Daring and deliberation: Virtue, rhetoric, and diplomacy in Thucydides’ account of the Athenian empire
| Author | Eric A Fleury |
| Date | 01 October 2020 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1755088218812096 |
| Published date | 01 October 2020 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1755088218812096
Journal of International Political Theory
2020, Vol. 16(3) 270 –286
© The Author(s) 2018
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DOI: 10.1177/1755088218812096
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Daring and deliberation:
Virtue, rhetoric, and
diplomacy in Thucydides’
account of the Athenian
empire
Eric A Fleury
College of the Holy Cross, USA
Abstract
In Thucydides’ account of the Peloponnesian War, the juxtaposition between the
speeches in defense of the Athenian empire and their political effects uncovers critical
insights into the need for rhetoric to balance the tasks of domestic enthusiasm and
diplomatic interaction. In Thucydides’ account of the Peloponnesian War, Pericles
boasts that Athens has perfected “daring and deliberation,” having built an empire
through courageous deeds while maintaining a democracy in which competing interests
and perspectives receive a fair hearing. These qualities justify Athenian supremacy, but
actually maintaining it instead calls for Athens to be cautious and for its subjects to
accept the status quo without question. As Athens perceives a decline in its wartime
fortunes, it struggles to preserve a reputation for daring and deliberation without
undertaking actions that would falsify its self-representation. Its virtues become a
substitute for its interests, so that it can no longer act with either morally or prudently.
The declining effectiveness of Athenian rhetoric speaks to Thucydides’ teaching that
warfare, while presenting an opportunity for a city to display its greatest traits, is far
more likely to corrupt them, which requires that orators reconcile the city’s sense of
its own righteousness with the realities of its situation.
Keywords
Athenian empire, Rhetoric, Statesmanship, Thucydides
Corresponding author:
Eric A Fleury, Department of Political Science, College of the Holy Cross, 1 College Street, Box 49A,
Worcester, MA 01610, USA.
Email: efleury@holycross.edu
812096IPT0010.1177/1755088218812096Journal of International Political TheoryFleury
research-article2018
Article
Fleury 271
Introduction
In Thucydides’ account of the Peloponnesian War, rhetorical appeals to justice and
morality routinely fail to dislodge considerations of interest and relative power advan-
tages. In the first pair of speeches in Book One, a Corinthian appeal to lawfulness and
gratitude fails to dissuade Athens from an alliance with Corcyra, the naval power and
strategic location of which make it a desirable prize despite the likelihood of such an
alliance elevating the risk of war (Thucydides, 1996: 28). When the Spartans in turn
angrily denounce Athens’ violation, Thucydides (1996) intervenes in his own voice to
clarify that disputes over legal questions paled before the “real cause” of war, namely
“the growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Sparta” (1996:
16). After several years of warfare, both of the principal antagonists profess an explicit
doctrine of naked self-interest as the supreme moral good. After the city of Plataea falls
to Sparta, the survivors agree to submit their fate to a court of law, only to have the
Spartan judges asking “whether they had done the Spartans and allies any service in the
war then raging” (Thucydides, 1996: 185–193) and then executing them one by one
when they fail to provide a satisfactory response. Later on, the Athenians laying siege to
Melos dash the Melians’ hope for a Spartan rescue by assuring them that the Spartans,
like themselves, “consider what is agreeable honorable, and what is expedient just”
(Thucydides, 1996: 354).
The clearest and most consistent expression of this outlook is the “Athenian thesis,” a
series of speeches which argues that it is the nature of political communities to seek
dominion, and that standards of justice only become relevant when weakness in the face
of an enemy leaves them no other choice (see Orwin, 1986). Yet there is extensive debate
over how the thesis reflects Thucydides’ overall political teaching. For realists such as
Kenneth Waltz (2001: 159–160) and Robert Gilpin (1981: 93), the Athenian thesis pro-
vides a foundational account of international anarchy and the consequent power dynam-
ics that determine relations among states. Other scholars such as Michael Doyle (1990)
and Daniel Garst (1989) qualify the structuralist dimensions of this claim while retaining
the basic contention that Thucydides puts forward a realist interpretation of politics in
which conflicts of interest relegate questions of justice to secondary importance. In this
view, Athenian rhetoric presents an accurate appraisal of its incentives and pressures in
an inherently competitive international system. The city’s eventual defeat results from
Sparta’s appropriation of the same logic in its formation of a balancing coalition, repre-
senting themselves as the “liberators of Hellas” (Thucydides, 1996: 289) while in truth
seeking to remove the chief obstacle to its own dominance.
An alternative view holds that Thucydides juxtaposes Athenian speech and its war-
time fortunes so as to critique the rhetorical premises of Athenian imperialism, especially
its rejection of moral constraints. Laurie Johnson Bagby (1994) states that “as the
Athenians came to believe and act on their theory of human nature and state action, their
legitimacy declined among their allies and empire and their domestic political order
became corrupt and disintegrated” (1994: 143). Peter Ahrensdorf (1994) argues that the
attempt to actualize the Athenian thesis triggered a psychological backlash, in which
Athens engaged in self-defeating behavior out of fear that “the gods believe[d] that
Athenian imperialism [was] unjust and [would] punish Athens for her injustice” (1994:
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