We live in a democratic world. Out of 193 United Nations member states, there are only a handful of outright authoritarian regimes[1]. Even in states where the rule of law is observed mostly in the breach and where the rights of citizens are continuously subverted by elites, there is the notion that the maintenance of power and legitimacy requires at least some form or popular elections – more or less manipulated – and respect for the established constitution[2].  Most monarchies are constitutional republics in all but nostalgic adherence to their charming feudal relics; and even the darkest corners of the earth pay lip service to the basic package of human rights enshrined in the United Nations Charter and declarations.

Our generation has become accustomed to thinking of this as the normal state of affairs, and that anything else is an aberration. It is extraordinary considering that less than 25 years ago, half of Europe lived under communist autocracies and the triumph of democracy was very much in doubt. 100 years ago, less than a quarter of the nations of the earth were democratic republics, and many of those in Latin America could only just be called that by act of grace. 200 years ago, in 1814, there were only two republics in the world, one of which was the United States of America and the other, the Haitian Republic: due to the issue of slavery, the US did not establish diplomatic relations with her sister republic for another 48 years.

In fact, for most of recorded history, democratic government has been the exception, the outlier. Most states, for most of history, have been ruled by some form of autocracy: monarchical, theocratic, oligarchic, aristocratic, military or ideological. The few have ruled the many and if the many didn’t like it, they could stuff it. So it is remarkable that the experience of 30 centuries of human government should have been turned on its head in less than 3.

As far as we know, democracy as a form of government arose only once in the 3,000 odd years of recorded history before it appeared in Greece at the end of the Sixth Century B.C. The peculiar conditions that allowed democracy, or demokratia[3], to arise in the narrow, rocky peninsula of ancient Greece – especially in Athens – are to be found elsewhere[4]. It is sufficient for our purposes that it did take root in Greece and was exported around the Mediterranean with the Greek colonists who settled distant shores.

It is undoubtedly from the Greek colonies in Southern Italy that the Romans became acquainted with democratic forms of government. When they finally threw off the yoke of the hated Tarquinii and overturned the foreign, Etruscan monarchy, they adopted a republican government as most suited to their temper. The early Roman Republic was by no means a democracy like Athens, but it was not far removed from the more oligarchical governments of a Thebes or Corinth. Over the ensuing centuries, the Romans extended the franchise – most unwillingly it is true – pushed and prodded by the growing voice and awareness of the plebian citizenry. It is to the late Republic that so many of our most recognized democratic visionaries looked in the XVII^th and XVIII^th centuries[5].