Progress Review: Peace and Public Discourse in Classical Athens: Evidence from the Ekklēsia - Gordon Chadwick

Continuing my research into the place of peace in the public discourse of democratic Athens, in this seminar I will present evidence from my investigation of peace in deliberative oratory ­– i.e. policy speeches delivered in the ekklēsia by orators like Demosthenes and Andocides – which, I will argue, further supports my thesis that classical Athens’ peace discourse was underdeveloped and cursory, especially when compared to the polis’ robust war discourse. I will begin by briefly summarising the content of my first two chapters, which examined modern political science and international relations theories which posit a positive relationship between peace and democracy, before demonstrating how evidence from the Athenian funeral orations (epitaphioi logoi) challenges these assumptions. I will then present the findings of my third chapter, beginning by explaining the methodological framework I have developed for assessing peace discourse in Athenian deliberative oratory based on the rhetorical treatises of Aristotle (Rhetoric) and Anaximenes of Lampascus (Rhetorica ad Alexandrum). Finally, I will present several examples of speeches I have analysed in my chapter using this framework to argue that, much like the funeral orations, Athenian deliberative oratory did not feature a substantive peace discourse and, conversely, was characterised by a pervasive war discourse which, contrary to the assumptions of contemporary political science and IR theory, stressed a strong, positive association between democracy and war.