ARISTOTLE'S CLASSIFICATION OF POLITIES.

I have now described, in a roughly chronological order, the different kinds of government which successively appeared in the Greek states from their infancy to their overthrow by Macedonia. I proceed to give clearer ideas both of the principles on which those governments were constructed and of the full meaning of certain terms employed in the foregoing descriptions of them, by stating the classification of polities which Aristotle gives us in his treatise on Politics. The time at which this work was written cannot be precisely determined, but part of it was certainly composed after, and other parts probably before, the battle of ChÆroneia225.

Aristotle observed all the governments that he knew, and as the result of his observation divided polities (that is to say, forms of government, or principles on which governments were constructed or might be constructed) into two classes, the right or normal polities in which government was carried on for the good of the whole community, and the perverted or abnormal polities in which it was conducted by the governors for their own private interest. Further, since he observed that in all the polities power was lodged in the hands either of one person, or of a few, or of the citizens in general, he subdivided each of his two classes into three species according as power belonged to one person, or to few, or to many. Among the normal polities the first species was characterized by the rule of one man for the good of all, and was known as as??e?a or kingship: in the second the few best men ruled for the good of all, and it was known as ???st???at?a or the rule of the best: the third, where a large number of citizens ruled for the good of all, deserved in a special and honourable sense the name of p???te?a(Polity, or the rule of p???ta?—a Commonwealth), which was more loosely applied to all constitutions. Among the perverted polities the first species was tyranny, or the rule of one man for his private interest; the second oligarchy, or the selfish rule of the few (who in practice were always identical with the rich); and the third democracy, the rule of the many (or rather of the poor, since the poor are always the most numerous) for the selfish interest of their class226.

The character of the several species of polity is better understood from the observation of concrete instances than from mere definition.

(1) Kingship, the rule of one for the good of all, is best exemplified in the monarchies of the heroic age of Greece, in which the kings ruled over willing subjects, came to the throne by inheritance and not by violence, and governed within the limits imposed by custom227. Other instances of kingship occurred in the early history of LacedÆmonia, in Macedonia, and among the Molossians: for in all these cases the kings owed their power to the gratitude of their subjects for good services which they had rendered in founding the state or in acquiring new territory228. Even the Persian monarchy of Cyrus and Darius, although despotic, was an example of kingship and belonged to the normal polities: for the power of the king was controlled by custom and acquired not by violence but by inheritance, and its despotic nature was merely an accident due to the slavish character of the Asiatics229. Beside the heroic monarchies of the Greeks we may set the governments of such kings as Cerdic of Wessex, Ethelbert of Kent, Edwin of Northumbria, and Alfred the Great: with the conquering kings of Macedonia we may compare Alaric the Visigoth or Clovis the Frank: and for the monarchy of the Persians we may find a parallel in the Ottoman sultanate of the fifteenth century.

(2) Aristocracy is constituted on the principle that power belongs to those few best men who are best qualified to use it for the good of the community230. The principle that power is based upon merit belongs to the best kind of monarchy, as we have just seen, and the only difference between aristocracy and this best kingship is that aristocracy gives the power to more than one and kingship to one only.

There is no instance in Greek history of an aristocracy pure and simple. The most aristocratic governments in Greece were those of the tribes in the heroic age and the government of Sparta before 500 B.C.: but all these were instances of aristocracy combined with kingship. The elders who formed the Spartan council were selected for merit and the councils were aristocratic: but the kingly power was important as well as the power of the council, and the Spartan government is to be classed as a monarchy with a large element of aristocracy.

The principle that power and merit should go together was very sparingly applied in the other Greek states, and the usual method of appointing to offices was by drawing lots among the candidates: exceptional instances of the use of voting in elections are found at Athens in the cases of the archons for a few years after 508 B.C.231, and of the ten generals throughout the period of the democracy.

The constitution of Rome in the third century B.C. and especially after the battle of CannÆ, when magistrates were selected for merit without regard to their patrician or plebeian order, and the senate, the supreme power in the government, was filled entirely with men who had served as magistrates or been named senators for high character and ability, is an example of almost unmixed aristocracy. The small non-aristocratic elements in that constitution were democratic or oligarchic.

