Time to use Ostrakas?

One of the objectives of writing this blog is to force myself to think out of the box, or think differently within the box.

Protests all over the world including India on how a few individuals destroy the peace of mind of the vast majority. Provided below is a 2600 year old concept borrowed from history.

Long ago there existed in Europe several powerful city states. A fine example was Athens, which had with great difficulty got rid of the petty tyrants and introduced a very successful democracy which lasted several hundred years.

As is well known democracies give rise to a peculiar problem.  Some people claiming to work in the  interest for the people but really working for themselves game the system. They distort the basic goodness of democracy and corrupt democracy and entrench themselves completely. 

Once in power these self centered power maniacs are almost impossible to eliminate.  The Athenians recognised that such people left to their antics would divide the people into factions  and unnecessarily cause anxiety to the people. They had to find a solution.

The solution the people of Athens evolved was the system of 'ostracism', wherein each year one high profile person, mostly a leader, who become haughty, rude, inconsiderate, scheming etc and was likely to cause anxiety to the people, was banished into exile for 10 years from Athens.

The simple procedure required the Athenian citizens to gather in the market place and write the name of the person who they thought should be banished on ostrakas (pieces of broken pottery) which were used as voting tokens. At that time papyrus was imported from Egypt and hence expensive whereas  ostrakas were abundant and cheaply available.  The citizens scribbled the name of the person they wanted on their individual  ostraka and the person who got most number of ostrakas ( but with a minimum of 6000 ostrakas) was exiled for 10 years.

Many powerful people such as Astrides the most powerful general who defeated the Persians at Marathon was exiled in 490 B.C. and as was the famous and powerful general Themistocles in 472 B.C because they became haughty and did not care for the people but only about themselves.

The selfish system is slightly odd because the person is exiled even without being guilty. The citizens decide to punish someone first and then decide who it had to be.

This unusual practice forced leaders to take into consideration the opinion of most of the citizens and those that were socially inferior to them. Ostracism was a simply a pragmatic preventive measure that ensured no one ever became to big for his boots. The exiled person did not suffer any monetary loss or property confiscation etc, he or she just had to remove their presence from the community. 

Would it not be a great idea if each year the citizens could banish one person who they believe is causing anxiety to the people from a village, taluka, district, municipal corporation, state and at the national level.

If this idea were ever implemented I wonder;

• In this age of technology distance may not be a barrier anymore for troublesome people to cause anguish 
• Who would provide residence and asylum to these wretched people who would be exiled.