Athenian Democracy and Meritocracy

Athenian Democracy and Meritocracy To what extent did the Athenian democracy live up to its ideology of being a meritocracy, and to what extent was power still in the hands of the wealthy? Athenian democracy was an evolving process in the 5 th century B.C. The concentration of power in the political establishment would change considerably from when the first seeds were planted until the voting citizenship was expanded and new leaders emerged towards the end of the century. Democracy was not instituted in the name of human rights but for pragmatic purposes and it is necessary that we look at it in this light when considering whether Athens was a meritocracy and whether the wealthy still held considerable power in Democratic Athens. It is certainly true that Athenian Democracy, like all systems, on paper differed considerably to how it was implemented. In this essay I will argue that Athenian Democracy was largely successful in implementing a state democracy in which, to a large extent, there were no obvious discrepan cies over who was favoured in matters of society and the state. I will show that the Athenian constitution largely kept the city as a meritocracy, making its citizens equal before the state in matters of legality and political power. However, I will also consider the limitations of Athenian Democracy and to what extent certain functions may have limited its success. I will argue that the power of the wealthy was in most respects limited by the structure of the state but was held back to some extent by the inevitable advantages that come from wealth. I will mainly be arguing that whatever limitations there were, they were not enough to have a damaging effect on democracy as a whole. The Athenian Democracy allowed that only adult males of Athenian ancestry were part of the democratic system, which overall made up around 10-20% of the demos. Slaves, freed slaves, children, women and metics (foreigners in Athens) were excluded. It is obvious from this that to label Athens as a meritoc racy in the modern sense is absurd. In this essay, I will consider Athens as a meritocracy in terms of the rights and opportunities of those who are citizens, not from those who aren’t and will therefore consider to what extent Athenian Democracy worked the way it was supposed to. The wealthy did not hold power to the extent that it harmed the democratic process. The wealthy certainly did have many advantages compared to the poor, but this is not necessarily any comment upon Athenian democracy simply an inevitability that those with wealth will be able to achieve more than those without. The wealthy had power but not to an extent that was greatly damaging to the state. When defining wealth, I will consider Aristotle’s definition as including money, land, real estate, furniture, livestock and a high quality and quantity of slaves (Rhet. 1361a12-16). There was most definitely a significant wealth inequality amongst Athens’s citizens whereby the leisure class (thos e who didn’t need to work as a result of family fortunes, nobility etc.) made up roughly 5-10% of the populace. This class barrier was certainly realised by the lower classes who often showed their resentment at the wealthy. However despite this inequality, they did not see this as particularly affecting when it came down to the political and legal powers of the people, as this inequality was grudgingly accepted. Wealth discrepancies were not seen as unjust as potential legal or political barriers that may have affected the citizens. (see Ober ch.5)

Manipulating Data Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Manipulating Data - Essay Example It is the result of an old code that is modified over the years plenty of times. Another aspect is that changing one part of the code would have unpredictable effects on all the other parts of the program, just as a bowl of spaghetti where pulling one can affect all the other strands. Thus the complex structure is named after spaghetti. Spaghetti code is caused mainly by inexperienced programmers following their mandates and creating a complex program which is being modified by several other people previously. Structured programming however decreases the chance of spaghetti code (Dixit, 2007, p. 92). The structured programming was a method formed in 1966 as a logical programming method which is a precursor to the object-oriented programming. This programming method is aimed to improve the quality, clarity, and development time of computer programs through the extensive use of block structures and subroutines instead of simple tests such as GOTO statements resulting in spaghetti code which makes it difficult to maintain and follow (Agarwal, 2009, p. 253). Modular programming has been functioning since the 1970s as a technique which subdivides a computer program in various other sub-programs. It separates the computer programs into individual and independent modules. It is a separate software component which is used with many other applications and functions in the system. The functions which are similar are grouped together while the separate functions are grouped as separate units. Object-oriented programming can be used with modular programming as it allows multiple programmers to work on divided programs independently (Mitchell, 2003, p. 239). Object-oriented programming is the method which is most commonly used today. It provides a programming model based on objects as it integrates the code and data by using objects. An object can be the abstract data type which has a state and behavior both. These objects can also be like real