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Why Did Athens Create The First Democracy

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Athens, a small city state in ancient Greece, created the first democracy in the world. A democracy is a government that allows all people to make decisions. Athens created the first democracy between the 5th and 4th century bce (bc) Before Athens, other civilizations did not create a democracy or a type of government that was similar to a democracy. This made it hard for Athens to create the first democracy because they did not know what they needed to do to create a democracy. According to the article that is titled The Making and Unmaking of Democracy, “The democratic Athenians had no historical model of democracy from which they might hope to learn”. This proves that Athens did create the first democracy and that they did not know what …show more content…
Oligarchies were rare, but some civilizations did use them. The oligarchies were governments that allowed a small group of people to rule. A monarchy is a type of government that has one person in charge. According to an article titled The Athenian Representative Democracy, “Democracy was not just a new form of government, but a new way of thinking in regards to the role of the citizen”. This proves that Athens was the first democracy. If the people had to think a different way, that proves that the people were not exposed to that way of thinking in any other civilization before. Even the people who were not originally from Athens had to learn a new way of thinking. This proves that other civilizations did not have the way of thinking that democracies need to be successful. The population in Athens during the time that they created the first democracy was anywhere from 250,000 to 300,000 people. About 100,000 of these people were actual citizens of Athens. Of this large population, only 30,000 of them were adult males that were able to vote in the democracy. That is only about 10 percent of the original …show more content…
Athens democracy was very similar to an oligarchy. The only major difference between an oligarchy and Athens democracy was that there was a slightly bigger group ruling. In an oligarchy an extremely small group of people ruled. Oligarchies were the most similar to modern democracies until Athens created the first “democracy”. It is similar to an oligarchy because if it was a full democracy, every person could vote. In modern democracies every adult can vote. In Athens democracy, only adult males that were citizens of Athens could vote in the democracy. If someone from a different civilization went into Athens, they could not vote unless they became a citizen. People who were in lower social classes, like slaves, were not allowed to vote even if they were adult males. In modern democracies, it is extremely easy to tell every person that votes what is going on in the government due to technology. In Athens democracy, this was not as easy because the government would either have to travel to the area that the majority of the people that can legally vote live or gather all of the people in one area near where the government is located. This proves that Athens created more of an oligarchy than they did a democracy. They were more of a democracy than all governments that were created before them. Athens democracy had a massive impact on modern

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