This is the core chapter in the first part of the book (Chapters i–v, on democracy). Aristotle argues that democracy works best when the population consists largely of country-dwellers, not town-dwellers, because the former are disinclined to exercise too frequently the democratic right of attendance at the meetings of the assembly in the city; and he dwells at some length on the sterling merits of an agricultural population. Ancient literature is full of more or less romantic praises of country life, but Aristotle’s assessment is relatively cool and dispassionate, being strictly for the purpose of assessing political and constitutional advantages. Towards the middle and end of the chapter he notes and recommends certain measures of crucial importance to an ‘agrarian’ democracy; they affect mainly the related problems of land-tenure and qualification for citizenship.
This ‘best’ democracy is not an extreme democracy; and in this connection we encounter, not for the first time in the Politics, a doctrine of political checks and balances (cf. introduction to II ix). Aristotle believes that the extreme forms of any constitution are less durable than the moderate or ‘mixed’ (see e.g. IV xi–xii, VI v–vi). Hence in an agrarian democracy the ‘notables’ and ‘middle people’ have an important role: it is they who will do most of the ruling (they have the leisure), but subject to election and formal ‘scrutiny’ (euthuna, see II ix, n. 14), by the poorer people. Thus the richer citizens will not feel resentful at a democracy run by, and largely in the interests of, the poor; and they will lend the state culture, administrative wisdom, and stability. On the other hand they cannot, in language reminiscent of VI ii, ‘do as they please’: there is always the agrarian population to check them by its power of election and scrutiny.
1318b6 Of the four democracies the best is that which is first in order, as was said in the preceding parts of our work.1 It is also the oldest of all. I am referring to the ‘first’ as it would be in a classification by peoples. An agrarian people is the best; so that it is possible to construct a democracy, too,2 anywhere where the population subsists on agriculture or pasturing stock. For having no great abundance of possessions, they are kept busy and rarely attend the assembly; and since they lack the necessities of life3 they are constantly at work in the fields, and do not covet the possessions of others. They find more satisfaction in working on the land than in ruling and in engaging in public affairs, so long as there are no great gains to be made out of holding office; for the many are more interested in making a profit than in winning honour. An indication of this is to be found in the fact that they put up with tyrannies in the old days and oligarchies at the present time, so long as work is not denied them and nothing is taken from them. Some of them quickly acquire wealth; the rest are at any rate not destitute. Moreover, to have the sovereign power to vote at elections and to scrutinize outgoing officials makes up any deficiency which those who have ambitions may feel. For in certain democracies, where the many have sovereign power to deliberate but do not participate in elections to office (electors being selected from all by turns, as at Mantinea), even then they are content enough; and this arrangement too, which once existed at Mantinea, is to be regarded as a form of democracy.
1318b27 Hence for this other kind of democracy4 which we have mentioned, it is advantageous as well as customary that all should elect to offices, call to scrutiny, and sit as jurymen; but that persons to fill the most important offices should be selected from among those possessing a certain amount of property (the greater the office, the higher the property-qualification) – or even not on the basis of property at all, but ability. Running affairs of state on this basis will be bound to be successful, because the offices will always be in the hands of the best persons, in accordance with the wishes of the people and without their being jealous of the respectable men. Moreover, this form of administration will satisfy the notables and the respectable sort, who will not find themselves ruled by their inferiors; and their own ruling will be just, because others will have the sovereign power to call them to scrutiny. For this dependence, and not allowing a man to follow all his own decisions, are beneficial. (Freedom to do exactly what one likes cannot do anything to keep in check that element of badness which exists in each and all of us.) The inevitable result is this most valuable of principles in a constitution: ruling by respectable men of blameless conduct, and without detriment to the populace at large.
1319a4 It is clear then that this is the best of the democracies, and the reason also is clear, namely that the people is of the kind it is. In considering next the means whereby a people may be made an agrarian one we find that some of the laws which the ancients adopted in many places are exceedingly useful, such as absolutely to prohibit the acquisition of land above a certain amount, or at any rate to permit it only beyond a certain distance from the central citadel and city. And in many states in early times it was laid down by law that the original estates might not even be sold. A somewhat similar effect is produced by the law ascribed to Oxylus,5 which prohibits a man from raising a loan on more than a certain proportion of his land. In present-day conditions matters should also be put right by means of the law of the Aphytaeans, which is very useful for the purpose which we have under discussion. For the Aphytaeans, though their numbers are large and their land small, are all tillers of the soil: assessments are not based on whole properties but on portions of them so small that even the poor easily exceed the property-qualification.
1319a19 Next to an agrarian population the best is a pastoral people, which earns a livelihood from cattle. There are many points of resemblance to agriculture proper; indeed, when it comes to the operations of war they are in a particularly well-trained condition, physically fit, and capable of living in the open.
1319a24 Virtually all the other populations that make up the other democracies are greatly inferior to these two. Their lives are inferior, and none of the work they do has the quality of virtue, a mass of mechanics and market-fellows and hirelings as they are. Also this class of person, which is constantly milling around the city and the market-place, can all too easily attend the assembly. An agrarian populace on the other hand is dispersed over the countryside; its members neither appear at meetings nor feel the need of such gatherings to the same extent. And where in addition the countryside is so situated as to extend a long way from the city, it is easy to make a good democracy or polity: the populace are then compelled to make their homes far away, on the land; and so even if there is a market-place crowd, it should not be allowed in democracies to hold assemblies in the absence of the country-dwellers. So much then for the first and best democracy and how it should be composed. What we have said will throw light also on the composition of the others: they must deviate in order and at each stage exclude the next inferior multitude lower down the list.6
1319b1 The most extreme democracy, in which all share, is something which not every state can tolerate; and it is not likely to last unless it is well held together by its laws and customs. (I need hardly add more to what I have said earlier7 about the factors by which this and the other constitutions may be destroyed.) As to the setting up of this democracy and the establishment of the power of the people, the leaders habitually add in as many men as possible and make them all citizens, both the illegitimate and those born in wedlock, and those also who are of citizen stock on only one side, the mother’s or the father’s. This whole policy is particularly characteristic of such a democracy. Popular leaders regularly resort to such measures; but the addition of new members ought to continue only until the multitude just outnumbers the notables and middle people, and no further. To go beyond this point makes for disorganization in the constitution, and irritates the notables to such an extent that they barely tolerate the existence of the democracy (it was precisely this that caused the faction at Cyrene).8 A small admixture of inferiority is disregarded, but a large one is all too obvious.
1319b19 There are other steps also which may be usefully taken in promoting this kind of democracy, such as those used by Cleisthenes9 when he wanted to strengthen the democracy at Athens, and by the promoters of democracy at Cyrene. I mean that new tribes and brotherhoods should be established, more numerous than the old, and ceremonies held at private shrines should be concentrated on a few public ones; and in general one must fix things so that there is as much social intercourse as possible and a break-up of the former associations.
1319b27 Moreover there is evidently something characteristic of democracy in all the typical measures of tyranny – lack of control over slaves (which may be expedient up to a point), and over women and children, and disregard of everyone living as they please. There is a lot of support for this kind of constitution; most people prefer to live undisciplined lives, for they find that more enjoyable than restraint.