In an effort to facilitate the pro-democrats’ ability to mobilize even if their regime is overthrown, Demophantos invented and the Athenians then promulgated the first-ever tyrant-killing law. Passage of the law—especially the swearing of the oath that it mandated—accomplished that crucial objective by inducing what I have called a pro-mobilization threshold sequence. First, it generated common knowledge of widespread credible commitment to defend the democracy in the event of a coup. Second, it incentivized brave individuals to commit the first public act in defense of the democracy—to “kill a tyrant.” In the event of a coup, therefore, it would be more likely that someone would commit a conspicuous act in defense of the democracy and that that act would trigger an ever-growing cascade of pro-democracy resistance. Pro-democrats would thus be able to mobilize in the absence of a functioning democracy
The successful mobilization against the Thirty Tyrants demonstrated that the promulgation of the decree of Demophantos did, in fact, facilitate revolutionary mobilization and thus secured the foundation of the Athenians’ democracy. Despite the fact that the democracy was overthrown and the Thirty sought to atomize the pro-democrats, Thrasyboulos and his men set out from Thebes reasonably expecting that they would attract a sufficient number of supporters—that is, they believed that the Athenian population was defined by a pro-mobilization threshold sequence because of the oath and decree of Demophantos. They were right. The pro-democrats mobilized and soon overwhelmed the Thirty.
Thus the most powerful and influential democratic polis in the Greek world had invented an institution that gave pro-democrats a credible threat—second strike capability—against their anti-democrat opponents. Henceforth, anti-democrats knew that if they staged a coup, the pro-democrats would nonetheless be able to mobilize in sufficient numbers. Staging a coup would now be irrational. Pro-democrats thus proceeded into the fourth century with confidence, knowing that their domestic opponents were deterred: the dēmos had the kratos to impose their will on the state.
Learning and Adoption Outside of Athens
Despite originating in Athens and being deeply imbued with Athenian democratic ideology, the citizens of several poleis subsequently promulgated their own tyrant-killing law. How did this happen? What significant dynamics were involved? What, if anything, were the larger effects? In order to explore those questions, I present a diffusion model that is based on inter-polis social learning. It is admittedly hypothetical. But, as I will demonstrate below, it is quite plausible; and it does provide an efficient and effective means to explore what we might call the Nachleben of the decree of Demophantos.
At its most basic level, the dynamic of diffusion likely consisted of two steps. First, the citizens of city x learned from the citizens of city w that the promulgation of tyrant-killing law helps defend a democracy by inducing (what I, certainly not they, call) a pro-mobilization threshold sequence among the population. This implies, of course, a broader awareness: namely, that the pro-democrats’ capability to mobilize is at the heart of the struggle for control of the polis. They (i.e., the citizens of city x) came to understand that if anti-democrats successfully implement practices of widespread disinformation and intimidation, pro-democrats would be unable to draw upon their collective strength, despite the fact that they all would like to do so. They learned, that is, that the revolutionary coordination problem constitutes perhaps the most serious threat to the viability of their democracy. But they also learned (from city w) that if they are able to generate and maintain common knowledge of widespread credible commitment to defend the democracy and if they properly incentivize brave individuals to take the all-important first steps in their defense, pro-democrats will be able to draw upon their collective strength and mobilize in defense of their regime, no matter how thorough the anti-democrats’ “anti-mobilization” practices might be. In brief, the citizens of city x would have learned from city w what the Athenians themselves learned in the late fifth century.
Second, the citizens of city x decided to promulgate their own tyrant-killing law.3 This was their “Demophantos moment.” After having considered what they were doing and why they were doing it, the citizens generated common knowledge of their pledge to resist tyranny and to reward tyrant killers. They now were defined by a pro-mobilization threshold sequence: henceforth, individuals believed that, if they acted in defense of their democracy, a sufficient number of individuals would follow them. The foundation of their democracy was thus secure. The promulgation of the tyrant-killing law also made the citizens of city x more like the citizens of democratic Athenians, the paradigmatic tyrant killers: they too had fully adopted the ideology of tyrannicide—the call to act “just like” Harmodios and Aristogeiton—as a means to defend their democracy. Thus not only did the citizens of city x learn from city w what the Athenians learned in the late fifth century, they became what the Athenians then became.
