Tyrant
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A tyrant (Greek τύραννος, tyrannos), in its modern English usage, is an absolute ruler unrestrained by law or person, or one who has usurped legitimate sovereignty. Often described as a cruel character, a tyrant defends his position by oppressive means, tending to control almost everything in the state.[1][2] The original Greek term, however, merely meant an authoritarian sovereign without reference to character,[3] bearing no pejorative connotation during the Archaic and early Classical periods. However, it was clearly a negative word to Plato, a Greek philosopher, and on account of the decisive influence of philosophy on politics, its negative connotations only increased, continuing into the Hellenistic period.
Plato and Aristotle define a tyrant as "one who rules without law, and uses extreme and cruel tactics—against his own people as well as others".[4] It is defined further in the Encyclopédie as a usurper of sovereign power who makes his subjects the victims of his passions and unjust desires, which he substitutes for laws.[5] During the seventh and sixth centuries BC, tyranny was often looked upon as an intermediate stage between narrow oligarchy and more democratic forms of polity. However, in the late fifth and fourth centuries BC, a new kind of tyrant, the military dictator, arose, specifically in Sicily.
Tyranny includes a variety of oppressive types of government - by a tyrant (autocracy), by a minority (oligarchy, tyranny of the minority) or by a majority (democracy, tyranny of the majority). The definition is extended to other oppressive leadership and to oppressive policies. For example a teacher may find the school administration, the textbook or standardized tests to be oppressive, considering each to represent a tyranny.
Etymology
The English noun tyrant appears in Middle English use, via Old French, from the 1290s. The word derives from Latin tyrannus, meaning "illegitimate ruler", and this in turn from the Greek τύραννος tyrannos "monarch, ruler of a polis"; tyrannos in its turn has a Pre-Greek origin, perhaps from Lydian.[6][7] The final -t arises in Old French by association with the present participles in -ant.[8]
Definition
"The word "tyranny" is used with many meanings, not only by the Greeks, but throughout the tradition of the great books."[9] The Oxford English Dictionary offers alternative definitions: a ruler, an illegitimate ruler (a usurper), an absolute ruler (despot) or an oppressive, unjust or cruel ruler. The term is usually applied to vicious dictators who achieve bad results for the governed. The definition of a tyrant is cursed by subjectivity. Oppression, injustice and cruelty do not have standardized measurements or thresholds.
"Both Plato and Aristotle speak of the king as a good monarch and the tyrant as a bad one. Both say that monarchy, or rule by a single man, is royal when it is for the welfare of the ruled and tyrannical when it serves only the interest of the ruler. Both make lawlessness - either a violation of existing laws or government by personal fiat without settled laws - a mark of tyranny."[9]
"Like a roaring lion or a charging bear is a wicked ruler over a poor people. A ruler who lacks understanding is a cruel oppressor; but one who hates unjust gain will enjoy a long life." Proverbs 28:15-16
"By justice a king gives stability to the land, but one who makes heavy extractions ruins it." Proverbs 29:4
"The sovereign is called a tyrant who knows no laws but his caprice." Voltaire in a Philosophical Dictionary
"Where Law ends Tyranny begins." Locke in Two Treatises of Government
The definition is dependent on perspective. A historical example is George III of England. From the British perspective he was a legitimate constitutional monarch. From the colonial perspective he was a tyrant based on a list of grievances enumerated in the United States Declaration of Independence. Colonists were not represented in parliament, so they lacked the rights of the English. Economic exploitation of the colonies was reasonable (perhaps even popular) from the British perspective, tyranny to the Yankees.
Bad results are also subjective and relative. Authoritarian rule might be beneficial (Mustafa Kemal Atatürk of Turkey) or of limited lasting harm to the country (Francisco Franco of Spain).[10] pp 169, 418-9 Those who list or rank tyrants can provide definitions and criteria for comparison or acknowledge subjectivity. Comparative criteria may include checklists or body counts. Accounting for deaths in war is problematic - war can build empires or defend the populace - it also keeps winning tyrants in power. "Ch'in Shih-huang is the first emperor of China. He united seven separate kingdoms into a single nation. He built the Great Wall and was buried with the terra-cotta soldiers. The Chinese have mixed feelings about him. They're proud of the nation he created, but he was a maniacal tyrant." Gene Luen Yang Oppressive dictators have held states together (Alexander the Great, Josip Broz Tito).