It may be remarked that it is according to Aristotle an aristocratic feature in a government if officers are appointed by election and not by lot, because if officers are elected power and merit tend to go together232. Hence it may be regarded as an aristocratic feature in modern states that members of Parliament are elected, provided they are elected for merit: if they are elected for their willingness to give pledges, they are no longer elected for merit, and they will use their power not for the good of all but to comply with the wishes of their constituents, and the real rulers will be the constituents.

The appointment of the Premier and the Cabinet must be made according to merit and is aristocratic. The English method of selecting officers for the army and for the civil service by competitive examination is in principle aristocratic, being adopted because merit is shown by success in examination.

(3) Of Polity, the rule of many for the good of all, there are many species. Aristotle describes some of them in general terms, but does not name a definite example of any.

The first species was a form of government adopted by some Greek peoples after the fall of the heroic monarchies. In that age distinctions of class depended on military efficiency, and military efficiency on wealth. The only effective warriors were those who fought on horseback or from a chariot (we do not know whether chariots were still used in fighting, and Aristotle's words are ambiguous): those men who possessed horses, whether they served in war themselves or placed their horses at the disposal of other warriors, helped to furnish the effective part of the army; and, because they rendered this service to the community, they became the ruling class. In the Polity thus constituted the ruling class was not a large one, though larger than the ruling class in a mere oligarchy: and this species of Polity, though it was not oligarchy, had a somewhat oligarchical character. The second species of Polity was constructed on much the same lines as the first, but in a later age, when the effective warriors included not only the horsemen but also a much larger force of heavy armed infantry or hoplites. In this case, as in the other, military efficiency was dependent on property: the panoply, or complete suit of armour and set of weapons which a hoplite required, had to be skilfully wrought, and was a possession beyond the means of the poor, though it cost far less than the breeding and keep of a horse. The ruling class included every man who furnished, either for his own use or for use by another, either a war-horse or the equipment of a hoplite: and the ruling class was so large that the Polities of the second species were known in the times when they existed, though not in Aristotle's time, as democracies233. There were also many other varieties of Polities. In all of them, political power was shared by a class or classes which included a large part of the free men, and therefore the classes that were neither very rich nor very poor were of great political importance. The importance of the upper and middle classes might be secured by various methods: by conceding political rights only to those who had a certain amount of property, the amount being so fixed that those who had political rights were slightly more numerous than those who had them not; by giving political rights to all free men but compelling those who had property to be regular, under pain of a fine, in attendance at the assembly; or by other like devices.

The one feature common to all Polities was that they were made by a fusion of oligarchy and democracy. They were in one way democratic because they conceded political rights to a large body of free men: but in another sense they had a trace of oligarchy in their composition, because they gave more power to a man with property than to one who was very poor234.

From what has been said it is clear that the second species of Polity is well exemplified in the system of government which existed in most of the German tribes in the time of CÆsar or Tacitus: a system in which the assembly of the warriors, including both horsemen and foot soldiers, determined the action of the community. The name Polity may also be applied to the government established at Athens by Solon, in which the power granted to the common people was only just so much as to prevent them from being disaffected235: and to the constitution of Cleisthenes, in which the assembly of the citizens was supreme, but did not hold its meetings very frequently, and showed no undue favour toward the poorer citizens. And, finally, all modern governments with popular representative institutions, though they differ from Aristotle's Polity in many important features, yet have more in common with that kind of government than with any other that Aristotle recognises.

(4) We turn to the three perverted forms of government. Democracy, the rule of the many (or rather of the poor, since the poor are always the most numerous) for the selfish interest of their own class, will be considered first, because it is the least strongly contrasted with the right polities which have been already examined. The word democracy, as has been noticed above, did not always denote an extreme democracy, for there was a time when it was applied to those moderate governments which Aristotle calls Polities: and Aristotle himself is not perfectly constant in his use of the word, since there is a passage236 in which he makes it comprehend both moderate and extreme popular rule. The democracy however which we now have to consider is the extreme or thoroughgoing democracy.

From many passages in the Politics we learn what Aristotle regarded as the distinctive features and tendencies of complete democracy.

Democracy was a form of government which arose in cities with a large population and a large revenue: the whole of the citizens not only were theoretically admitted to a share in the work of governing, but actively and habitually exercised their powers, and those citizens who could not otherwise afford the time to attend assemblies were enabled to do so by receiving remuneration out of the state treasury. And indeed such a population had more leisure than any other for attendance at the assemblies and for serving on juries: for, as their private property was small, their time was not used up in attending to the management of it. The consequence was that under this form of government the ultimate authority in the state was not any established constitution but the mass of the poor citizens237.

