Tyrant
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"Tyranny" redirects here. For other uses, see Tyranny (disambiguation).
This article is about a political ruler. For other uses, see Tyrant (disambiguation).
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A tyrant (Greek τύραννος, tyrannos) was originally one who illegally seized and controlled a governmental power in a polis. Tyrants were a group of individuals who took over many Greek poleis during the uprising of the middle classes in the sixth and seventh centuries BC, ousting the aristocratic governments. Plato and Aristotle define a tyrant as, "one who rules without law, looks to his own advantage rather than that of his subjects, and uses extreme and cruel tactics—against his own people as well as others".[1]
In common usage, the word "tyrant" carries connotations of a harsh and cruel ruler who places his or her own interests or the interests of an oligarchy over the best interests of the general population, which the tyrant governs or controls. The Greek term carried nopejorative connotation during the Archaic and early Classical periods but was clearly a bad word to Plato, and on account of the decisive influence of political philosophy its negative connotations only increased down into the Hellenistic period, becoming synonymous with "Authenteo" - another term which carried authoritarian connotations around the turn of the first century A.D.[citation needed] During the seventh and sixth centuries BC, tyranny was often looked upon as an intermediate stage between narrow oligarchy and more democratic forms of polity. However, in the late fifth and fourth centuries, a new kind of tyrant, the military dictator, arose, specifically in Sicily.
Etymology
The English noun tyrant appears in Middle English use, via Old French, from the 1290s. The word derives from Latin tyrannus, meaning "illegitimate ruler", and this in turn from the Greek τύραννος "monarch, ruler of a polis". The final -t arises in Old French by association with the present participles in -ant.[2]
Greek τύραννος is itself a loanword from a pre-Greek source, like βασιλεύς, and perhaps also ἄναξ, a loan from a superstrate semantic sphere. Speculations on Tyrrhenian origin connect the Etruscan theonym Turan for Venus (perhaps from an epitheton "*Lady", paired with Atunis "*Lord") and the ethnonym of the Tyrrhenians itself.[3]
[edit]Historical forms
In ancient Greece, tyrants were influential opportunists that came to power by securing the support of different factions of a deme. The word "tyrannos", possibly pre-Greek, Pelasgian or eastern in origin,[4] then carried no ethical censure; it simply referred to anyone, good or bad, who obtained executive power in a polis by unconventional means. Support for the tyrants came from the growing middle class and from the peasants who had no land or were in debt to the wealthy land owners. It is true that they had no legal right to rule, but the people preferred them over kings or thearistocracy. The Greek tyrants stayed in power by using mercenary soldiers from outside of their respective city-state. To mock tyranny, Thales wrote that the strangest thing to see is "an aged tyrant" meaning that tyrants do not have the public support to survive for long.
[edit]Corinth
In Corinth, growing wealth from colonial enterprises, and the wider horizons brought about by the export of wine and oil, together with the new experiences of the Eastern Mediterranean brought back by returning mercenary hoplites employed overseas allowed Cypselus, the first tyrant of Corinth in the 7th century BC, to overthrow the aristocraticpower of the dominant but unpopular Bacchiadae, who were killed, executed, driven out and exiled in 657 BC. Corinth prospered economically under his rule and Cypselus manages to rule without a bodyguard but when he managed to bequeath his position to his son, Periander, whose position was less secure, his son required a bodyguard of mercenary soldiers personally loyal to himself.
Nevertheless, under Cypselus and Periander, Corinth extended and tightened her control over her colonial enterprises, and exports of Corinthian pottery flourished. However, tyrants seldom succeeded in establishing an untroubled line of succession. Periander's successor was less fortunate and was expelled. Afterward, Corinth was ruled by a lackluster oligarchy, and was eventually eclipsed by the rising powers of Athens and Sparta.
[edit]Athens
In Athens, the inhabitants first gave the title of tyrant to Peisistratus, a relative of Solon, the Athenian lawgiver, who succeeded in 546 BC, after 2 failed attempts, to install himself as tyrant. Supported by prosperity of the peasantry and landowning interests of the plain (prospering from the rise of olive exports), and his clients from Marathon, he managed to achieve supreme power. Through an ambitious program of public works, by fostering the state cult of Athena, by encouraging the creation of festivals and supporting the Panathenaean games, in which prizes were jars of olive oil, and in his support of the Dionosia (leading to the development of Athenian drama) Peisistratus managed to maintain his personal popularity.
