Polis 9780691155388 Hardback

“This is history-writing at its very best.”Times Literary SupplementA definitive new history of the origins, evolution, and scope of the ancient Greek city-stateThe Greekpolis, or city-state, was a resilient and adaptable political institution founded on the principles of citizenship, freedom, and equality. Emerging around 650 BCE and enduring to 350 CE, it offered a means for collaboration among fellow city-states and social bargaining between a community and its elitesbut at what cost?Polisproposes a panoramic account of the ancient Greek city-state, its diverse forms, and enduring characteristics over the span of a millennium.In this landmark book, John Ma provides a new history of thepolis, charting its spread and development into a common denominator for hundreds of communities from the Black Sea to North Africa and from the Near East to Italy. He explores its remarkable achievements as a political form offering community, autonomy, prosperity, public goods, and spaces of social justice for its members. He also reminds us that behind the successes of civic ideology and institutions lie entanglements with domination, empire, and enslavement. Mas sweeping and multifaceted narrative draws widely on a rich store of historical evidence while weighing in on lively scholarly debates and offering new readings of Aristotle as the great theoretician of thepolis.A monumental work of scholarship,Polistransforms our understanding of antiquity while challenging us to grapple with the moral legacy of an idea whose very success centered on the inclusion of some and the exclusion of others.