Imperial Democratic Citizenship: Ancient Athens, Republican Rome, and America

The concept of citizenship, which is unknown to the states and empires of the Ancient Near East, constitutes one of the most salient features of the Greek and Roman World. The article discusses the concept from Archaic Greece to Late Antiquity.

2017

Politeia in Greek Federal States 78 Chiara Lasagni 4 The Case of Multiple Citizenship Holders in the Graeco-Roman East 110 Andreea Ștefan part 2 Citizens and Non-citizens in the Roman World 5 Citizens among Outsiders in Plautus's Roman Cosmopolis. A Moment of Change 135 Elena Isayev For use by the Author only | © 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV vi contents 6 Were Children Second-Class Citizens in Roman Society? Information Technology Resources for a New Vision of an Ancient Issue 156 Donato Fasolini 7 Egyptians and Citizenship from the First Century ad to the Constitutio Antoniniana 172 Valerio Marotta 8 Fifty Years before the Antonine Constitution: Access to Roman Citizenship and Exclusive Rights 199 Arnaud Besson part 3 Ancient Citizenship in the Philosophical and Political Reflection 9 Metaphorical Appeals to Civic Ethos in Lycurgus' Against Leocrates 223 Jakub Filonik 10 Alteram loci patriam, alteram iuris: "Double Fatherlands" and the Role of Italy in Cicero's Political Discourse 259 Filippo Carlà-Uhink 11 Ancient and Modern Sources of Hegel's Conception of the Roman Citizenship 283

This is a condensed version of a proposal I submitted for consideration of an NEH grant in 2019.

Citizens in the Graeco-Roman World. Aspects of citizenship from the archaic period to 212 AD, 2017

Politeia in Greek Federal States 78 Chiara Lasagni 4 The Case of Multiple Citizenship Holders in the Graeco-Roman East 110 Andreea Ștefan part 2 Citizens and Non-citizens in the Roman World 5 Citizens among Outsiders in Plautus's Roman Cosmopolis. A Moment of Change 135 Elena Isayev For use by the Author only | © 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV vi contents 6 Were Children Second-Class Citizens in Roman Society? Information Technology Resources for a New Vision of an Ancient Issue 156 Donato Fasolini 7 Egyptians and Citizenship from the First Century ad to the Constitutio Antoniniana 172 Valerio Marotta 8 Fifty Years before the Antonine Constitution: Access to Roman Citizenship and Exclusive Rights 199 Arnaud Besson part 3 Ancient Citizenship in the Philosophical and Political Reflection 9 Metaphorical Appeals to Civic Ethos in Lycurgus' Against Leocrates 223 Jakub Filonik 10 Alteram loci patriam, alteram iuris: "Double Fatherlands" and the Role of Italy in Cicero's Political Discourse 259 Filippo Carlà-Uhink 11 Ancient and Modern Sources of Hegel's Conception of the Roman Citizenship 283

BMCR 2021.12.33, 2021

The review is also available at https://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2021/2021.12.33/

2019

This chapter surveys the history of Roman practices of enfranchisement from their origins to Caracalla’s grant. It considers the varied purposes which enfranchisement was made to serve over several centuries and attempts to gauge the fluctuating pace of expansion and trace the changing shape of the citizen body. It also assesses the role played by Rome's distinctive approach to citizenship in its remarkable success as an imperial power. From the beginning the expansion of the citizen body was bound up with the expansion of Roman hegemony. But the fact that enfranchisement was regularly deployed as an instrument of empire does not necessarily mean that it was the key to Rome's success. Lastly, the chapter reflects on the implications of an expanding citizenship for Roman discourses of identity, with a focus on the imperial elite. Again, it is easy to exaggerate the importance of citizenship relative to others vectors of elite identity.

Polis: The Journal for Ancient Greek Political Thought, 2019

1994

In the contemporary United States the image and experience of Athenian democracy has been appropriated to justify a profoundly conservative political and educational agenda. Such is the conviction expressed in this provocative book, which is certain to arouse widespread comment and discussion. What does it mean to be a citizen in a democracy? Indeed, how do we educate for democracy?

2018

After the restoration of democracy in Athens in 403 B.C. the question of who should be included in the citizen-body was fervently contested. Two of the speeches composed by Lysias for delivery at this period have been interpreted by Bakewell (1999) as constituting a covert proposal of adding an alternative to citizenship by birth: legal naturalization. This paper argues that Bakewell’s interpretation misunderstands the argument of the speech Against Philon which is only concerned with eligibility to serve in the Council, and not with citizenship. Furthermore, the paper questions the validity of what Bakewell (1999) considers as Athenian stereotypes of metics (resident aliens), and concludes that these are more stereotypes held by modern scholars, generated by misunderstandings of the actual composition of the metic community, rather than ancient Athenian views. As the paper is addressed not only to Classicists, but also to scholars of other disciplines who might be interested in the...

Athenian Legacies: European Debates on Citizenship, 2015

Contemporary accounts of neo-Roman or republican liberty have subjected Berlin’s characterization of negative liberty to a thoroughgoing and compelling critique. However, in their attempts to present a more sophisticated history of negative forms of liberty, they have neglected to subject the other pole of Berlin’s dichotomy to a similar critique. In their assessment of the democratic tradition, republicans have remained trapped in the parameters that Berlin used to define positive liberty. However, Berlin’s characterization of positive liberty as a form of self-mastery that necessitates the subjection of the empirical self to the higher or rational self is rooted in the elitist critique of Athenian democracy. In the hands of republicans, Berlin’s characterization of positive liberty becomes democratic liberty without any historical examination of the institutional arrangements or ideological developments of the Athenian democratic tradition. This paper seeks to reassess the Athenian conception of freedom as ‘independence’ by stressing the significance of free labour in the Athenian democratic tradition. Republican political thought would benefit from an engagement with this critical literature because it raises challenging questions regarding the nature of ‘non-domination’ for any contemporary conceptualization of liberty within a capitalist society that seeks to go beyond the limits of neo-liberalism.