A modern tyrant might be objectively defined by proven violation of international criminal law such as crimes against humanity.[11][12][13] Few are tried.
Early history
The state is the product of civilization. Agriculture allowed greater concentrations of people which lead to more conflict. Political and military leaders arose to manage conflicts. All leaders were once dictators.[14] p 2 "[T]he very essence of politics in [agrarian civilizations] was, by our contemporary democratic standards, tyrannical".[10] p 6 Eventually alternative forms and methods of government arose which allowed belated definitions and criticism. Machinery displaced slaves recently.
Historical forms
In ancient Greece, tyrants were influential opportunists that came to power by securing the support of different factions of a deme. The word tyrannos, possibly pre-Greek, Pelasgian or eastern in origin,[15] then carried no ethical censure; it simply referred to anyone, good or bad, who obtained executive power in a polis by unconventional means. Support for the tyrants came from the growing middle class and from the peasants who had no land or were in debt to the wealthy landowners. It is true that they had no legal right to rule, but the people preferred them over kings or the aristocracy.
The Greek tyrants stayed in power by using mercenary soldiers from outside of their respective city-state. To mock tyranny, Thales wrote that the strangest thing to see is "an aged tyrant" meaning that tyrants do not have the public support to survive for long.
Corinth
In Corinth, growing wealth from colonial enterprises, and the wider horizons brought about by the export of wine and oil, together with the new experiences of the Eastern Mediterranean brought back by returning mercenary hoplites employed overseas created a new environment. Conditions were right for Cypselus to overthrow the aristocratic power of the dominant but unpopular clan of Bacchiadae. Clan members were killed, executed, driven out or exiled in 657 BC. Corinth prospered economically under his rule, and Cypselus managed to rule without a bodyguard. When he then bequeathed his position to his son, Periander, the tyranny proved less secure, and Periander required a retinue of mercenary soldiers personally loyal to him.
Nevertheless, under Cypselus and Periander, Corinth extended and tightened her control over her colonial enterprises, and exports of Corinthian pottery flourished. However, tyrants seldom succeeded in establishing an untroubled line of succession. Periander's successor was less fortunate and was expelled. Afterward, Corinth was ruled by a lackluster oligarchy, and was eventually eclipsed by the rising fortunes of Athens and Sparta.
Athens
In Athens, the inhabitants first gave the title of tyrant to Peisistratus (a relative of Solon, the Athenian lawgiver) who succeeded in 546 BC, after two failed attempts, to install himself as tyrant. Supported by the prosperity of the peasantry and landowning interests of the plain, which was prospering from the rise of olive oil exports, as well as his clients from Marathon, he managed to achieve authoritarian power. Through an ambitious program of public works, which included fostering the state cult of Athena; encouraging the creation of festivals; supporting the Panathenaeic Games in which prizes were jars of olive oil; and supporting the Dionysia (ultimately leading to the development of Athenian drama), Peisistratus managed to maintain his personal popularity.
He was followed by his sons, and with the subsequent growth of Athenian democracy, the title "tyrant" took on its familiar negative connotations. The murder of Peisistratus' son, the tyrant Hipparchus by Aristogeiton and Harmodios in Athens in 514 BC marked the beginning of the so-called "cult of the tyrannicides" (i.e., of killers of tyrants). Contempt for tyranny characterised this cult movement. Despite financial help from Persia, in 510 the Peisistratids were expelled by a combination of intrigue, exile and Spartan arms. The anti-tyrannical attitude became especially prevalent in Athens after 508 BC, when Cleisthenes reformed the political system so that it resembled demokratia (ancient participant democracy as opposed to the modern representative democracy).
The Thirty Tyrants whom the Spartans imposed on a defeated Attica in 404 BC would not be classified as tyrants in the usual sense and were in effect an oligarchy.
Aesymnetes
An aesymnetes (pl. aesymnetai) had similar scope of power to the tyrant, such as Pittacus of Mytilene (c. 640-568 BC), and was elected for life or for a specified period by a city-state in a time of crisis—the only difference being that the aesymnetes was a constitutional office and was comparable to the Roman dictator. Magistrates in some city-states were also called aesymnetai.