Again in another striking passage Aristotle says that there are democracies in which the ultimate authority is not the established constitution but the mass of the people and the resolutions which the people chooses to make.... In these democracies the common folk becomes a monarch, a monarch composed of many men, a multitude reigning collectively.... The common folk, being a monarch, determines to rule as a monarch owing no obedience to the constitution, so that, becoming a despot, it esteems most highly those men who flatter it the most: and this kind of democracy holds the same place among popular governments as tyranny among kingly governments. The same temper and character is found in this democracy as in tyranny: both of them are arbitrary rulers of the better citizens, only the one rules by resolutions, the other by decrees, and the one is influenced by demagogues, the other by personal adulators238.

In yet other passages we are told that democratically governed cities are beyond all others anxious to ensure equality among their citizens, and that the use of ostracism for the expulsion of any man, who from wealth or personal popularity or from any other cause has unusual political influence, is a result of this anxiety239: and when we find that the practice of appointing to offices by drawing lots is democratic240, we may observe (though Aristotle does not say so) that this also is a striking exemplification of the same guiding principle. When we read that the principle of democracy is freedom241 we must, considering the tenor of two passages which have been already quoted, understand that the freedom that is meant is not the freedom of the individual but the freedom of the assembly to do whatever it pleases.

The marks then of a pure democracy as conceived by Aristotle are these: (1) All the citizens, and more especially the poor citizens, actively and habitually control the business of government, and come together in frequent general assemblies for that purpose: (2) The assembly of citizens is free to do whatever it pleases, not being bound to conform to any law, precedent, or established constitution: (3) Every citizen has, as far as the nature of things permits, an equal share with every other citizen of political power and the enjoyment of office.

It is certain that Aristotle regarded the Athenian constitution as an example of the genuine or extreme species of democracy, since that constitution cannot be brought under any of the other species which he defines: moreover he says explicitly that it is only in the extreme form of democracy that demagogues are to be found242, and we know from history that demagogues were plentiful and powerful at Athens. But much of what he says about extreme democracy cannot be taken as referring to Athenian democracy: at any rate it does not accurately depict the democracy under which the Athenians lived. In support of these statements, I may adduce two facts. Firstly, the Athenian assembly was not in practice free to do whatever it liked, and was not above the law and the constitution. It could indeed decide in favour of an unconstitutional measure whenever it chose, and its decision was carried into effect: but the proposer of the measure acted at his peril. In case the people after accepting his proposal continued for a whole year to think it good and useful, he was safe: but if within the year his measure became unpopular, he was certain to be condemned under a GraphÊ ParanomÔn, and to suffer heavy penalties. And secondly, the passage, in which Aristotle denounces extreme democracy for turning the common folk into an arbitrary ruler who defies law and precedent and oppresses the wealthier citizens, can only refer to cases in which the poorer classes take pleasure in reckless changes and in robbery of the rich: at Athens the assembly, though the poor citizens predominated in it, disliked changes and was considerate towards the wealthy citizens243.

The mischiefs which Aristotle regarded as attendant on democracies have certainly been found in some governments which have borne that name. Aristotle could not have denounced them as he does unless he had seen them exemplified in some Greek democracies: in the governments (nominally at least democratic), which ruled in Paris during the French Revolution, all and more than all the evils that he describes were to be found. Athens was practically exempt from them, and we may seek causes for its immunity. One cause, the long training that the Athenians went through under the constitution of Cleisthenes, has been already noticed: the other was that at Athens the principles on which Greek democracy was founded were actually followed out in the daily life of the community, the citizens gave their time and attention to the work of government, and the people was far more truly a self-governing people than any other that has ever existed.

From what has just been said it will be seen that I regard Athens as the sole historical example of a true democracy in the Greek sense of the term. The Florentine Republic after 1324 A.D. is often compared with the Athenian democracy: but, out of the three characteristics of Greek democracy, the Florentine constitution had only the two least important: the citizens had indeed, as far as possible, equal shares in the enjoyment of office, and the assembly was free to do as it liked: but the assembly was rarely convoked, and the true governors were not the assembled citizens, but some fifty citizens selected by drawing lots every two months or every four months to fill the various magistracies and boards which ruled the city244. In modern Switzerland some faint traces of actual self-government by the citizens can be detected in the yearly assemblies held in four of the smaller cantons, and in the cantonal and federal Referenda, or popular votes on new laws: but they are no more than traces, and do not make the Swiss government at all like the Athenian: and, beside this, Switzerland is a federal state while Athens was a city, and for that reason the two states are so unlike that it is useless to compare them.

