Athenian Political Thought and the Reconstruction of American Democracy

by Euben, J. Peter; Wallach, John R.; Ober, Josiah

• ISBN13: 9780801429804
• ISBN10: 0801429803
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1994-12-01
• Publisher: Cornell Univ Pr

Summary

'I know of no safe repository of the ultimate power of society, ' Thomas Jefferson wrote, 'but the people themselves, and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion.'

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. 1
Norm and Form: The Constitutionalizing of Democracy	p. 29
Democracy: An Idea of Ambiguous Ancestry	p. 59
The Creation of a Legacy: A Manufactured Crisis in Eighteenth-Century Thought	p. 81
Democracy, Power, and Imperialism in Fifth-Century Athens	p. 103
How to Criticize Democracy in Late Fifth- and Fourth-Century Athens	p. 149
Frank Speech, Democracy, and Philosophy: Plato's Debt to a Democratic Strategy of Civic Discourse	p. 172
Democracy and Political Theory: A Reading of Plato's Gorgias	p. 198
The Tragedy of Critical Theory	p. 229
The Melting Pot, the Mosaic, and the Agora	p. 252
Athenian Political Thought and the Feminist Politics of Poiesis and Praxis	p. 265
The Zero Degree of Society: Aristotle and the Athenian Citizen	p. 289
Two Democracies and Virtue	p. 319
Selected Bibliography	p. 341
Contributors	p. 347
Index	p. 349
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