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The Origins of Democratic Thinking

The Origins of Democratic Thinking

Paperback

Series: Cambridge Classical Classics

General ReferenceAncient History GeneralGeneral Political Science

ISBN10: 1009492977
ISBN13: 9781009492973
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: Feb 19 2026
Pages: 354
Weight: 1.04
Height: 0.74 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
The Athenians invented democracy - and as they grappled with the implications, they also invented democratic political theory. By reconstruing Protagoras the sophist, Thucydides the historian, and Democritus the cosmologist in the context of political developments and contemporary scientific, literary, and philosophical works, Cynthia Farrar's seminal study reveals the emergence of a distinctive and still cogent understanding of democratic order. All three thinkers wrestled with democracy's insistence on separating political from social identity and status. Unlike Plato and Aristotle, they constructed democratic theories that were genuinely democratic: addressed to citizens, and inviting them to interpret what their own and collective well-being demands in the world as it is. In a new introduction, Farrar makes the case for the continued relevance of the ideas explored in this book by recounting her own attempts to adapt Athenian structures of democratic citizenship and to reinterpret their democratic theory for the modern world.

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