Archaic tyrants
The heyday of the Archaic period tyrants came in the early 6th century BC, when Cleisthenes ruled Sicyon in the Peloponnesus and Polycrates ruled Samos. During this time, revolts overthrew many governments in the Aegean world. Chilon, the ambitious and capable ephor of Sparta, built a strong alliance amongst neighbouring states by making common cause with these groups seeking to oppose unpopular tyrannical rule. By intervening against the tyrants of Sicyon, Corinth and Athens, Sparta thus came to assume Hellenic leadership prior to the Persian invasions. Simultaneously Persia first started making inroads into Greece, and many tyrants sought Persian help against popular forces seeking to remove them.
Populism
Greek tyranny in the main grew out of the struggle of the under classes against the aristocracy, or against priest-kings where archaic traditions and mythology sanctioned hereditary and/or traditional rights to rule. Popular coups generally installed tyrants, who often became or remained popular rulers, at least in the early part of their reigns. For instance, the popular imagination remembered Peisistratus for an episode - related by (pseudonymous) Aristotle, but possibly fictional - in which he exempted a farmer from taxation because of the particular barrenness of his plot.
Peisistratus' sons Hippias and Hipparchus, on the other hand, were not such able rulers, and when the disaffected aristocrats Harmodios and Aristogeiton slew Hipparchus, Hippias' rule quickly became oppressive, resulting in the expulsion of the Peisistratids in 510 BC, who resided henceforth in Persepolis as clients of the Persian Shahanshah (King of kings).
Sicilian tyrants
The tyrannies of Sicily came about due to similar causes, but here the threat of Carthaginian attack prolonged tyranny, facilitating the rise of military leaders with the people united behind them. Such Sicilian tyrants as Gelo, Hiero I, Hiero II, Dionysius the Elder, Dionysius the Younger, and Agathocles maintained lavish courts and became patrons of culture. The dangers threatening the lives of the Sicilian tyrants are highlighted in the morale tale of the "Sword of Damocles".
Later tyrants
Under the Macedonian hegemony in the 4th and 3rd century BC a new generation of tyrants rose in Greece, especially under the rule of king Antigonus II Gonatas, who installed his puppets in many cities of the Peloponnese. Examples were Cleon of Sicyon, Aristodemus of Megalopolis, Aristomachus I of Argos, Abantidas of Sicyon, Aristippus of Argos, Lydiadas of Megalopolis, Aristomachus II of Argos, and Xenon of Hermione.
Against these rulers, in 280 BC the democratic cities started to join forces in the Achaean League which was able to expand its influence even into Corinthia, Megaris, Argolis and Arcadia. From 251 BC under the leadership of Aratus of Sicyon, the Achaeans liberated many cities, in several cases by convincing the tyrants to step down, and when Aratus died in 213 BC, Hellas had been free of tyrants for more than 15 years. The last tyrant on the Greek mainland, Nabis of Sparta, was assassinated in 192 BC and after his death the Peloponnese was united as a confederation of stable democracies in the Achaean League.
Roman tyrants
Roman historians like Suetonius, Tacitus, Plutarch, and Josephus often spoke of "tyranny" in opposition to "liberty". Tyranny was associated with imperial rule and those rulers who usurped too much authority from the Roman Senate. Those who were advocates of "liberty" tended to be pro-Republic and pro-Senate. For instance, regarding Julius Caesar and his assassins, Suetonius wrote:
Therefore the plots which had previously been formed separately, often by groups of two or three, were united in a general conspiracy, since even the populace no longer were pleased with present conditions, but both secretly and openly rebelled at his tyranny and cried out for defenders of their liberty.[16]
Niccolò Machiavelli, building on this opposition, conflates all rule by a single person (whom he generally refers to as a "prince") with "tyranny," regardless of the legitimacy of that rule, in his Discourses on Livy. He also identifies liberty with republican regimes; whether he would include so-called "crowned republics" (such as modern constitutional monarchies) is somewhat unclear from the text.
In the classics
Tyranny is considered an important subject, one of the "Great Ideas" of Western thought. The classics contain many references to tyranny and its causes, effects, methods, practitioners, alternatives... They consider tyranny from historical, religious, ethical, political and fictional perspectives. "If any point in political theory is indisputable, it would seem to be that tyranny is the worst corruption of government - a vicious misuse of power and a violent abuse of human beings who are subject to it."[9] While this may represent a consensus position among the classics, it is not unanimous - Hobbes (for example) dissented, claiming no objective distinction (vicious vs virtuous) existed among dictators. "They that are discontented under monarchy, call it tyranny; and they that are displeased with aristocracy, call it oligarchy: so also, they which find themselves grieved under a democracy, call it anarchy..." (in Leviathan)
Dante mentioned tyrants ("who laid hold on blood and plunder") in the seventh level of Hell (Divine Comedy) where they are submerged in boiling blood. These included Alexander the Great and Attila the Hun who shared the region with highway robbers.
