A wealth of political literature has survived from Greek antiquity, from political theory by Plato and Aristotle to the variety of prose and verse texts that more broadly demonstrate political thinking. However, despite the extent of this legacy, it can be surprisingly hard to say how ancient Greek political thought makes its influence felt, or whether this influence has been sustained across the centuries. This volume includes a range of disciplinary responses to issues surrounding the legacy of Greek political thought, exploring the ways in which political thinking has evolved from antiquity to the present day.
Notes on contributors
Introduction
Part 1: The Reproduction of Greek Political Thought
1 Sovereignty, Rebellion and Golden Age: Hesiods Legacy
Ioannis D. Evrigenis
2 The most politic historiographer: Thucydides and Political Thought
Neville Morley
3 Platonic Revivalists? The Cases of Simone Weil and Leo Strauss
Robert A. Ballingall
Part 2: Greek Thought in New Environments
4 Athenian Democracy and Its Critics in Republican Rome
Jed W. Atkins
5 Greek Legacies in the English Republic: John Milton and James Harrington
Rachel Foxley
6 Thinking about the Public Realm in Early Sixteenth-Century France: Plutarch
and Geoffroy Tory
Rebecca Kingston
7 Greek Political Thought and Modern Ideas of Liberty
Paschalis M. Kitromilides
8 No Trojan Horses: the Legacy of Greek Political Thought in the Early
American Republic
Arlene W. Saxonhouvi Contents
9 Islamic Political Thought and the Greek Legacy: the Social Covenant and
Charismatic Authority
Vasileios Syros
Part 3: Variation and Adaptation
10 Grotius, Hobbes and Rawls: Aristotelian Justice and Social Contract
Theory
Alan Cromartie
11 The relevance of relevance: Trends in Higher Education and the Legacy of
Greek Political Thought in England and the USA, 19001970
Liz Sawyer
12 Platos Political Works in Nineteenth-Century Polish Thought
Tomasz Mróz
13 Classicising the Radical Imaginary: the Legacy of Athens in the Thought of
Cornelius Castoriadis and Jacques Rancière
Carol Atack
Part 4: Greek Thought and the Potential for Dissent
14 Democracys Forgotten Futures and the Greek Political Legacy or, What
Histories of Dmokratia Do Contemporary Critiques of Democracy Need?
Alexandra Lianeri
15 Social Theory and the Politics of Recognition in the Writings of
Aristotle
Tony Burns
16 The Political Legacies of Greek Tragedy: Building the Beautiful City, and
Being Thrown out of It
Barbara Goff
Index
David Carter teaches Classics at the University of Reading. He is the author of The Politics of Greek Tragedy (2007) and editor of Why Athens? A Reappraisal of Tragic Politics (2011).
Rachel Foxley is Associate Professor in Early Modern History at the University of Reading. She is the author of The Levellers: Radical Political Thought in the English Revolution (2013) and has written widely on classical republicanism in the seventeenth century.
Liz Sawyer was an Associate Researcher at the Ioannou Centre for Classical and Byzantine Studies at Oxford University until 2021. Her translation of selected writings by Plutarch is forthcoming in the Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought series.
