Brutal physical revolution can, and usually does, end the tyranny of the few.

At the same time, its greatest accusation against rebels is this same desire to be alike: the suffragette is accused of wanting to be a man, the socialist is accused of envy of the rich, and the black man is accused of wanting to be white. That any one of these should simply want to be himself is to the average worshipper of the majority inconceivable, and yet of all worlds, may the good Lord deliver us from a world where everybody looks like his neighbor and thinks like his neighbor and is like his neighbor.

How astounded the future world citizen will be to know that as late as 1918 great and civilized nations were making desperate endeavor to confine the development of ability and individuality to one sex—that is, to one-half of the nation; and he will probably learn that similar effort to confine humanity to one race lasted a hundred years longer.

Today we are gradually coming to realize that government by temporary coalition of small and diverse groups may easily become the most efficient method of expressing the will of man and of setting the human soul free.

Instead of the artificial attempts to divide all possible ideas and plans between two great parties, modern legislatures in advanced nations tend to develop smaller and smaller minority groups, while government is carried on by temporary coalitions.

Peoples and governments will not in the future assume that because they have the brute power to enforce momentarily dominant ideas, it is best to do so without thoughtful conference with the ideas of smaller groups and individuals.

If the absolute monarchy of majorities is galling and inefficient, is it any more inefficient than the absolute monarchy of individuals or privileged classes have been found to be in the past?

Horror in Pink #2

dangerous perversion of the real democratic ideal.

viz., any minority that cannot become a majority is not worthy of any consideration.

Has the minority, even though a small and unpopular and unfashionable minority, no right to respectful consideration?

the seeming instantaneousness of violence—its ability to quickly deliver a result—foreshortens both strategy and a commitment to democratic transformation over the long term.

‘Those who labour withtheir minds govern others, while those who labour with their strength aregoverned by others’

They still didn't support myobjectives, though. It was all too dangerous.

By the time people realized that they had been fooled, it was toolate to do anything. Ben Ali had built a dense network of domesticspies-and a system of extrajudicial punishments-that kept thecountry in line with fear.

Many Tunisians believed that and countless other lies that fol-lowed

Thiswas where all the RCD students lived in relative style, two to aroom and without any elec;tricity cuts, which affected only floorsthree and above.

We were instinctively self-censoring froma young age.

Later, I took my criticizing activities to the Web, where I used aproxy-software that broke the censorship on Web sites that criti-cized Ben Ali. I enjoyed venting. But at a certain point I wondered,"Is this how I am going to fight against Ben Ali? Is this how I amgoing to change my country?·" The answer, of course, was "No."

most of us never dared to imagine another order.

From that moment, the questions and doubts I had aboutrevolt-and that many young Tunisians shared-were erased for-ever. The revolution had begun, sweeping from the south to northof the country like a steady, unstoppable wave

The mindset, however, was self-defeating. Tunisia itself gradually became a big jail

Shh! The walls are listening!" My parents taughtme not to talk politics, not to criticize, and not to think.

between these moments others make the decisions. The potential risk of this arrangement, as has been noted by astute observers since the birth of modern republics, is that citizens might grow distrustful of the people who are actually running government on a daily basis and of the special influences to which they might be subject. It’s worth noting that, among long-established democracies today, there’s a robust correlation whereby countries with larger populations tend to have lower trust in government.

of, roughly, only 20,000 individuals.

The first difference between early democracy and our democracies today is that this earlier form of rule was a small-scale phenomenon

In all of these societies there were several defining features that tended to reinforce early democracy: small scale, a need for rulers to depend on the people for knowledge, and finally the ability of members of society to exit to other locales if they were unhappy with a ruler.

But speechis for making clear what is beneficial or harmful, and hence also what isIS just or unjust. For it is peculiar to human beings, in comparison to theother animals, that they alone have perception of what is good or bad,just or unjust, and the rest. And it is community in these that makes ahousehold and a city-state.19

Hence he is the most unrestrained and most savage of ani- 35mals when he lacks virtue, as well as the worst where food and sex areconcerned. But justice is a political matter; for justice is the organizationof a political community, and justice22 decides what is just.