Ancient Greeks, as well as the Roman Republicans, became generally quite wary of many people seeking to implement a popular coup. Shakespeare portrays the struggle of one such anti-tyrannical Roman, Marcus Junius Brutus, in his play Julius Caesar.
Enlightenment
In the Enlightenment, thinkers applied the word tyranny to the system of governance that had developed around aristocracy and monarchy. Specifically, John Locke as part of his argument against the "Divine Right of Kings" in his book Two Treatises of Government defines it this way: “Tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, which nobody can have a right to; and this is making use of the power any one has in his hands, not for the good of those who are under it, but for his own private, separate advantage.”[17] Locke's concept of tyranny influenced the writers of subsequent generations who developed the concept of tyranny as counterpoint to ideas of human rights and democracy. Thomas Jefferson referred to the tyranny of King George III of Great Britain in the Declaration of Independence, and the concept was refined in turn to refer to the Kings of France, the tyrants of the Terror, and to Napoleon I in turn during the French Revolution and subsequent regimes.
Methods of obtaining and retaining power
"The people have always some champion whom they set over them and nurse into greatness.... This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector." Plato in The Republic
Dictators inherit the position, rise as company men in the military/party or seize power as entrepreneurs.[14] p 7 Early texts called only the entrepreneurs tyrants, distinguishing them from "bad kings". Such tyrants may act as renters, rather than owners, of the state.
The methods of tyrants to retain power have changed little in over two thousand years.
They placate world opinion by staging rigged elections.[14] p 2
They use or threaten violence.[14] p 7
They seek popular support by appeals to patriotism and claims that conditions have improved.[14] p 7
Lengthy recommendations of methods were made to tyrants by Aristotle (in Politics for example) and Niccolò Machiavelli (in The Prince).[9] These are, in general, force and fraud. They include hiring bodyguards, stirring up wars to smother dissent, purges, assassinations, unwarranted searches and seizures...
"The tyrant binds his followers to him by by making them accomplices to his crimes." Anonymous[18]
"The tyrant confuses those he can't convince, corrupts those he can't confuse, and crushes those he can't corrupt." Anonymous[19]
Recent tyrants
Political leaders are not objectively labeled as tyrants because the definition is subjective. Most recent governments nominally have some anti-tyrannic elements.[14] p 2 The degree to which rule is oppressive or damaging to the populace is also subjective. One text considers 13 20th century examples (chosen as interesting to the author) in detail. Tyranny is defined there as the "abuse of power". p 2 Some recent tyrants are identified as ideological tyrants (characterized by extreme political certitude) while others are classical tyrants (characterized by dishonesty).[10]
| 20th Century Tyrant | Country |
|---|---|
| Adolf Hitler | Germany |
| Joseph Stalin | Soviet Union |
| Mao Zedong | China |
| Pol Pot | Cambodia |
| Kim Il-sung | North Korea |
| Nicolae Ceaușescu | Romania |
| Saddam Hussein | Iraq |
| Ne Win | Burma |
| Argentine Generals | Argentina |
| Rafael Trujillo | Dominican Republic |
| François Duvalier | Haiti |
| Idi Amin | Uganda |
| Jean-Bédel Bokassa | Central African Republic |
The tyrants are not ranked. Much information is provided in the text to justify the (admittedly subjective) label of tyrant. Trujillo is acknowledged to be a borderline case. pp 359-365 In passing, the text notes that some notorious dictators from the distant past suffered at the hands of hostile historians.
A second text identifies a hundred notorious despots, including 40 from the 20th century.[20]
A later text identifies 30 former tyrants of the late 20th century and 20 tyrants of the early 21st century.[14] Most of the historical and biographical content supports the labels and ranking. Dictators who suppressed freedoms were ranked based on torture, executions, starvations, interference with other states and actual power.
There is much commonality among these lists of recent tyrants.
