Democracy doesn't mean one person one vote per se - it means governance by "the people" instead of the tyrant. Ironically a tyrant might be deliberately installed in times of peril by the people and then removed from office later on. Politics were quite robust in those days. Politics - from politike I think (never studied Greek, only Latin) - people of the city, also "police" is derived from politike or perhaps polis, which is nearly how Police is pronounced with a Scottish accent - especially around Glasgow.
Let's face it when the Greeks came up with a functional democracy, slavery was routine and obviously women and servants and other undesirables were ineligible to vote. Times have changed somewhat since then but there is still much work to do to ensure full equality for all. One day we may all be able to cry "Liberty, equality, fraternity" and not frown at fraternity meaning brotherhood and hence is rather sexist.
Anyway, what we have here in the UK is a voting system which is called "first past the post". It does involve one person = one vote but it is designed to avoid close results meaning a hung parliament. I don't actually know anyone who is a fan of this system but then again voting systems are quite a niche worry at the moment. The US system for presidential elections "colleges" is even weirder than ours for parliament/PM.
Quite obviously the UK cannot be the oldest example of a democracy because the word itself is way older than the UK and the old Greeks clearly invented the concept and lived by it! The current boast I think is oldest parliament "Mother of Parliaments" but I think Iceland may have prior art on that with the Alþingi - "allthingi". That letter that looks like a p is a thorne and was also used in English until we unceremoniously ditched it a few years back. Thorne also has a form that looks like y so "Ye olde shoppe" which is literally pronounced as "the old shop" but most hereabouts will insist on as something like "ye oldee shopee". Bloody kids!
Democracy doesn't mean one person one vote per se - it means governance by "the people" instead of the tyrant. Ironically a tyrant might be deliberately installed in times of peril by the people and then removed from office later on. Politics were quite robust in those days. Politics - from politike I think (never studied Greek, only Latin) - people of the city, also "police" is derived from politike or perhaps polis, which is nearly how Police is pronounced with a Scottish accent - especially around Glasgow.
Let's face it when the Greeks came up with a functional democracy, slavery was routine and obviously women and servants and other undesirables were ineligible to vote. Times have changed somewhat since then but there is still much work to do to ensure full equality for all. One day we may all be able to cry "Liberty, equality, fraternity" and not frown at fraternity meaning brotherhood and hence is rather sexist.
Anyway, what we have here in the UK is a voting system which is called "first past the post". It does involve one person = one vote but it is designed to avoid close results meaning a hung parliament. I don't actually know anyone who is a fan of this system but then again voting systems are quite a niche worry at the moment. The US system for presidential elections "colleges" is even weirder than ours for parliament/PM.
Quite obviously the UK cannot be the oldest example of a democracy because the word itself is way older than the UK and the old Greeks clearly invented the concept and lived by it! The current boast I think is oldest parliament "Mother of Parliaments" but I think Iceland may have prior art on that with the Alþingi - "allthingi". That letter that looks like a p is a thorne and was also used in English until we unceremoniously ditched it a few years back. Thorne also has a form that looks like y so "Ye olde shoppe" which is literally pronounced as "the old shop" but most hereabouts will insist on as something like "ye oldee shopee". Bloody kids!