, he must be politically active (Aristotle 1253a). By nature, they want to cooperate together in society. Aristotle defines a citizen as a person who has full political rights to participate in judicial or deliberative office. (Aristotle 1275b) Each citizen has the ability to possess moral virtues. This is in contrast to Plato’s ideal state, where only the ruling class is able to be politically involved. Each citizen is able to posses private property, for one should call the city-state happy not by looking at a part of it but at all the citizens (Aristotle 1329a). This means that all classes of the state as a whole should be happy, not just one sole tier.

Democracy and Oligarcy as forms of government have been in existence for a long period of time, both terms first appeared in ancient Greek political and philosophical thought. Both forms of government exist in the modern world, but which form of government is more better, there is a question. So, in my essay I will compare Democratic and Oligarchy Governments to understand which form of them is the best.

One person might say that anarchy would be the only way to have complete and utter freedom, while others would go as far as to believe a controlled communist government is the best route to achieving liberation. Factions (a group of people who agree on certain topics) are inevitable, due to the nature of man. As long as men hold different opinions, have different amounts of wealth, and own different amount of property, they will continue to fraternize with people who are most similar to them. In Federalist #10, James Madison summed up factions

An example of this is the Anti- Federalist concerns about a republican government not working on a scale this large or diverse. Like the Roman empire, whose government was based on the idea on classical republicanism, they believed it would fall and turn into a monarchy in order to control its people. The Federalist needed a theory to combat this argument so James Madison complied wrote in Federalist 10 that factions were the great enemy of society. Madison defines a faction as “a number of citizens,... who united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.” Factions are dangerous because there will be a majority faction and then a risk of tyranny will arise, because the

Madison says that the most common cause for the development of factions is the various and unequal distribution of property.

Oligarchy comes from the Greek words “oligos” meaning “few” and “archo” meaning “rule”. Essentially “oligarchy” means “rule of the few in their own interests and not in the interest of the majority or the public good.” (Melville, 2011). Melville states that oligarchy was a “degeneration” of aristocracy as stated by Aristotle. Oligarchies were the most common form of government in the Ancient Greek city-states. In Sparta, the Gerousia (council of twenty-eight men over sixty-year of age together with the two kings) was an elite assembly dominated by the wealthier members of Spartan society. The Gerousia approved all laws that were submitted to the popular assembly for vote. The Ephors were a group of five men who were elected annually for a single term of office. The Ephors usually deferred to the guidance of the Gerousia (Brand, n.d.).

One way in which a republic deals with factions is the delegation of government to elected officials. The object of the elected officials is “to refine and enlarge the public views by passing them through the medium of a chosen body of citizens, whose wisdom may best discern the true interest of their country (Publius,76).” This in effect will put the power of our country into the hands of qualified individuals. These individuals will be able to hear the voice of the people and decide what is the right decision for the country.

Swiss-French writer Benjamin Constant and ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle offer conflicting viewpoints concerning the merits and possibilities of ancient Greek democracy. Aristotle’s political theory attempts to justify his city-state’s political structure by providing a model of the common good, or Chief Aim, his end goal for Athenian democracy. He believed Athenians could reach the Chief Aim as a society by individually learning to be virtuous and then instilling laws and morals based on these ideals. In his lecture, The Liberty of the Ancients Compared with that of the Moderns, Constant highlights that the individual liberties protected in a modern representative democracy are much more important than the political liberties that one was given in antiquity. Constant illustrates that while some ideas of ancient Greek democracy are precious, Aristotle’s political theory is not an obtainable reality and it was beneficial that modern democracies transitioned to a system that protects individual liberty.

Aristotle says that justice is thought of as equality among all, there is a disregard to merit (p.172). In a society, there is usually more poor people and because there is this demand of equality then the majority rule (p.174). Mob rule is then authoritative. All governments have their forms, which are good and are bad. Democracy to Aristotle is not the best regime because it is ruled by the poor or the ones that need from the government. Government is not chosen by those who pursue virtue, but instead pursue wealth. The democratic principle is that of freedom, wealth, and birth. Not virtue. He believes the best regime would not be exactly a democracy but a polity that would be a combination of freedom, wealth, birth and virtue. The best regime has ideal conditions in which it becomes a predictable regime and consists of values, choices, the inanimate, elements of the class of workers, and the education of rulers. Democracy has a big defect in that it does not have intelligence or wisdom. It is the rule of many. It is based on the idea of happiness by following pleasures (p.48). Democracy comes into play when the majority revolt against the oligarchy because of the ideas of freedom. The problem with it is that people are pursuing their pleasures, not thinking of the state as a whole. There is unity based on pleasure. Before long, everyone is pursuing their own pleasures and there is an undermining of authority

These views were evident, and perhaps promoted, due to the continual control of government by aristocrats. These rulers sought to improve their own interests over those of the poleis, and promoted their own values and ideas. Aristotle believed that the best form of governing should be decided by those governed and, although he believed democracy to be the best of the examples of government, believed that voting would both satisfy the citizens’ desire for equality and avoid revolutions such as those that result from the tyrannies that had come before.

He explains that all men are born possessing different faculties and abilities with which to acquire property and that these different faculties lead to different amounts of property. It is then the government’s purpose to protect these different amounts of property. Man’s reason gives him the capacity to fulfill this purpose while retaining a certain measure of self-government through democratic and republican governments. However, man’s reason cannot wholly be relied upon, because men are also ruled by their passion and self-interest. The aforementioned disparity of property between men causes society to become divided into different classes with different interests, and driven by their passions, men of these different classes form groups called factions. Publius defines a faction as “a number of citizens … who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens.” Factions then seek to seize power over other citizens for their own benefit. Publius uses the history of republics and democracies to point out the fact that it is factions that lead to the downfall of these governments. When these governments fall, tyrannies rise up in their place, oppressing the people and infringing on their rights, therefore acting contrary to the very purpose of

In the fifth-century BC, Athens emerged as one of the most advanced state or polis in all of Greece. This formation of Athenian ‘democracy’ holds the main principle that citizens should enjoy political equality in order to be free to rule and be ruled in turn. The word ‘democracy’ originates from the Greek words demos (meaning people) and kratos (meaning power) therefore demokratia means “the power of the people.” The famous funeral speech of Pericles states that “Our constitution is called democracy because power is in the hands not of a minority but of the whole people.” However, only citizens (free adult men of Athenian descent) could participate in political matters. Women and slaves held no political rights, although they were

In his discussions of constitutions and cities in Politics, Aristotle makes it very clear that his top priority is to provide people with the opportunity to pursue and achieve the good life. An integral part of this is the stability of the constitution. Although Aristotle explicitly states that a kingship is the best system of rule for any given generation, its lack of stability from one generation to the next disqualifies it from being the best in reality. In his attempts to find a constitution with stability, Aristotle comes to the decision that the middle class would be the ruler of such a constitution. This, he says, will minimize the

Democratic Government – this is the government for the poor and needy and not a government for common good. This to Aristotle is the best form of government but it can degenerate into demagogue and anarchy