Democracy in Athens
Citizens vote for themselves, without a king
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Cleisthenes' reforms of 508 BCE organised citizens into demes and created the assembly, the ekklesia, where every enfranchised man could speak and vote. The Council of 500 was chosen by lot, not election — the Greeks held that elections favoured the rich and well-known. The system covered perhaps 10–20 per cent of the population. Athenian direct democracy is not the ancestor of modern representative government in a straight line, but it supplied the idea itself: that legitimate power can come from below.
For children
In Athens the inhabitants decided for themselves what the city should do, by turning up and voting. That was something entirely new. But only free men born in Athens could take part — women, slaves and immigrants were excluded.
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Part of Terra Saga — the story of Earth on a timeline. terrasaga.org