> afaik it dates back at least to Ancient Athens and was one of the tenets of their democracy: rich people were excluded from the political process entirely.
My only source for this is Etienne Chouard[1], a French teacher; it dates back to a 2011 video of a lecture[2] (in French). Notwithstanding political opinions, I expected his apparently factual take on history to be reliable; but I am now questioning whether he can be trusted fully in terms of intellectual honesty. Again, notwithstanding opinions, is he being genuine is his arguments, eg. not skewing history? I'll let you be the judge of that. I am not a specialist in Ancient history, though I have a bit of a formal pol.sci. background.
It wasn't about "rich" so much as perceived to be dangerously influent, my mistake. Note that it was entirely subjective, to be decided by a vote.
The procedure implemented was called "ostracism" and allowed the exclusion of anyone from political affairs for 10 years, simply based on a vote by citizens, without a need for justification whatsoever. Common reasons apparently were "he speaks too well", "craves power too much", "I don't trust him".
Thank you, HN for a quick and efficient fact-check.
[2]: https://youtu.be/HDg2sIZZi8I?t=2408 (40:08 to ~42:00) Note that the whole is quite interesting from a political science standpoint, again notwithstanding any political opinion (note that the speaker however does not refrain from speaking his).
Did a rather poor online search, and the closest I came to something on the subject I found[1] is this:
> Of this group, perhaps as few as 100 citizens - the wealthiest, most influential, and the best speakers - dominated the political arena both in front of the assembly and behind the scenes in private conspiratorial political meetings (xynomosiai) and groups (hetaireiai). These groups had to meet secretly because although there was freedom of speech, persistent criticism of individuals and institutions could lead to accusations of conspiring tyranny and so lead to ostracism
When your previous post said that "rich people were excluded from the political process entirely. You could either become rich or participate in politics, not both — in a direct democracy, no less" I took your claim to be that the rich weren't even allowed to vote in the direct democracy, not that they would be ostracised for being percieved to conspire with other rich people to influence that democracy using their extra power/wealth.
Edit: I just read your other fact-checking-yourself comment (currently under this one) and wanted to note that I wasn't trying to beat a dead horse. I appreciate your willingness to accept that your recollection/phrasing was incorrect.
I appreciate your understanding. And your phrasing, you nailed it.
Candidly, while nigh impossible to see things from the eyes of Ancient Greeks, I think the main take away (which may explain my incorrect recollection, as a shortcut/oversimplification) is that their view of democracy accepted 'sentiment' as valid motive, as valid 'reason' for principle and action. Part of such sentiment was suspicion, the sense of "feels right / wrong". It wasn't naive or blind, nor die-hard objective or quantified; the practice of democracy had to feel 'right', ad hoc. (I've read, in other contexts, accounts of suspicion against greed and wealth from this time very comparable to what we hear today; on a number of topics for that matter, like immigration or cultural identity, the words and perceptions of every day people are strikingly similar.)
It seems that human judgment was deemed 'sacred' or 'quintessential' enough for Ancient Greeks that they let it flow freely, though in some specific moments and places, carefully constrained within the whole political framework —remember that the point was less excellence thereof than survival of all.
Also interesting is the 'de-escalating' approach, ostracism has a negative outcome: not to 'empower' the good guys but rather to 'disable' the bad ones. Here lies a very important principle of their democracy: never give too much power to anyone, especially the ones you 'like' (it always backfires against democracy, as it did eventually in the Roman experiment a couple centuries later). Seek the minimum amount of global power required to fulfill the mission, less is more, lower is better. Concentration of power is a threat to the distribution ideal sought by democracy.
Whatever we think of it, the democratic 'experiment' back then lasted some 200 years, under these principles, and I think it's well worth studying if our current regimes are to become more 'direct' in the hyper-connected environment we now find ourselves in.
Source please.