What did democracy mean before liberalism? What are the consequences for our lives today? These questions are examined by this book.

Josiah Ober is currently a Professor of classics, political science, and (by courtesy) philosophy at Stanford University, California. He has been the Chairman of both a top-ranked humanities department within the department of classics at Princeton University, New Jersey, and a top-ranked department of political science at Stanford University. He has held visiting professorships in the UK, France, and Australia. His previous books have won prizes from the American Philological Association, the Society for Institutional and Organizational Economics, and the Association of Academic Publishers, and have been translated into French, German, Italian, Greek, Chinese, Korean, and Turkish.

List of figures and tables; Preface; Acknowledgements; Note on the text; 1. Basic democracy; 2. The meaning of democracy in classical Athens; 3. Founding Demopolis; 4. Legitimacy and civic education; 5. Human capacities and civic participation; 6. Civic dignity and other necessary conditions; 7. Delegation and expertise; 8. A theory of democracy; Epilogue. Democracy after liberalism; Bibliography; Index.