Thucydides: The Reinvention of History

[RamistThomist]

Kagan, Donald. Thucydides: The Reinvention of History.

Donald Kagan’s goal, whether stated or not, is to rescue Athenian democracy from Thucydides’ charge that after the death of Pericles, it was manipulated by successive demagogues. On a more positive note, we get a tour-de-force of the causes of the Peloponnesian War, the figures involved, and the disastrous (or happy, depending on your point of view) end.

What makes the Peloponnesian War so fascinating is that it seems easy to make parallels between Athenian democracy and American foreign policy today. We have the narrative of Sea Power vs. Land Power, democracy vs. strong man government. Kagan (or Thucydides) notes that this is one of the first wars in which money was a factor.

Kagan’s other goal is to rebut Thucydides’/Pericles’ argument that the war between Athen and Sparta (or America and China/Russia) was inevitable. I think the standard scholarly line at this point is that Kagan is correct, at least as the argument currently stands. Was war inevitable? If life in Athens and Sparta continued as is, then no. On the other hand, proponents of international democracy rarely consider Pericles’ warning: your empire has become a tyranny. You now have to keep it whether you like it or not.

Kagan’s method is to examine Thucydides’ word (logos) against the actual deed (ergon). To do this he consults Plutarch to see what Thucydides is leaving out.

My main contention is Kagan’s rebuttal of Thucydides’ claim that Athens wasn’t a true democracy. The most obvious point is the number of slaves and disenfranchised women. Kagan notes, however, that this was true of almost every society and form of government until a few centuries ago (and still true in the Middle East today). Fair enough. He then counters that numerous playwrights criticized Pericles, something he asserts would be impossible in a dictatorship. The implication is that means it is a true democracy. I disagree. Kagan has something in mind like “Free speech” customs. While they are often in a democracy (except for Lincoln’s and Wilson’s presidencies), they are not part of the definition of a democracy, and so can’t be relevant to the discussion.

More troubling, though, is that Kagan doesn’t address Athen’s dialogue with the Metilians. As Athens was taking them over (question: is empire consistent or inconsistent with democracy?), Athens says, “Freedom and hope is nice, but we are stronger than you are and there isn’t much you can do to stop us.”

Aside from this criticism, this is a fine work of analysis and historiography.

 

[Deleted member 11889]

The reason that Kagan feels able to make that assertion is because of the way he is defining democracy. Athens, in his mind, was a true democracy with respect to the way Athens proper was governed. They may have had an empire which they ruled by force, but the freedmen of Athens ran and governed Athens itself, and elected its officials, in the manner of a true democracy. As a democracy, it found itself in possession of an empire.*

You really should read his four-volume work on the Peloponnesian War, because everything else that Kagan writes on Greek history writes is an extension or elaboration of this work. It's one of the best and most enjoyable scholarly history works out there.** Kagan does consult other sources but he points out that none of them are as reliable as Thucydides (e.g., Herodotus, Diodorus, and Plutarch). So his primary tactic is to use Thucydides' own commitment to factual reporting to uncover the bias of Thucydides. In the process, he shows that the guy had some axes to grind (e.g., Cleon) and was willing to give a free pass to some epic blunderers (e.g., Nicias). Bear in mind that Thucydides was an officer in the Athenian military who was somehow implicated in the Amphipolis disaster, 424 BC, and spent the next 20 years in exile from Athens observing the war and writing his history (think of him as the ancient Greek version of Luke). Yes, he can be selective in his reporting, but he is committed enough to his historical approach that he proves his own undoing by factually reporting much of the evidence against himself.

Digressing somewhat, I find Kagan's other helpful contribution to thinking about history is his emphasis on analyzing decisions in light of the information available at the time, rather than basing their worth on the outcome. So, for instance, he defends Athens' rejection of the first peace offer under Cleon, noting how at the time, Athens had reasonable hopes of being able to continue the war. But he concurs with Thucydides' assessment of the second rejection as a poor move.

*This simply reinforces the idea that democracy carried out to its extreme logical end is an impossibility (anarchy), and that in reality a government is run on a spectrum of "<-- less democratic | more democractic -->" with Athens being far enough along in its government of itself to be considered a "true democracy" in Kagan's mind.

**The Melian dialogue is mentioned in here, and my hunch is that Kagan omits it because it's not particularly relevant to the aforementioned conception of democracy that Kagan employs.