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This book explores the intriguing idea that there is much more democracy in human history than is generally acknowledged. It establishes that democracy was developing across greater Asia before classical Athens, clung on during the ´Dark Ages´, often formed part of indigenous governance and is developing today in unexpected ways.

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Introduction: Democracy and History PART I: PRE-ATHENIAN DEMOCRACY What is so ´Primitive´ about ´Primitive Democracy´? Comparing the Ancient Middle East and Classical Athens; B.Isakhan Before Athens: Early Popular Government in Phoenicia and Greek City States; S.Stockwell Republics and Quasi-Democratic Institutions in Ancient India; S .Muhlberger Digging for Democracy in China; P.Keating PART II: DEMOCRACY IN THE ´DARK AGES´ Behind a Veil: Islam´s Democratic History; M.Abdalla & H.Rane Ideals and Aspirations: Democracy and Law-Making in Medieval Iceland; P.P.Boulhosa Democratic Culture in the Early Venetian Republic; S.Stockwell PARR III: INDIGENOUS DEMOCRACY AND COLONIALISM Africa´s Indigenous Democracies: The Baganda of Uganda; I.Kizza The Hunters who Owned Themselves; P.Paine Aboriginal Australia and Democracy: Old Traditions, New Challenges; L.Behrendt The Pre-History of the Post-Apartheid Settlement: Non-Racial Democracy in South Africa´s Cape Colony, 1853-1936; P.Fry PART IV: ALTERNATIVE CURRENTS IN MODERN DEMOCRACY Birthing Democracy: The Role of Women in the Democratic Discourse of the Middle East; K.L.Gandolfo The Streets of Iraq: Protests and Democracy after Saddam; B. Isakhan Monitory Democracy? The Secret History of Democracy Since 1945; J.Keane Conclusion: Democratizing the History of Democracy; B.Isakhan & S.Stockwell

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MOHAMAD ABDALLA Founding director of the Griffith University Islamic Research Unit and a co-director of the National Centre of Excellence for Islamic Studies, Australia LARISSA BEHRENDT Professor of Law and Director of Research at the Jumbunna Indigenous House of Learning at the University of Technology, Sydney, Australia PATRICIA PIRES BOULHOSA has held the Snorri Sturluson Icelandic Fellowship, and in 2006 delivered the Jón SigurÐsson Memorial Lecture POPPY FRY Assistant Professor of History at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire, USA. K. LUISA GANDOLFO Researcher affiliated to the Centre for Middle Eastern and Mediterranean Studies at the Panteion University in Athens, Greece BENJAMIN ISAKHAN Research Fellow with the Centre for Dialogue at La Trobe University, Australia JOHN KEANE Professor of Politics at the University of Westminster, UK and at the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin, Germany PAULINE KEATING Senior Lecturer in the History Programme at the Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand IMMACULATE KIZZAProfessor of English at The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, USA STEVEN MUHLBERGER Professor of History at Nipissing University in North Bay, Ontario, Canada PHILIPPE PAINE Independent Canadian scholar who has researched and written on the cross-cultural history of democracy for two decades HALIM RANE Deputy Director of the Griffith University Islamic Research Unit, Australia STEPHEN STOCKWELL Professor of Journalism and Communication, at Griffith University´s, Australia

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