While the rule of tyrants is often truncated, the list of longest-ruling non-royal national leaders since 1900 contains many labeled tyrants.
Psychology of tyrants
The classics note that tyrants are often unhappy.[9] "In every tyrant's heart there springs in the end this poison, that he cannot trust a friend." Aeschylus Tyrants (explicitly including Adolph Hitler, Joseph Stalin and Saddam Hussein) appear to suffer psychological pathologies that result in self-destructive behavior. "His grandiosity and his skills in deception, manipulation, and intimidation are an advantage to him in securing power. But as he moves toward absolute power, he is also apt to cross moral and geographic boundaries in ways that place him in a vulnerable position. Thus, he may engage in cruelties that serve no political purpose, challenge the conventional morality in ways that undermine his base, engage in faulty reality testing, and overreach himself in foreign engagements in ways that invite new challenges to his rule."[21] These pathologies are not evident earlier in life although those without a certain level of brutal self assurance do not become dictators. The ruled also exhibit pathologies. An attempt on Hitler's life outraged Germans. "When Stalin died many wept, even in the concentration camps!"[10] p 162 There is no simple relationship between popularity and tyranny.
See also
References
- ^ "Tyrant (entry)". 1911 Encyclopediam Britannica.
- ^ "Tyrant". The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Thomas Zemanek. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2009 (Trans. of "Tyran," Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, vol. 16. Paris, 1765). Retrieved 1 April 2015.
- ^ "Tyrant (entry)". Merriam-Webster online dictionary. Merriam-Webster.
- ^ Glad, B. (2002, March) [better source needed]. Why Tyrants Go Too Far: Malignant Narcissism and Absolute Power. Political Psychology, 33. Retrieved May 15, 2010, from JSTOR database.
- ^ "Tyrant". The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Thomas Zemanek. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2009 (Trans. of "Tyran," Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, vol. 16. Paris, 1765). Retrieved 18 April 2009.
- ^ "Online Etymology Dictionary".
- ^ R. S. P. Beekes, Etymological Dictionary of Greek, Brill, 2009, pp. 1519–20.
- ^ tyrant, Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition
- ^ a b c d e Adler, Mortimer J., ed. (1952). "95: Tyranny". Great Books of the Western World. Vol. 3: The Great Ideas: II. Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica.
- ^ a b c d Chirot, Daniel (1994). Modern tyrants : the power and prevalence of evil in our age. New York Toronto New York: Free Press Maxwell Macmillan Canada Maxwell Macmillan International. ISBN 9780029054772.
- ^ Robertson, Geoffrey (2005). "Ending Impunity: How International Criminal Law Can Put Tyrants on Trial". Cornell International Law Journal. 38 (3): 649–671.
- ^ Liolos, John J. (2012-05-01). "Justice for Tyrants: International Criminal Court Warrants for Gaddafi Regime Crimes". Boston College International and Comparative Law Review. 35 (2): 589–602.
- ^ Thorp, Jodi. "Welcome Ex-Dictators, Torturers and Tyrants: Comparative Approaches to Handling Ex-Dictators and Past Human Rights Abuses". Gonzaga Law Review. 37 (1): 167–199.
- ^ a b c d e f g Wallechinsky, David (2006). Tyrants : the world's 20 worst living dictators. New York: Regan. ISBN 978-0060590048.
- ^ Forrest, George "Greece, the history of the Archaic period" in Boardman, John et al. (1986), The Oxford History of the Classical World (OUP)
- ^ Suetonius, The Lives of Twelve Caesars, Life of Julius Caesar 80
- ^ Two Treatises of Government (199)
- ^ Frank, Leonard (1999). Random House Webster's quotationary. New York: Random House. p. 889. ISBN 9780679448501.
- ^ Frank, Leonard (1999). Random House Webster's quotationary. New York: Random House. p. 889. ISBN 9780679448501.
- ^ Cawthorne, Nigel (2004). Tyrants : history's 100 most evil despots & dictators. London: Arcturus. ISBN 978-0572030254.
- ^ Glad, Betty (March 2002). "Why Tyrants Go Too Far: Malignant Narcissism and Absolute Power". Political Psychology. 23 (1). International Society of Political Psychology: 1–37.
External links
- Tyrant by Jona Lendering at livius.org.
- Bryn Mawr Classical Review
- Victor Parker, A History of Greece, 1300 to 30 BC (chapter 7)