As the number of cities that adopted tyrant-killing law increased (i.e., as city x learned form city w, and so on), cities that had not yet adopted would become more likely to do so. That would be due to a number of reasons. First, the citizens of a greater number of cities simply became aware of the law type; word spread, that is, thus making promulgation conceivable. Second, it would be easier for a citizen of city x to convince his fellow citizens to promulgate such a law if he could cite examples of such activity in other cities. The logic here, too, is simple: if tyrant-killing law were known to work in many poleis, it likely would work in polis x too; it would thus be worth the effort to craft and promulgate such a law in city x. And finally, as tyrant-killing law became more normal, individuals in city x likely would want to become part of the movement—to have their own tyrant-killing law and thus become committed tyrant killers themselves.
The inter-polis cascade of learning and adopting would have increased the credibility of pro-democrats’ commitment to mobilize pursuant to the promulgation of their own tyrant-killing law. The single most important dynamic here is that people would have known that tyrant-killing law actually worked. If it were common knowledge in city x that the promulgation of tyrant-killing law helped the citizens of cities v and w defend their democracy, the credibility of the commitment of the citizens in city x would be increased: since everybody knows that tyrant-killing law works, people would be even more convinced that, should they act in defense of their democracy, a sufficient number of individuals will follow them. Thus the citizens of polis x—both pro-democrats and, just as important, anti-democrats—would know that their population is in fact defined by a pro-mobilization sequence. It is important to note, however, that the increased credibility would not just flow to new adopters (like from city x to city y, to city z, and so on): as more and more cities adopted tyrant-killing legislation, the credibility of earlier adopters to enforce their law would also increase—they, too, would be emboldened by the success of others and thereby maintain their own pro-mobilization threshold sequence.
The logical consequence of the cascading dynamic I just described would be the gradual creation of a common, Panhellenic, democratic culture that celebrates tyrant killing in defense of democracy, and thereby worked to lower the revolutionary thresholds among democracy supporters in the various cities. A level of cultural standardization or homogenization, that is, would emerge: tyrant killing and the use of public law (vel sim.) to make it a rational act becoming a common part of Greek democratic political culture. Thus, although the ideology and law type might have originated in Athens, it would become the property of Greek democrats everywhere. It would become the standard solution to the “defense of democracy” problem.
As noted above, my diffusion model and the effects thereof are by necessity hypothetical. But the following two points give it considerable support.
First, for well over two centuries following the promulgation of the decree of Demophantos, we find evidence for tyrant-killing ideology and/or tyrant-killing law when the survival of democracy is at stake. I have pointed out in this book
significant examples: in Asia Minor shortly after the Peloponnesian War; on the mainland during the second and third quarters of the fourth century; on the mainland in response to Philip II’s imperialism; in early Hellenistic Asia Minor. And there are other examples too. Timoleon’s campaigns for “democracy” in Sicily during the third quarter of the fourth century, for example, were clearly configured as anti-tyranny or tyrant-killing campaigns.4 And the leaders of the Achaean League from the mid-third to the early second century considered their enemies to be tyrants and were themselves prominent tyrant killers.5 We thus have evidence for the type of Panhellenic cultural standardization or homogenization that was predicted by my simple model.