He was followed by his sons, and with the subsequent growth of Athenian democracy, the title "tyrant" took on its familiar negative connotations. The murder of his son, the tyrantHipparchus by Aristogeiton and Harmodios in Athens in 514 BC marked the beginning of the so-called "cult of the tyrannicides" (i.e., of killers of tyrants). Contempt for tyranny characterised this cult movement. Despite financial help from Persia, in 510 the Peisistratids were expelled by a combination of intrigue, exile and Spartan arms. The anti-tyrannical attitude became especially prevalent in Athens after 508 BC, when Cleisthenes reformed the political system so that it resembled demokratia (ancient participant democracy as opposed to the modern representative democracy).
The Thirty Tyrants whom the Spartans imposed on a defeated Attica in 404 BC would not be classified as tyrants in the usual sense and were in effect an oligarchy.
[edit]Aesymnetes
An aesymnetes (pl. aesymnetai) had similar scope of power to the tyrant, such as Pittacus of Mytilene (c. 640-568 BC), and was elected for life or for a specified period by a city-state in a time of crisis—the only difference being that the aesymnetes was a constitutional office and was comparable to the Roman dictator. Magistrates in some city-states were also called aesymnetai.
[edit]Archaic tyrants
The heyday of the Archaic period tyrants came in the early 6th century BC, when Cleisthenes ruled Sicyon in the Peloponnesus and Polycrates ruled Samos. During this time, revolts overthrew many governments in the Aegean world. Chilon, the ambitious and capable ephor of Sparta, built a strong alliance amongst neighbouring states by making common cause with these groups seeking to oppose unpopular tyrannical rule. By intervening against the tyrants of Sicyon, Corinth and Athens, Sparta thus came to assume Hellenic leadership prior to the Persian invasions. Simultaneously Persia first started making inroads into Greece, and many tyrants sought Persian help against forces seeking to remove them.
[edit]Populism
Greek tyranny in the main grew out of the struggle of the popular classes against the aristocracy or against priest-kings where archaic traditions and mythology sanctioned hereditary and/or traditional rights to rule. Popular coups generally installed tyrants, who often became or remained popular rulers, at least in the early part of their reigns. For instance, the popular imagination remembered Peisistratus for an episode - related by (pseudonymous) Aristotle, but possibly fictional - in which he exempted a farmer from taxation because of the particular barrenness of his plot.
Peisistratus' sons Hippias and Hipparchus, on the other hand, were not such able rulers, and when the disaffected aristocrats Harmodios and Aristogeiton slew Hipparchus, Hippias' rule quickly became oppressive, resulting in the expulsion of the Peisistratids in 510 BC, who resided henceforth in Persepolis as clients of the Persian Shahanshah (King of kings).
[edit]Sicilian tyrants
The tyrannies of Sicily came about due to similar causes, but here the threat of Carthaginian attack prolonged tyranny, facilitating the rise of military leaders with the people united behind them. Such Sicilian tyrants as Gelo, Hiero I, Hiero II, Dionysius the Elder, Dionysius the Younger, and Agathocles maintained lavish courts and became patrons of culture.
[edit]Roman tyrants
Roman historians like Suetonius, Tacitus, Plutarch, and Josephus often spoke of "tyranny" in opposition to "liberty". Tyranny was associated with imperial rule and those rulers who usurped too much authority from the Roman Senate. Those who were advocates of "liberty" tended to be pro-Republic and pro-Senate. For instance, regarding Julius Caesar and his assassins, Suetonius wrote:
- Therefore the plots which had previously been formed separately, often by groups of two or three, were united in a general conspiracy, since even the populace no longer were pleased with present conditions, but both secretly and openly rebelled at his tyranny and cried out for defenders of their liberty.[5]
Niccolò Machiavelli, building on this opposition, conflates all rule by a single person (whom he generally refers to as a "prince") with "tyranny," regardless of the legitimacy of that rule, in his Discourses on Livy. He also identifies liberty with republican regimes; whether he would include so-called "crowned republics" (such as modern constitutional monarchies) is somewhat unclear from the text.
[edit]Philistine "Seren"
The term "Seren", frequently appearing in the Bible as the title of the rulers of the five Philistine city-states, is considered by some historians to be derived from or related to the Greek "tyrannos"[citation needed]. In contemporary Israel, this is used as a military rank, equivalent to captain.
[edit]In the arts
Ancient Greeks, as well as the Roman Republicans, became generally quite wary of anyone seeking to implement a popular coup. Shakespeare portrays the struggle of one such anti-tyrannical Roman, Marcus Junius Brutus, in his play Julius Caesar.
