Bernard Manin reader of ancient democracy

This article examines the sources from Ancient philosophy used by Bernard Manin in <em>The principles of representative government</em>, on which he based the main arguments of his political theory. Manin, almost in an unspoken way, will occasionally return – both in his own reflections and through engagement in dialogue with others – to diverse interpretations of Athenian democracy that arise controversy to the meaning of his work. This results in an endorsement of the validity of Athenian democracy as a model case for the understanding of modern democracies. This article points out, firstly, that both the author and his work are criss-crossed by an intellectual tension of a marked philosophical and political character; secondly, that this tension, along with the discussions over a definition of what is a good democracy, opens a space for clarification of those controversies. The disputes, we will conclude, are not the result of misunderstandings; or if they are, they make sense in Bernard Manin’s own text.