ABSTRACT
This chapter is devoted to the structure and evolution of the Athenian economy. It focuses initially on the state institutions that were involved, how they pursued their objectives, and how they were controlled and audited through democratic processes. As in all contemporary democracies, the state produced, distributed, and financed a great variety of public goods and services, either directly, using its own facilities and personnel, or indirectly, by outsourcing them from the private sector. The civil service, the defense, the courts, the police, and an extensive body of officers with supervisory and regulatory responsibilities offered services as state servants appointed by lot and for limited terms. By contrast, services like the construction of public works, paideia, health and services like the collection of custom duties and the cleaning of the streets were allocated to private enterprises through auctioning of contracts. As for the private sector, the evidence attests to the view that during classical times, Athens made good strides toward turning from an agrarian economy toward one based on mining, handicraft and manufacturing, and services. It succeeded to a significant extent under the influence of the discovery of the silver mines in Laurion, the need to defend against foreign aggressors and the constant pressure for exports to finance the vast quantities of grains that were necessary to feed the Athenian population. But instrumental was also that citizen values and attitudes became friendly to entrepreneurship, and the accumulation of wealth through business came to be regarded as an exemplary sign of social success and recognition. As a result, the Athenian economy particularly in the 4th century BCE mixed robust features of a true market economy with some features more characteristic from its archaic past.
