Investing in democracy: the practice and politics of jury pay in classical Athens

Robert Sing

Research output: ThesisMaster's Thesis

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Abstract

From the mid-fifth century the Athenian democracy paid every citizen who volunteered as a juror for each day of service. This system of civic pay had the effect of reducing the loss in earnings ordinary citizens incurred by participating in government. Since the popular courts were a powerful institution of the democracy, civic pay strengthened the power of the demos and helped ensure that Athens remained a democracy, of the direct Athenian kind, in fact and not just in name. Compared with other disbursements made by the Athenian state, comparatively little is known about jury pay and the aim of this study is to provide an over-due reassessment of this important political and financial phenomenon. There is no clear-cut evidence for when jury pay began, but the introduction is conventionally dated to shortly after the Ephialtic reforms of 462/1. This date is not, however, problem free, and the possibility of a later dating and a connection with the citizenship law of Perikles (451/0) should be acknowledged. The implications of juror remuneration extend beyond adjusting the makeup of juries. The provision of public money was an investment in popular sovereignty and, at a time when the courts were being incorporated into the administration of the Athenian empire, an investment in the empire itself. The radicality of the dikastikon resides in the way it not only transcended but also synthesised traditional, private benefaction with the distributions of surplus revenue the state had long made to its citizens as shareholders in the polis. Analysis of the likely purchasing power of jury pay during the Peloponnesian War suggests it provided most citizens with only partial compensation for lost earnings. That ordinary Athenians appear to dominate juries nevertheless, is an additional reason not to dismiss outright as comic distortion the Aristophanic characterisation of jurors as lower-class elderly men.
Original languageEnglish
QualificationMasters
Publication statusUnpublished - 2010

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