Second, the “diffusion of institutions” dynamic I outlined with respect to tyrant-killing law is consistent with other episodes in ancient Greek history. This is particularly clear in the Archaic period, when institutions such as the alphabet, the hoplite phalanx, and coinage diffused through various areas of the Greek world, creating a certain decree of standardization in important domains of Greek culture.6 And this dynamic is also evident in the Hellenistic period, when peer polity interactions—that is, the transmission of information between the citizens of the various states—contributed to the standardization of a large set of diplomatic formulae and protocols (e.g., those involved with asylia, syngeneia, and traveling judges), of dialect (i.e., koinē), and practices such as euergetism and the epigraphic habit—to name just a few of the obvious examples.7 Simply put, good ideas spread throughout the ancient Greek world and contributed to a common Greek culture. The invention and diffusion of tyrant-killing law and ideology was part of that characteristic phenomenon.
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Tyrants, ancient as well as modern, fear the collective power of their people perhaps more than anything else. They have accordingly devised and implemented sophisticated practices that work to atomize the population—to prevent the people from doing what they actually want to do. And most often they succeed: thus the rarity of democracy in world history. Over 2,400 years ago, however, the Athenians invented a tool—tyrant-killing law—that enabled pro-democrats to draw upon their collective strength and mobilize against nondemocratic regimes despite whatever anti-mobilization practices they might have implemented. And like great technological innovations throughout history, it spread as the citizens of other poleis adopted it in order to gain control of their own political destiny. That helped secure the world’s first democratic age.
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1 This is the conclusion of the author known as “the Old Oligarch.” See Ober (1998: 14–27) on this author and his assessment of the Athenian democracy’s apparent invulnerability.
2 Thus Demosthenes (58.34) equates the annulment of the graphē paranomōn with the overthrow (katalusis) of the dēmos. On the graphē paranomōn see also Lanni and Vermeule (2013), Schwartzberg (2013), and Teegarden (2013).
3 The emphasis here is on the word “decided.” I do not here describe a “contagion model” like that used to assess the spread (for example) of influenza. The diffusion of institutions is the result of an individual or individuals’ conscious decision to adopt after having considered why it would be advantageous to do so.
4 See, for example, Plut. Tim. 24.1, 32.1. Plutarch also writes (Tim. 39) that the people of Syracuse buried Timoleon at public expense and conducted annual music and athletic contests in his honor “because he overthrew the tyrants.”
5 Margos of Karuneia killed the tyrant of Bura in 275/4 (Polyb. 2.41.14) and in 255 became the first sole holder of the office of strategos (Polyb. 2.43.2). Aratos of Sikyon was famous for his anti-tyranny policy and campaigns (e.g., Polyb. 2.44; Plut. Arat. 10.1). The people of Sikyon erected a bronze statue of him after he liberated them in 251 from the tyrant Nikokles. After Aratos died, they buried his body in the agora and conducted annual sacrifices to him on the day that he liberated their city (Plut. Arat. 53.3–4). Philopoimen, the last great leader of the league, personally killed the Spartan “tyrant” Machanidas in 207 at the battle of Mantinea (Polyb. 11.18.4). The Achaeans subsequently erected in Delphi a bronze statue of him in the act of killing the tyrant (Plut. Phil. 10.7–8, Syll.3 625; Plut. Phil. 21.5, Syll.3 624).
6 For general comments on the innovation and diffusion through the Greek world of the alphabet, hoplite phalanx warfare, and coinage, see Snodgrass (1980: 78–84, 99–107, 134–36).
7 On peer polity interactions in the Hellenistic period, see Ma (2003).
Appendix
The Number and Geographic Distribution of Different Regime Types from the Archaic to the Early Hellenistic Periods
In the introduction I made significant assertions about the success of democracy within the larger ancient Greek world during the Archaic, Classical, and early Hellenistic periods. I here provide the data to support those assertions. In order to present the data within a more useful and compelling context, however, I also provide data on the success of other regime types during those same periods.
The data are culled exclusively from Hansen and Nielsen’s Inventory of Archaic and Classical Poleis (2004), in particular from its appendix 11. I entered the data into a database that allows simple yet fundamental queries relating, most importantly, to the total number of cities for which we have regime-type information and the percentage of those cities that experienced the different regime-types in a particular period of time. The result, I believe, is a fairly compelling rough sketch of the relative success of the major regime types over several centuries.
