Politeia | EPFL Graph Search

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Politeia (πολιτεία) is an ancient Greek word used in Greek political thought, especially that of Plato and Aristotle. Derived from the word polis ("city-state"), it has a range of meanings from "the rights of citizens" to a "form of government". According to Liddell and Scott's Greek-English Lexicon a meaning of politeia is "the conditions and rights of the citizen, or citizenship", analogous to the Latin civitas. Politeia, in Greek means the community of citizens in a city / state. It should not be confused with "regime" that is meant by politeuma or "Status quo" that is meant by kathestos. Politeuma is the word describing the political situation of the community of citizens in a city/state, and kathestos means also the general situation of an object, an agreement, or something else. Politeia is derived from both the root word polis meaning "city" or "state", and from the verb politeuomai that means "I am living as an active citizen of the polis." People living in a Greek city/state were not necessarily citizens. A person that was ostracized from the active matrix of the city was an example of such. Another example was people who lived in the city but were not active citizens who had a say in the political processes of the community. Women, slaves and others who Greek men deemed unworthy were not in the active matrix of the political formations of that city state, making them not-citizens, so not part of politeia. In the works of ancient Greek philosophers, the principal meaning of politeia appears to be: "how a polis is run; constitution". A politeia differs from modern written constitutions in two respects: first, not all Greek states put their laws in writing; more importantly, the Greeks did not normally distinguish between ordinary and constitutional legislation. If a certain body had the power to change the laws, it had the power to change the laws controlling its own power and membership – even to abolish itself and set up a new governing body.

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