The classical Athenian 'state' had almost no formal coercive apparatus to ensure order or compliance with law: there was no professional police force or public prosecutor, and nearly every step in the legal process depended on private initiative. And yet Athens was a remarkably peaceful and well-ordered society by both ancient and contemporary standards. Why? Law and Order in Ancient Athens draws on contemporary legal scholarship to explore how order was maintained in Athens. Lanni argues that law and formal legal institutions played a greater role in maintaining order than is generally acknowledged. The legal system did encourage compliance with law, but not through the familiar deterrence mechanism of imposing sanctions for violating statutes. Lanni shows how formal institutions facilitated the operation of informal social control in a society that was too large and diverse to be characterized as a 'face-to-face community' or 'close-knit group'.
Author(s): Adriaan Lanni
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2018
Language: English
Pages: 240
City: Cambridge
Cover
Half-title
Title page
Copyright information
Dedication
Table of contents
Acknowledgments
List of abbreviations
Part One
One: Informal Social Control and Its Limits
1.1. Social Sanctions and the Economy of Reputation
Social Sanctions: Definitions
Social Sanctions in Action
Some Practical Limits on the Power of Social Sanctions
Ideological Limits on the Power of Social Sanctions
1.2. Internalized Norms
1.3. Self-Help and Private Discipline
Private Discipline
Self-Help
Self-Help in Response to Nocturnal Theft and Violent Attack
Self-Help in Response to Adultery and Fornication
Self-Help Beyond the Household
1.4. Settlement and Private Arbitration
Two: Law Enforcement and Its Limits
2.1. The Underenforcement of Athenian Statutes
Reduced Probability of Prosecution and Enforcement of Judgments
Uncertainty about Trial Outcomes
2.2. Spheres of Enhanced Deterrence
Economic Security
Maintaining Order in Public Spaces
Security from Theft
Securing the Democracy
Part Two
Three: The Expressive Effect of Statutes
3.1. The Expressive Function of Law
The Expressive Role of Law in Athens
3.2. The Law Prohibiting Hubris and the Treatment of Slaves
Legal Treatment of Slaves
The Hubris Law in Context
The Expressive Effects of the Law Against Hubris
3.3. Homosexual Pederasty and the Prostitution Laws
The Cultural Context of Pederasty
The Athenian Prostitution Laws and Modern Interpretations
The Expressive Effect of the Prostitution Laws
3.4. Conclusions
Four: Enforcing Norms in Court
4.1. Norms in Court
Treatment of Family and Friends
Moderation in the Face of Conflict
Honesty and Fair Dealing in Business Affairs
Loyalty and Service to the City
Norms of Private Conduct
Legal Norms Unrelated to the Charge
4.2. Enforcing Norms, Not Statutes
Unpredictable Outcomes, Predictable Arguments
Creating Incentives to Conform to Extrastatutory Norms
Norm Enforcement, Ancient and Modern
4.3. The Advantages of Athenian-Style Norm Enforcement
Facilitating Informal Sanctions
Compensating for Underenforcement of Statutes
Maintaining the Fiction of a Limited State
Five: Court Argument and the Shaping of Norms
5.1. The Courts as Sites for Debating and Shaping Norms
5.2. Case Studies
Aeschines, Against Timarchus: Testing the Limits of Noble Pederasty
Demosthenes’ Against Meidias and Against Conon: Debating Interpersonal Violence
Lysias’ On the Death of Eratosthenes: Updating the Law on Self-Help
Lycurgus the Norm Entrepreneur
Six: Transitional Justice in Athens
6.1. The Terror
Accession of the Thirty and Judicial Murder
The Creation of the 3,000 and Widespread Extrajudicial Killings
Informers and Citizens’ Arrests
Involuntary Exile, Massacre at Eleusis, and the Rise of the Democratic Opposition
Forms of Collaboration
6.2. “Reconciliation”
The Terms of the Reconciliation Agreement
Implementation and Resistance
6.3. The Role of Legal Institutions in Reconciliation
Courts and Collective Memory
Courts and Collective Memory: Discrediting the Oligarchy
Courts and Collective Memory: Constructing Unity
Courts and Collective Memory: Praising the Amnesty
Courts and Accountability
Participation and Social Repair
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
