Athenian style democracy in ancient Rome

Both ancient Athens, and and ancient Rome were, technically, democracies at times. But, their approach to democracy was rather different. Rome was, like most modern "democracies", a Res Publica, a "public entity", where the influence of the general public on government was mediated by election of representatives to run the government, for a fixed period of time. French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau described "representative democracy" as a contradiction in terms, because the representatives will simply represent themselves and their own interests. Effectively, timed dictatorships, or oligarchies. Now, while the Athenians also elected representatives, they adopted an approach to controlling any abuses or excessive self-interest while they were in power, that was rather unique. Any and all government officials could be ostracized -- expelled from Athens -- by a simple vote of a small percentage of the total Athenian citizen population, at any time at all. Imagine if the President of the United States, or the Prime Minister or Queen of England could be expelled from the United States, or Britain, if a million signatures could be collected from the population as a whole! Now, that would change things a bit, wouldn't it? So, we could expect rather less tolerance of disparities of wealth, and rather less corruption, hmmm? Probably, the conflicts between the plebians and the equestrians would be largely eliminated, in Rome. Probably, the Roman Empire is delayed, and the democracy lasts longer. Or, would a more democratic Roman Democracy be more self-destructive, like Athens was, and would Rome collapse rather earlier, with no Roman Empire at all? Any thoughts, at all?

British concentration camps in South Africa

[QUOTE="jsb, post: 17010077, member: 72349"]Why would it have any effect? Did the Germans not effectively discount GB actions when they decided that going via Belgium was worth the risk of the small British forces trying to help the French? GB will still not want Germany dominating Europe so I don't see much change outside SA?[/QUOTE] I think that's precisely my point. Germany DID discount British actions when they invaded Belgium in 1914. Would they really have done that without the Boer War? And, from a German point of view, wouldn't the most degraded, disgraceful and immoral thing the British did during that war, have been the starvation of Dutch/Boer women and children, probably quite unnecessarily, even from the standpoint of winning the war, in concentration camps? I think it's significant that German Communist writer Bertolt Brecht wrote his Threepenny Opera in 1928, based on John Gay's Beggar's Opera, he sets it just before the Boer War, and ends it with the commencement of said War. Thus, the gangster Macheath, "Mac the Knife", is very much equated to the British Government as a whole in the Boer War. Because, at least to the German people, the Boer War was simply an act of gangsterism start to finish. Now, gangsters are violent and greedy, they have little discipline or foresight. So, effectively, in terms of the British actions in using concentration camps particularly, Germany may have seen very little reason to take Britain seriously anymore, at all. Britain had no discipline to fight real wars, they had no principles to cause them to adhere to treaties like the inviolability of Belgium, maintained for a century, since the fall of Napoleon. So, I think it's actually conceivable, that the reason the Kaiser sold Britain short, and confidently went to war against France and Russia in 1914, was because the British had behaved so very inappropriately in South Africa. He may simply have dismissed the British, because of those concentration camps in South Africa!