Compare And Contrast The Four Forms Of Government

Several different forms of government were found in the city-states of Ancient Greece. In order to compare the qualities of the different governments we must first understand what distinguished each form from another. For this paper we will look at the governments types of aristocracy, oligarchy, monarchy, tyranny and democracy in city-states and discuss the similarities and differences of each focusing especially on those that share strong similarities. Aristocracies and oligarchies are both forms of governments that are ruled by a small group of people. In aristocracies that small group is intended to be made up of those that are in the best position to rule, “the morally and intellectually superior” (Aristocracy, 2016). Of …show more content…
Democracy was something new and experimental and certainly still influenced by those that would have been part of an aristocracy or oligarchy. Many of the city-states in ancient Greece cycled through these various forms of government as dissatisfaction with the current form of government or institution by a conquering party would implement a change. While these were all considered different in name they seemed to serve the wealthy and influential. Even democracy was often considered controlled by individuals, as Thucydides said of Pericles’ control over the Demos in Athens (Blackwell, 2003, para. 4). As there appeared to be so much instability in the governments of Ancient Greek city-states it seems like the identification of any individual system was dependent upon the person viewing it. And often was some combination of two forms. The oligarchy of Sparta might well have considered themselves an aristocracy. What might be a monarchy to one is a tyranny to another, what is a democracy to some may be a farce of an aristocracy to another. This is something that we still see with discussions of governments