For as a human being is thebest of the animals when perfected, so when separated from LAW andJUSTICE he is worst of all.

It comes to be for the sake of living, but it remains in existence for the sake of living well

The reason all people say that the gods too are ruled by a king isthat they themselves were ruled by kings in the distant past, and somestill are. Human beings model the shapes of the gods on their own, and 25do the same to their way of life as well.

But thefirst community constituted out of several households for the sake of 1 Ssatisfying needs other than everyday ones is a village

That is why the same thing is beneficial for both master and slave.4

appropriate SCIENCE, ruling ISand being ruled in turn, has the position of statesman. But these claimsare not true.

Foras in other cases, a composite has to be analyzed until we reach thingsthat are incomposite, since these are the smallest parts of the whole, so if20 we also examine the parts that make up a city-state, we shall see betterboth how these differ from each other, and whether or not it is possibleto gain some expertise in connection with each of the things we havementioned.3

The good with the most authority is HAPPINESS, since everything else ispursued in part for its sake, while it is pursued solely for its own sake. Thescience with the most authority, STATESMANSHIP, directs the entire city-statetoward happiness.

In stark contrast to China and India, in the classical period no Greek school ofthought—indeed hardly a single individual—seriously considered opting outof his political community. The state and its politics were more central to theway people lived and thought than they were in any other ancient culture.

It was a relatively relaxed ideo-logical environment.

The gods were more like humans than in other cultures; they had humanemotions, foibles, and moral fallibility. They are not particularly benevolent(as they tended to be in the theologies of sacred monarchies

a widespread commitmenton the part of citizens to participate in public affairs

Nevertheless, there was far more popular control overdomestic and foreign policy, far more political participation, than anywhereelse in the ancient world, or in the vast majority of modern states.

Pericles noted that it was only at Athens that those who donot take part in public affairs (ta politika) are looked down upon (Thucydides2.40.2). By these means the citizens ‘gained control over the constitution as awhole’. 25

he powerful should thank him for preventing the populace fromdestroying their wealth. ‘I took my stand like a boundary stone...betweenthem’ (EG 28). Solon was both a moral thinker and a politician: he put hissolutions into practice by combining might and right (West, ed., 141) andpiecemeal political engineering.

Eunomia meant generosity(euergesia: doing good works) as opposed to pleonexia (being grasping)

What he tried toinstil in his fellow citizens was sophrosune (self-control, discretion, moder-ation); this became a fundamental moral and political value (Greenhalgh 1972:195–6). He spared no pains in pointing out to the Athenians that their poliswas in danger of being destroyed by its rich citizens, who, ‘lured by wealth...know not how to restrain their excess’. Their injustices are reducing the polisto slavery. This is a public evil, affecting everybody ‘even (in) the innermostrecesses of his bed-chamber’

hecitizens elected (594) Solon (‘the wise’), an itinerant Athenian merchant,as a special chief officer with full powers to sort out the class war betweenrich and poor. This tactic of calling in a ‘wise lawgiver with unlimited power’(CGR 423) was a major innovation.

networks of carefully nurtured personal relationships with peers, subordinatesand inferiors’

When a whole family, or one individual among the rest, happento be so outstanding in virtue that they exceed all the others, then it is just thatthis family be royal and sovereign over all, and that this individual be king’(Politics 1288a1.15–35). This no doubt had something to do with the examplesof Philip of Macedon, at whose court his father had served, and of Alexander,whom Aristotle had tutored.

The comic drama-tist Aristophanes (c. 448–380) made fun of leaders in Athens’ ‘democratic’polis; he was the only person in the ancient world who regularly and publiclycriticized active politicians without fear of reprisal

Moderation was a virtue;

The community of the polis, like other forms of state, superseded the clan asthe focus of loyalty and comradeship. Disputes were to be settled, wrongs putright not by feud and violence but by public law and in a spirit of civility whichone finds in such proverbs as ‘forgiveness is better than vengeance’, ‘winbloodless victories’, ‘obey the laws’, ‘do not speak ill of neighbours’.

This was patriotism, not nationalism.The polis ‘became the focus of a man’s moral, intellectual, aesthetic [as well as]social and practical life’ (Kitto 1951: 11).