I have not examined the evidential basis for all of the data that I included. Acknowledged experts wrote the entries for each of the poleis contained in the Inventory. If they suggest that city x experienced a democracy (or another regime type) in time y, I took their word at face value.
I have divided the data into periods of a half century. Using shorter units of time is unfortunately not practicable. There is one problem, however, in dividing the data even into periods of a half century. One of Hansen and Nielsen’s temporal categories refers to the “middle” of a century, which corresponds to the forth to sixth decades of that century. For example, C7m (“middle of seventh century”) refers to the years 660–640, C4m refers to the years 360–340. Yet Hansen and Nielsen also have temporal categories that refer to the first or second half of a century. For example, C7f (“first half of seventh century”) refers to 699–650, while C7 (“second half of seventh century) refers to 649–600. Likewise C4f refers to 399–350, while C4 refers to 349–300. The difficulty (for this appendix) arises when there is evidence for a particular regime type in a city during the “middle” of the century, since that city could have experienced that regime during the first or the second half of the century, or both. I have decided to have it refer to both halves of the century. Thus, for example, if there is evidence for democracy in city x in C4m, I mark it as experiencing democracy in both the first half and the second half of the fourth century.
I must also comment on what I mean by a city having “experienced” a particular regime type. First, that experience need not have been long in duration: if a democracy controlled city x for a month in, for example, C4f, that city experienced democracy in the first half of the fourth century. Second, a polis can experience several different regimes types in one half century. Thus the combined number of regime types experienced by all cities in a particular half century will be greater than the number of poleis for which we have regime type information for that half century; likewise, the sum of the percentages of cities experiencing all of the various regime types in a given half century will be greater than one hundred. For example, in a particular half century we might have regime-type information for ten cities, each of which experienced democracy, oligarchy, and tyranny. In that case there would thirty different regimes experienced by ten poleis, and the sum of the percentages of cities experiencing the various regime types for that half century would be 300: 100 percent experienced democracy, tyranny, and oligarchy.
I here present two charts that efficiently capture the data. Figure A1 indicates both how many cities are known to have experienced a particular regime type in a given half century and the percentage of cities known to have experienced that particular regime type during that half century (out of all cities for which we have regime-type information for that half century). Figure A2 indicates the percentage of geographic regions known to have contained at least one city that experienced a particular regime type in a given half century. The two charts thus provide a decent basis to quickly gauge the success of a particular regime type over time. The more successful a regime type is, the greater the percentage of both cities and regions that experienced it.
I also include the raw data, organized by half century. The reader can thus assess for himself or herself the accuracy of my conclusions.
Numbers of Cities for Which Regime Type Data Are Available
FIRST HALF OF THE SEVENTH CENTURY
There is regime-type information for 28 different cities: Amathous, Argos, Athenai, Axos, Epidauros, Idalion, Istros, Kolophon, Korinthos, Kourion, Kroton, Kyme (in Italia), Lampsakos, Lapethos, Lokroi, Marion, Metapontion, Paphos, Paros, Rhegion, Salamis, Samos, Sikyon, Soloi, Sparta, Sybaris, Syrakousai, Taras. There is regime-type information for ten (out of thirty-nine)1 different regions: Cyprus, Argolis, Attica, Crete, Black Sea Area, Ionia, Megaris-Korinthia-Sikyonia, Italia and Kampania, the Aegean, Propontic Coast of Asia Minor.
Figure A1. Regime type occurances over time.
Figure A2. Regime type distributions over time.
OLIGARCHY
Thirteen cities are known to have experienced oligarchy: Athenai, Epidauros, Istros, Kolophon, Korinthos, Kroton, Kyme (in Italia), Lokroi, Metapontion, Paros, Rhegion, Sybaris, Syrakousai. Thus 46 percent of the cities for which there is regime-type information experienced an oligarchy.
Death to Tyrants! Page 36
