Athens Vs Rome Dbq Essay

Throughout history, civilizations have organized their members and incentives in citizenship systems. Athens and Rome, both portray the traits of semi-perfect systems of their time. While Rome may have been the greater civilization, Athens had the better citizenship system, for having protective, unbiased, and open minded tradeoffs.
In reference to Rome, Athens’s citizenship system was less accepting by only allowing free, native born males to nationalize. While this aspect was considered a drawback by the Romans, truthfully it is actually a major tradeoff by Athens. As shown in Document A, Rome was more lenient to upcoming citizens. Although this adds to the power and development of the empire, it also creates holes in its security. Citizens with non-native origins are free to express their hatred and idea of change to the Roman government, by creating a negative cultural diffusion, and contributing to the downfall of Rome. On the other hand, Athens was free from any possible revolts and riots from any non-native Athenians.
Additionally, both civilizations had systems to keep their members in line, and keep checks on people in power. As explained in Document D, Athens had yearly ostracisms to prevent powerful Athenians from demolishing the democracy, while Rome had two censors who ranked citizens, and could

demote senators who did not meet the standards placed by the censors. Both systems achieve the same ideal of keeping good intended power, but the Athenian idea of ostracism was the superior idea. It was less susceptible to bias, for thousands of people would vote for who to ostracize and they could vote out anyone, while Rome had only two censors, who are more likely to be biased, to take a senator out of power.
A universal incentive of becoming a citizen in any society is their ability to voice ones and acquire a seat in a government based setting.

In document E and F you learn that Athens follows this basic idea, while Rome strays from it. Document E states that Athens allows for all of its citizens to participate and hold a seat in its assembly. One the other hand, Document F explains that Roman Senate did not allow the public to attend, and the seats were inherited, making the entire system corrupt. Athens citizens were more involved in the government than Rome’s citizens, making Athens government more effective for everyone to be able to voice their

views.
Overall, it can be agreed that both systems have their flaws, but Athens tradeoffs with these flaws are superior to Rome’s. Athens’s stingy requirements allow for equal rights, security, and suffrage for each citizen, something Rome was not able to cope up to.