In contrast to nearly every other literate ancient society, these were face-to-face communities, small enough for all citizens to meet together in one place,the agora (both market-place and assembly). 10 This was the only time in worldhistory that such relatively intimate communities flourished as sovereignstates.

The success of the polis as a type of political society depended crucially onits male members being willing to die for it (despite a slender belief in life afterdeath).

One’s own survival and that of one’sfamily depended on people with whom one had face-to-face contact. Govern-ment by the citizens could be maintained because it was the mass of citizenswho made up the predominant military force, the hoplites (heavy infantry), anextremely effective ‘block of identically equipped troops’.6 There was a con-nection between military and political participation. In fifth-century Athens,some justified dēmokratia7 on the ground that the state’s power rested on thenavy, which was manned by the common people

They were united by their language, religion, mythology,epic poetry (their nearest equivalent of scripture) and commerce. The Greeksare good example of a people united in their stories

The concerns of anoble person, said Mengzi, should be his family, his reputation, and theeducation of talented youngsters. Thus Confucians saw improvement ofmorals and culture as an end in itself.

Thus Confucians saw improvement ofmorals and culture as an end in itself.

The development of ethics in China from the sixth to thethird centuries BCE was more state-oriented than analogous developmentselsewhere. There was no mention of rewards in an afterlife.

The Confucian view, similarly, was one of enlightened paternalism: it is theduty of government to look after the people, but there was no suggestion thatthe people were to be consulted about how this should be done. On thecontrary, the people are, as a matter of observable fact, moulded by whoeveris in power: ‘if you desire the good, the people will be good. The virtue of thegentleman is the wind; the virtue of the people is the grass’ (CA 12.17, 19).Similarly, ‘if one day [the ruler] can overcome himself and turn to humane-ness, the world will turn to humaneness along with him’ (CA 12.1; 13.12). TheConfucian ideal was a moral ruler and a moral ruling class who would give thepeople moral leadership.

Some Chinese writers seem to have come tantalizingly close to this.According to a sixth-century source, ministers who are members of the royalfamily could depose a ruler who persists in his mistakes; in doing so, they wouldbe carrying out the will of Heaven and of the people.

All this might be thought to imply that acceptance by the common peoplewas necessary for holding the Mandate.

The people, especially the poor and the disad-vantaged or disabled, should be treated kindly by their social superiors (‘leadthem, work them . . . Do not weary them’: CA 13.1).21 This was in accordancewith the view stated in the Odes: the people are ‘indeed heavily burdened and itis time for them to rest a while’.22

deviate from the way of virtue and behave oppressivelyand licentiously, they will lose Heaven’s Mandate’

The difference between the nobleand the ‘small’ man was that the former ‘concentrates on right’, the latter on‘advantage’, especially financial gain

But discussion was limited to monarchy and did not, as in Greece, considerother types of state.

The revolution of c. 1046 BCE was based on, or gave rise to, the beliefthat the ‘Mandate (or Decree) of Heaven’ (tian ming) had passed to theZhou lineage, because of the Shang’s misrule and the virtue (de) 5 of theZhou.

. During this period of politicalflux and frequent warfare, Chinese philosophy got started—much as it didduring the age of independent poleis in Greece

Egypt’s was the first expression of sacred monarchy. It was effective for anenormous stretch of time because it was tied in to the current view of the waythings were.

I made the four winds that every manmight breathe thereof like his fellow...I made the great inundation that thepoor man might have rights therein like the great man...I made every manlike his fellow’ (c. 2000 BCE : ANE 7–8). Appointments should be made on thebasis of merit, not status (‘do not prefer the wellborn to the commoner, choosea man on account of his skills’) (Merikare, in Lichtheim: i. 101). Male andfemale were on the same moral plane. Was this related to the wide gulfbetween pharaoh and all subjects

urged to ‘administerequal justice to all’ regardless of wealth, status, or affinity to the judge

The wealthy and powerful have an obligation to provide for the poor andvulnerable. This was a central principle of the patrimonial state

Partly as a consequence, it was themost extreme theory of absolute monarchy.

nationalist religious imperialism