Compare And Contrast Western Civilization And Greek Life

The rise, development, and the continuance of the Greek civilization was one of the most influential aspects of many other ancient and modern day societies. Although other civilizations undoubtedly have their own way of operating in their respective societies, Greek life was unique in the fact that they were not physically united as one. “The country's rough terrain and geographically isolated settlements prevented the Greeks from forming a highly centralized, inland empire like the Egyptians. So they adapted their settlement pattern to the prevailing geography and settled in small, independent city-states nestled in valleys between the mountains, many of which were located near the sea.”("Western Civilization I”). Greece was not physically a consolidated country quite yet, however they took measures towards unifying under one way of life. Greek political life was composed of a period of internal political reformations within their city states to figure out which system was the most effective for while simultaneously attempting to encompass practices that they …show more content…
An oligarchy is a government run by a small group of people that have total control of the government. “Sparta and Athens differed drastically in how they viewed freedom” ("Western Civilization I”). In comparison to the Athenians, the Spartans had a less representative form of government partially because they believed freedom was a relative to Sparta itself, not it’s people. The debates surrounding Athenian democracy argue that they could not trust the people to make smart decisions, but who knows that the people want more than the actual people ("Western Civilization I”). “The city-state vested most political authority in its Council of Elders—28 men over the age of sixty” ("Western Civilization I”). By having a select few people from the same age group and gender vote for the entire masses does not guarantee equality nor a sense of belonging in the