[edit]Enlightenment
In the Enlightenment, thinkers applied the word tyranny to the system of governance that had developed around aristocracy and monarchy. Specifically, John Locke as part of his argument against the "Divine Right of Kings" in his book Two Treatises of Government defines it this way: “Tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, which nobody can have a right to; and this is making use of the power any one has in his hands, not for the good of those who are under it, but for his own private, separate advantage.”[6] Locke's concept of tyranny influenced the writers of subsequent generations who developed the concept of tyranny as counterpoint to ideas of human rights and democracy. Thomas Jefferson referred to the tyranny of King George III of Great Britain in the Declaration of Independence, and the concept was refined in turn to refer to the Kings of France, the tyrants of the Terror, and to Napoleon I in turn during the French Revolution and subsequent regimes.
Tyranny of the majority
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For the form of democracy, see Ochlocracy. For the Flesh Field album, see Tyranny of the Majority (album).
The phrase "tyranny of the majority" (or "tyranny of the masses"), used in discussing systems of democracy and majority rule, envisions a scenario in which decisions made by a majority place its interests so far above those of an individual or minority group as to constitute active oppression, comparable to that of tyrants and despots.[1] In many cases a disliked ethnic, religious or racial group is deliberately penalized by the majority element acting through the democratic process.
Limits on the decisions that can be made by majorities, as through supermajority rules, constitutional limits on the powers of a legislative body, or the introduction of a Bill of Rights, have been used to counter the problem.[2] A separation of powers has also been implemented to limit the force of the majority in a single legislative chamber.[2]
Term
A term used in Classical and Hellenistic Greece for oppressive popular rule was ochlocracy ("mob rule"). Tyranny meant absolute monarchy of an undesirable kind.
The phrase "tyranny of the majority" was used by John Adams in 1788.[3] The phrase gained prominence after its appearance in 1835 in Democracy in America, by Alexis de Tocqueville, where it is the title of a section.[4] It was further popularised by John Stuart Mill, who cites de Tocqueville, in On Liberty (1859). The Federalist Papers refer to the broad concept, as in Federalist 10, first published in 1787, which speaks of "the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority."
Lord Acton also used this term, saying:
The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections.—The History of Freedom in Antiquity, 1877
The concept itself was popular with Friedrich Nietzsche and the phrase (in translation) is used at least once in the first sequel to Human, All Too Human (1879).[5] Ayn Rand,Objectivist philosopher and novelist, wrote against such tyranny, saying that individual rights are not subject to a public vote, and that the political function of rights is precisely to protect minorities from oppression by majorities (and that the smallest minority on earth is the individual).[6]
In 1965, Herbert Marcuse argued the tyranny of the majority in his essay "Repressive Tolerance" on the idea of tolerance in advanced industrial society. He affirmed that "tolerance is extended to policies, conditions, and modes of behavior which should not be tolerated because they are impeding, if not destroying, the chances of creating an existence without fear and misery." and that "this sort of tolerance strengthens the tyranny of the majority against which authentic liberals protested."[7]
In 1994, legal scholar Lani Guinier used the phrase as the title for a collection of law review articles.[8]
[edit]Public choice theory
The notion that, in a democracy, the greatest concern is that the majority will tyrannise and exploit diverse smaller interests, has been criticised by Mancur Olson in The Logic of Collective Action, who argues instead that narrow and well organised minorities are more likely to assert their interests over those of the majority. Olson argues that when the benefits of political action (e.g. lobbying) are spread over fewer agents, there is a stronger individual incentive to contribute to that political activity. Narrow groups, especially those who can reward active participation to their group goals, might therefore be able to dominate or distort political process, a process studied in public choice theory.
[edit]Vote trading
Critics[who?] of public choice theory point out that vote trading, also known as logrolling, can protect minority interests from majorities in representative democratic bodies such as legislatures.[weasel words] Direct democracy, such as statewide propositions on ballots, does not offer such protections.
[edit]Concurrent majority
American politician John C. Calhoun developed the theory of the concurrent majority to deal with the tyranny of the majority. It states that great decisions are not merely a matter of numerical majorities but require agreement or acceptance by the major interest in society, each of which had the power to block federal laws that it feared would seriously infringe on their rights.
That is, it is illegitimate for a temporary coalition that had a majority to gang up on and hurt a significant minority. The doctrine is one of limitations on democracy to prevent the tyranny.[9]
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