The Road to Political Democracy: From Plato to the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union

Between the seventh and the fifth century BC, the political regime in some city-states in Greece evolved from monarchy to a kind of government by the free citizens called democracy, and this book drafts the red line of this type of regime. It explains democracy’s four main Aristotelian features—the rule by turn, the rule of law, education, and the role of the middle class—and describes and cites the historical milestones in its evolution. Touching upon on all of the pioneering stages through which political democracy has passed, this account quotes, comments, and highlights the specific importance of the main writings of American, British, French, German, Greek, and Roman philosophers, economists, jurists, and sociologists, and provides an overview of the principal declarations and international treaties on human rights.