Democratic Lessons: What the Greeks Can Teach Us: A Conversation with Josiah Ober

This book is based on an in-depth conversation with Josiah Ober, Tsakopoulos-Kounalakis Professor in Honor of Constantine Mitsotakis Professor of Political Science and Classics at Stanford University. Topics include the serendipitous factors that led Ober to study the classical world, the insights that examining rhetoric provide about ancient Athenian society, and how social media might help us fruitfully recreate aspects of the past. Ober discusses his insights that the ancient Athenians didn’t just happen to stumble upon the idea of democracy—they somehow managed to make it work in practice for the better part of 200 years, all the while facing many of the same divisive societal pressures that we are currently grappling with.
This carefully-edited book includes an introduction, Back to the Future, and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter:
I. Cutting One’s Wisdom Teeth - How a girlfriend’s dental work leads to Thucydides
II. Digging Deeper - Contrasting wars and lurking contradictions
III. Battling Iron Laws - Athenian democracy as a counterexample to theories of oligarchic inevitability
IV. Feet to the Fire? - Using new and old media to keep politicians on point
V. Why Athens? - Addressing elite capture and economic and political equality
VI. Dissent - Critiquing our system or our values
VII. Enter Aristotle - The perils of being a cat in a box
VIII. Increasing Eudaimonia - Improving democracy
IX. Dignity - An essential ingredient of a flourishing democracy
X. Keeping It Real - Engaging the general public with scholarly insights
Democratic Lessons: What the Greeks Can Teach Us is also part of the five-part Ideas Roadshow Collection, Conversations About Politics, which is available in hardcover, paperback and electronic format.
About Ideas Roadshow Conversations: Presented in an accessible, conversational format, Ideas Roadshow books not only explore frontline academic research but also reveal the inspirations and personal journeys behind the research.