Authors Meet Critics: "Demos: How the People Ruled Athens" by Daniela Cammack

Recorded on October 1, 2026, this video features an Authors Meet Critics panel on the book Demos: How the People Ruled Athens, by Daniela Cammack, Assistant Professor of Political Science at UC Berkeley, with a courtesy appointment in the Department of Ancient Greek and Roman Studies (formerly Classics).

Professor Cammack was joined in conversation by James Porter, Distinguished Professor and Irving Stone Chair in Literature in the Department of Rhetoric at UC Berkeley, and Kinch Hoekstra, Chancellor's Professor of Political Science and Law at UC Berkeley. Dylan Riley, Professor of Sociology at UC Berkeley, moderated.

This event was co-sponsored by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies and the Departments of Political Science and Ancient Greek & Roman Studies.

The Social Science Matrix Authors Meet Critics book series features lively discussions about recently published books authored by social scientists at UC Berkeley. For each event, the author discusses the key arguments of their book with fellow scholars.

A transcript of this podcast is available at https://matrix.berkeley.edu/research-article/demos.

In ancient Greece, demokratia meant "rule by the people"—but what people, and how did they rule? Scholars have long argued that demokratia signified the rule of all adult male citizens over themselves. In Demos, Daniela Cammack counters this view by arguing that demokratia meant rule by the crowd that assembled when a public meeting was held. This crowd was the demos, which the Greeks distinguished from orators, generals, councilors, public benefactors, and other civic leaders.

Drawing on literary and epigraphical evidence as well as the key theoretical insights of Aristotle and Hobbes, Cammack explains how constantly changing masses of ordinary ancient Greek men ruled while their leaders were ruled over. This political system relied on kratos, the power to prevail militarily, epitomized by the victories of the Athenian demos in civil conflicts around 508 and 404 BC. In peacetime, the superior strength of the demos revealed itself in large, frequently summoned crowds of ordinary citizens acting as policymakers, legislators, and (crucially) judges, who wielded great power over politicians.

Aristotle characterized the years 403 to 322 as the era of "ultimate democracy," and it was during this period that the Athenians pulled off a feat unmatched by modern democrats: making use of talented and ambitious leaders without being ruled by them. By contrast, the Greeks called rule by elected office-holders "oligarchy." As people today lose faith in democratic institutions, Cammack's account prompts us to ask if we've been doing democracy all wrong—or even at all.