Conflict democracy and voter choice a public cho

Authors: George Tridimas

Publish Date: 2016/10/01

Volume: 169, Issue: 1-2, Pages: 137-159

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Abstract

Ostracism the removal of a political leader from ancient Athens for a period of ten years without any additional financial sanction or other punishment was an important and rather unique institutional aspect of the direct democracy The present study explains the adoption of ostracism as the utility maximizing choice of a self–interested constitutional writer—cum—political actor to resolve violent political conflict and illustrates that it acted as a type of negative referendum on politicians Using notions from game theory and spatial decision modeling the paper goes on to attribute the infrequent use of ostracism to its twostage decision making process wherein the decisive voter of the first stage differed from the decisive voter of the second stageThe fundamental kinship of ancient and modern democracy has led modern researchers to apply the methodology of public choice to gain a better understanding of the practices of the ancient Greek democracies1 The present study follows this approach and offers new rational theory perspectives on ostracism a distinct characteristic of the direct democracy of ancient Athens 508–322 all dates BCE by which the demos in a twostage ballot decided to banish a political leader for a period of ten years From a modern perspective ostracism may sound as a bizarre practice and a harsh punishment that violates individual rights According to the Athenian Constitution of Aristotle 221–4 ostracism was enacted as a precaution against men in powerful positions to defend the demos from potential tyrants Even though the ancient biographer Plutarch considered it as motivated by envy against prominent citizens see for example Plutarch Parallel Lives Aristides 72 it put a stop to earlier violent political contests after which the winning side typically exiled the losing side and confiscated its property Ostracism was a potent weapon to eliminate leading individuals at least temporarily but it was deployed sparingly used ten times in the period 507–416 with no ostracisms taking place after that date although the procedure was not removed from the statutesAncient history scholarship has highlighted that ostracism accomplished several things not only could it defend democracy but it also provided a powerful mechanism for resolving intra–elite conflicts peacefully while simultaneously ascertaining the supremacy of the demos over elites it also broke policy impasses It was an important fixture of the institutional landscape of ancient Athens Yet contrary to other elements of the Athenian democracy there is no formal analysis of its characteristics in the contemporary collective choice literature The present paper aims to fill this gap by looking at the use of ostracism through the lens of rational choice theory thereby adding to political economy research on historical societies2 and to the rational choice literature on nontraditional legal institutions see for example Becker and Stigler 1974 Leeson 2007 Leeson and Coyne 2012 It focuses on two issues First considering Cleisthenes the constitutional writer of the law of ostracism as a rational self–interested actor the paper inquires into why he introduced ostracism as a method of resolving contests for political power among rival elites instead of continuing the previous norm of violent conflict and mass exile Second it explores the equilibrium outcome of ostracism as a twostage voting process wherein the decisive voter of the first stage may differ from that of the secondThe paper is structured as follows Section 2 describes the historical background of the introduction of ostracism and the procedures followed when applied it then reviews the ten attested ostracisms and surveys various modern interpretations of ostracism Section 3 examines ostracism as the utility maximising choice of the constitution’s writer at the time of its introduction Section 4 presents a twostage game theoretic model of ostracism and discusses the intuition gained by studying its equilibrium It attributes the moderate application of the procedure to the utility maximising choice of the decisive voter of the first stage rather than appealing to any normative or ideological principles Section 5 concludesIn the archaic period 750–500 before the establishment of democracy political contests and competition for policy making authority in the Greek citystates were characterized by violent conflict amongst rival elite factions whose status depended on control of the land with rather limited active participation by the nonelite poorer classes of the population These contests resulted in a cycle of destruction and instability wherein the winning side expelled the losing side without any limits on the number of those expelled or the duration of their exiles In turn those expelled sought to return sometimes in alliance with enemies of the polis defeat and exile the rival incumbents and so on in what Forsdyke 2000 2005 calls “the aristocratic politics of exile”Despite attempts by Draco in 621 and Solon in 594 to normalize political life by establishing laws regulating access to political power Athenian politics were typical of this pattern In 546 after his third attempt Peisistratus established tyranny but contrary to the earlier norm he allowed his rivals to stay in Athens and even hold public office while also gaining popularity among the nonelites with a range of policy measures that benefited the poorer Athenians However under Hippias Peisistratus’ son and heir violent aristocratic clashes resumed as Hippias abandoned his father’s practices and imposed a harsh rule He was eventually overthrown in 510 and exiled A struggle for control followed In 508 the aristocrat Isagoras seemed to gain the upper hand against Cleisthenes another aristocrat who in response allied himself with the nonelite demos Isagoras then requested the help of the Spartans who in 507 invaded Athens Cleisthenes was forced to flee along with another seven hundred families in a typical form of the politics of exile But when the Spartan expeditionary force attempted to remove the government and restore Isagoras the Athenian masses rose up and besieged them The Spartans withdrew Isagoras and those of his supporters who did not escape were executed and Cleisthenes and the rest of the exiles were recalled Cleisthenes introduced a number of constitutional changes that reflected the new balance of power between the elites and the citizens setting the foundations of democracy3 They included the creation of a new tribal system that eliminated earlier geographybased divisions of the Athenians a revised definition of citizenship the transfer of policy making powers from aristocratic councils to the Assembly of the Demos the establishment of the Council of Five Hundred to assist the Assembly4 and the law on ostracism Aristotle Athenian Constitution 2215The institutional arrangements of the Athenian democracy differed fundamentally from those of modern democracies In a modern representative system of government political parties propose policy platforms to the electorate and then compete for votes Voters vote for political parties and choose candidates for office The election winner has a mandate to govern and pursue her proposed policies The outcome of the election contest depends on the proposed policies as well as on valence—nonpolicy issues like the personality of the candidate and her perceived competence On the contrary the Athenian system of government had no recognizable political parties competing for office nor did it have a permanent bureaucracy to administer policy Voters chose policies directly not individual candidates with the notable exception of the ten generals elected to lead the army in times of war Whereas in modern practice the government initiates legislation in Athens it was private citizens who brought issues for discussion to the Council political leaders did not propose legislation in any official capacity After its own deliberation the Council brought the issue to the assembly either as a specific decree already passed by the Council or as an open issue to be discussed and voted upon The assembly voted after listening to the speeches for and against the motion Implementation of the policy measures was then the responsibility of the Council and if applicable specially appointed committees of magistrates It is understood that the Athenians were a demanding audience often booing and jeering public speakers Hansen 1999 Almost inevitably those with a talent for oratory or rich enough to be trained in rhetoric were the most frequent public speakers as a result their views on policy issues became well known The political leaders won or lost assembly votes on proposed policies but did not win or lose office in the modern sense A political leader could not be voted out of office this was true even for those elected to the post of general to command the military since generals were “in office” only during military campaigns

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