Demographics and Politics in Aristotle: from overpopulation to the critique of extreme democracy Démographie et Politique chez Aristote : de la poluanthropia à la critique de la démocratie extrême * En Fr

Résumé En

In the 7th book of Politics, in his treatment of the demographic conditions for the establishment of the best constitution (ἀρίστην πολιτείαν), Aristotle strongly criticizes the phenomenon of overpopulation (πολυανθρωπίαν) due to its side effects on the political functioning of a polis. In the present study, we attempt to investigate if and to what extent reality, at least as observed and interpreted by the philosopher himself, constitutes an empirical ally for his polemic against overpopulation. The following conclusion emerges from our analysis: the Stagirite philosopher is empirically grounding his thesis on the pathogenic character of overpopulation in the paradigm of the democratic city-states of his time, and particularly in the exemplary case of Athens, one of the most overpopulated city-states during Hellenic antiquity. For Aristotle, the sociopolitical history of Athens supports the assumption that overpopulation constitutes a demographic phenomenon, which triggers the increase of poverty and consequently the polarization among rich and poor populations, due to the disproportional arithmetic growth of the latter, something that unavoidably results to an outbreak of demagoguery and to the establishment of extreme democracy.