Cleisthenes' Reforms
What were they?
Reorganisation of tribes
before this, Athens had been divided into four tribes that had been dominated by aristocratic families
aristocratic families were also members of phratries, membership of which was necessary to become a citizen
Cleisthenes decided to divide Attica into 3 regions: coast, city and inland, and each region was then further divided into ten sections each, called a trittys
there were thus 30 trittyes in Attica
he also created new tribes, by taking one trittys from each region to form each tribe.
the new tribes could not be dominated by one or two aristocratic families, instead they comprised citizens from all walks of life and all geographical areas in Attica.
Cleisthenes decided to keep the phratries, but he stripped them of any function beyond socialising
Demes
Cleisthenes divided Attica into 139 demes
The deme now became the basis for citizenship
if a citizen moved from one deme to another, he still referred to himself by the name of the deme in which he initially registered
citizens now referred to themselves by deme rather than the name of their father reducing the importance of familial connections
each deme had:
a leader who served for one year
a series of officials
a council
an assembly
Political Reforms
Cleisthenes expanded the council created by Solon from 400 to 500 members, and each of the new ten tribes had to provided 50 citizens for the boule
Cleisthenes also introduced 'isegoria' which means 'equal right to address the assembly'
Another by-product of the deme system was that it split up and weakened his political adversaries
there was also a new bouletic oath "To advise according to the laws what was best for the people"
Aftermath
Even after the reforms of CLeisthenes, Athens remained a society where the wealthy held much power, largely through the Council of the Areopagus.
the reforms of Ephialtes in the late 460s and 50s changed that:
in 487/6 the athenians stopped electing the archons and started to select them by lot from a list of 500 candidates. This meant that by 462 the council of the Areopagus was no longer made up of the wealthiest citizens but of ex-archons who had been randomly selected.
by this time two rival factions had emerged in Athens the first was a Conservative faction led by men such as Aristides and Cimon. The other was reformist and wanted to give more powers to ordinary people, led by Ephialtes
in 462/1 Ephialtes introduced a major reform of the Council of the Areoapagus in order to make Athens more democratic. His reform deprived the areopagus of all its duties except for jurisdiction over murder and certain offences against the gods.
liturgies
rich men were required to undertake work for the state at their own expense
this would either be a trierarchy, in which you would pay for a trireme, or a liturgy in connection with a public festival, like funding a chorus
this shows how wealth could still be used for social capital