(5) Oligarchy, or the rule of the few rich for the advantage of their own class, admits of several degrees and varieties. There is something of oligarchy wherever the enjoyment of public office is limited to those who have a certain amount of property: there is a larger element of oligarchy if the qualifying amount is fixed extremely high, or if the body of rulers fill up vacancies in their own number, or if offices descend from father to son: and the state is completely oligarchic if, besides all this, the law does not control the rulers but the rulers control the law245. We may detect a minute trace of oligarchy in Solon's constitution which excluded the poorest citizens from the archonship. Perfect oligarchies are exemplified in the BacchiadÆ of Corinth whose power was hereditary and set them above the law, so that they could order Labda's child to be killed, and in the EupatridÆ or hereditary nobles of Athens, whose oppressive rule necessitated Solon's reforms. Other instances of oligarchy are found in the exclusive rule of the patricians at Rome from 510 B.C. to 367 B.C., and in the monopoly of office which was enjoyed by the wealthiest class of the Romans between 150 B.C. and the time of Julius CÆsar. The most complete example of an oligarchy is found at Venice between 1310 and the fall of the republic in 1797.

(6) Tyranny, the rule of one man for his private interest, has been exemplified in the stories of the despots of Corinth and Athens. For other instances we must go to the great storehouse of illustrations of tyranny, the mediÆval history of Italy where, besides the well known despots Eccelin da Romano, the Visconti, the Medici, and Cesar Borgia, there is such a host of minor tyrants that pages might be filled with a mere enumeration of their names.

We are now in a position to make some general remarks on Aristotle's classification of polities—to see in some measure what it was, and what it was not.

Aristotle defined a polity as "an ordering or arrangement of a state in respect of its offices generally and especially of the supreme office246": and from this definition, as well as from his use of the word p???te?a, it is clear that he regarded a polity as the form on which a whole government and not merely a part of a government was constructed. But nevertheless he recognised that a government consisting wholly of kingship or wholly of aristocracy was, at least among the Greeks, merely an ideal or perhaps an imaginary government, and was not within the range of practical politics247. And herein Greek history shows that he was right: for we never find in it a whole government composed solely of kingship or wholly of aristocracy. On the other hand we find that not only kingship and aristocracy, but also oligarchy and democracy, constantly occur as forms or principles on which a part of a government was constructed: for example the ancient Spartan constitution was in one part kingly, in another aristocratic, in another democratic; Solon's constitution contained elements both of democracy and of oligarchy; and even the mature Athenian democracy contained a trace of aristocracy in the selection of the ten generals for merit and not by chance. Hence it is clear that, while kingship, aristocracy, polity, democracy, oligarchy and tyranny were polities, and each of them was a form on which a whole government either real or ideal could be erected, four of them at least, kingship, aristocracy, democracy and oligarchy, were also forms on which a part of a government could be constructed, and which entered in very various combinations into the making of actual governments.

From what has been said it will be seen that Aristotle's classification of polities was based much more on philosophic theory than on history and that, in some part at least of its extent, it is not a direct classification of actual and concrete governments.

The only actual governments which it directly and straightforwardly classifies are those which were constructed wholly on the lines of any single one of the six polities, and these were tyrannies, pure oligarchies and Polities. As to the rest of the governments which Aristotle knew, it enabled him to describe them admirably, but did not help him to assign to them brief, distinctive and convenient class-names: for instance, it enabled him to describe the Spartan government as containing elements of kingship, of aristocracy and of democracy, and the constitution of the Phoenician city of Carthage as containing elements of kingship, aristocracy, oligarchy and democracy; but it did not furnish him with any class-name for either of those governments other than the single word normal or the descriptions of them which have just been mentioned248.

It has been necessary for me in speaking of the Greek governments to employ some class-names, and the names that I have used are tribal governments and city governments. The mere fact of using these names implied an assumption that the governments of the Greek tribes and the governments of the Greek cities formed in some way two distinct classes. With the aid of the Aristotelian polities and our historical examination of Greek governments we may now make some observations which will help us to see whether the assumption was justified by facts.

