Democracy: A Life

“The first part, and the bulk of it, is about ancient democracy. It’s heavily based on Athens because that’s the democracy that we really know about. He does point out that there were perhaps a thousand other democracies, but this is a big one…The last bit of the book is the revival in modern times—first of all, as an idea to be played with very cautiously. We’re talking about the British civil wars, the Levellers, the Diggers, and so on. There’s the cautious toying with democracy in the French Revolution. There’s some talk of the American Revolution as well. But with the French Revolution, very quickly we get Napoleon. And with American democracy, there was slavery. Then it ends up with some final reflections on democracy now and where we go from here.” Read more...

The best books on Ancient Greece

Christopher Pelling, Classicist