Athenian Empire Killed Athenian Democracy

The greatest threat to Athenian democracy was Athenian empire. As Athenian influence expanded and was maintained by force of empire, Athens internal democracy became unsafe. Athens, rather than making Greece safe for democracy, imperiled democracy's very existence. Ultimately, Athens grew into Empire by creating international government, where the power was placed in Athen's favor, allowing Athens to eventually absorb other states. This tremendous injustice, while spurring Athens on to imperial omnipotence, also predicted her downfall and eventual subjugation.

How this came to pass is as long as history, but much of the pieces came into place around 449 B.C. while in the aftermath of the Persian Invasion. The war with the Persians forged new powers in Greece and Athens became one of the foremost states alongside Sparta. Most of the lesser city-states were aligned behind the two monolithic giants in a primitive League of Nations called the Delian League. Perhaps a just political union between the separate Grecian cities would be a good thing, but the Delian League was not a servant of justice, but an Athenian tool to coerce the other political bodies in the league by exacting tributes from the rest.

Athens then became very rich, but increasingly unpopular until Sparta broke off to form the Peloponnesian League, brining many of the other states in the former league with them. In addition, many of the states subject to Athens and not inducted into the Peloponnesian League dissolved the political bands which connected them to the Delian League by revolting. With such tumult and injustice in Greece, the immediate recourse was to war: The Peloponnesian War. Which war forced Athens to suffer through deadly plagues, appalling ravages, and catastrophic defeats. The conclusion of the war found Athens soundly defeated and her former democracy corrupted and degenerate. In the end, Sparta acting as overseer, replaced Athenian Democracy with whatever governance Sparta saw fit to institute. After this new development, Athens fate was not always in Athenian hands, for after Spartan rule came Thracian, then Macedonian, Alexandrian, later followed by the Romans, Byzantines, and Ottoman Turks, among other subjugators throughout time.

History is a boneyard of dead empires and conquered peoples. Moreover, there seems to be no set cast, for one is king one day and vagabond the next. The tyrant ends his days being tyrannized it seems. It is a mystery, where the Western World would be if Athens, instead of exercising cruel dominion over her fellows, acted is justice with them. What if Athens, instead of enveloping nations against their wills, only took those into the fold that came willingly? Would the world be more politically stable?