Firstly, it may be noticed that all governments of Greek tribes were mixed governments containing within them in combination both the rule of the one and the rule of the few, or both the rule of the few and the rule of the many: and all governments of Greek city states were pure or unmixed governments, that is to say pure oligarchy, or pure tyranny, or pure democracy (in so far as a pure democracy is in the nature of things possible). In making this general statement about the governments of city states I do not regard Argolis from the time of Pheidon to 480 B.C., and Athens in the days of Cleisthenes as city states in the strictest sense of the term: for in Argolis the central city of Argos was by no means the sole place of importance, but was counterbalanced by the two ancient cities of Tiryns and MycenÆ, and in Attica in the time of Cleisthenes the rural districts were in some respects as important as the city of Athens.

Secondly, all the governments of the tribes were limited and constitutional, and all the governments of the city states with one possible exception, were absolute or unconstitutional. These propositions might almost be regarded as corollaries to those which preceded them, since in a mixed government the various elements impose limitations on the authority of one another, and ensure that each of them shall be subject to a constitution or general understanding about the exercise of power, while in an unmixed government the ruling person or class is likely to be subject to no restrictions: but it is more satisfactory to establish their truth from history. A moment's consideration shows that the mixed governments which prevailed in the tribes of the heroic age and at ancient Sparta, as well as those in which the military class were the ruling class, were all limited and constitutional. The unmixed governments of the cities were oligarchies, or tyrannies, or democracies. It is obvious that oligarchies and tyrannies were absolute governments, and in a democracy Aristotle tells us that the ruling class, the whole body of citizens, was above the law. The one possible exception occurs in the fully developed Athenian democracy, which was in many respects exceptional among Greek democracies. It is by no means clear that at Athens the mass of the citizens was an absolute ruler. The truth seems to be that it was an absolute ruler in so far that there were no limitations that it could not throw off at pleasure, but in practice it was very much like a constitutional ruler because it voluntarily submitted to formalities which restrained its actions.

Thirdly, in the tribes, government was conducted for the good of the whole community; in the city states, except perhaps Athens, it was conducted for the good of the rulers. After all that has been said, these propositions require no further proving.

We find then that in the tribes governments were mixed, constitutional and, in Aristotle's sense, normal; in the city states they were unmixed, and with one possible exception they were absolute and, in Aristotle's sense, abnormal or perverted.

Now that we have discovered from observation of numerous instances that the governments of the Greek tribes and the governments of the Greek cities stood in strong contrast with one another, we may try to find out the causes to which the contrast was due.

In the case of tribes it is impossible to make out completely why their governments were mixed, constitutional, and normal, because we know but little about the tribes and nothing of their history. But at any rate we may observe that the tribes were militant communities engaged in a constant struggle for existence with other similar communities, and that in such communities it is essential to the safety of each and all of their members that all the classes which contribute to the fighting strength should be kept contented and zealous in the common cause, and that therefore it is necessary that none of those classes should be oppressed and that each should have its fair share in determining their common action.

In the case of city states the reasons why the governments were unmixed, absolute, and abnormal are best seen contrasting a city state with a larger political community: for example, England in the middle ages. In that large political community it was impossible, owing to the size of the territory, the importance of the country districts, and the diverse characters of different districts, for any single person or class to engross all power and become the sole ruler. The size of the territory necessitated the existence of local rulers or magnates, the barons: and diversities of local character made each locality inclined in case of need to act for itself under its own baron. The result was that if any person or class attempted to become omnipotent and oppressive, some of the local districts rose in revolt under their barons and the attempt ended in failure. In a city state all the circumstances were different: the country districts had no strength or importance, the power, whether it was a person or a class, that ruled in the city, met with no resistance from outside the city, and, owing to the small size of the territory, had all its enemies within its reach, and could easily destroy them unless they chose to go into exile.

In my second chapter it was stated tentatively and without proof that there is an intimate connexion between the form of a political body and the form of the government by which it is ruled. The connexion between form of political body and form of government has now been traced in the case of the Greek tribes and cities, and it has been shown that the assumption which I made when I divided the Greek governments before the battle of ChÆroneia into tribal governments and city governments was one for which history affords justification.