Compare and contrast monarchy, aristocracy, tyranny, oligarchy, and democracy as forms of government in Ancient Greek city-states.
In today’s world democracy is the most popular and encouraged form of government. However in its history, it was given birth to in an era that witnessed the use and implementation of most of its counterparts. I like to call those forms of government, democracy’s predecessors. Even though some or all of them were practiced after democracy came to existence, they were once considered as problems to which democracy was the solution. I will now examine each of these terms in the context of the Ancient Greek states and see how they all vary from one another.
Monarchy
Merriam Webster’s dictionary defines monarchy as, …show more content…
Athens was also a monarchy because it was led by a king. Sparta’s rule by two kings can be referred to as a dual monarchy. Outside of Athens and Sparta, most other Greek states used a form of monarchy.
Tyranny
“Cruel and unfair treatment by people with power over others”, as defined by Merriam Webster.
Most or all ancient Greek city states to some extent practiced this form of government. None more so than the Spartan government, which was a military nation with slaves that made up the majority of their population. Looking at this definition, it is clear that Sparta now has two forms of government it practiced. Slavery was widespread in ancient Greek. The unfair treatment of women and non- citizens was also widespread. These “cruel and unfair” acts were delivered by the men, soldiers, politicians and aristocrats (the people with power). The others as can be implied was the women, slaves and non-citizens.
Therefore it can be concluded that most of ancient Greek states had some form of Tyranny.
Oligarchy
Oligarchy is defined by Oxford as, “a small group of people having control of a country, organization, or
In today’s world democracy is the most popular and encouraged form of government. However in its history, it was given birth to in an era that witnessed the use and implementation of most of its counterparts. I like to call those forms of government, democracy’s predecessors. Even though some or all of them were practiced after democracy came to existence, they were once considered as problems to which democracy was the solution. I will now examine each of these terms in the context of the Ancient Greek states and see how they all vary from one another.
Monarchy
Merriam Webster’s dictionary defines monarchy as, …show more content…
Athens was also a monarchy because it was led by a king. Sparta’s rule by two kings can be referred to as a dual monarchy. Outside of Athens and Sparta, most other Greek states used a form of monarchy.
Tyranny
“Cruel and unfair treatment by people with power over others”, as defined by Merriam Webster.
Most or all ancient Greek city states to some extent practiced this form of government. None more so than the Spartan government, which was a military nation with slaves that made up the majority of their population. Looking at this definition, it is clear that Sparta now has two forms of government it practiced. Slavery was widespread in ancient Greek. The unfair treatment of women and non- citizens was also widespread. These “cruel and unfair” acts were delivered by the men, soldiers, politicians and aristocrats (the people with power). The others as can be implied was the women, slaves and non-citizens.
Therefore it can be concluded that most of ancient Greek states had some form of Tyranny.
Oligarchy
Oligarchy is defined by Oxford as, “a small group of people having control of a country, organization, or