Was the fall of Rome necessary for western development?

[wryobserver]

I would like to ask others to comment on this theory that I have had since reading a number of books on the Roman empire which I have never heard expressed anywhere else before.

 

Traditionally we look back at the Roman empire with a certain amount of admiration and see it as a high point in social organisation, achievement and civilisation (in the broad sense of the world). The classic view is that the fall of the Roman empire was a catastrope for western civilisation and caused the onset of the "dark ages" which were dominated by fiefdoms, religious oppression, instability, economic difficulty and lack of learning.

 

I'd like to propose that the Roman empire had reached a technological and social plateau for hundreds of years which actually blocked change, and blocked advancement - culturally, socially, economically and intellectually. The reason why I have come to this conclusion is that when I scan the entire length of the Western empire (and the same thing is true of the Eastern empire which lasted much longer in the form of the Byzantine empire), I don't see a society in evolution, in growth and development. In fact it appears to be a sterile empire from that point of view. This is what I mean - can anyone think of any intellectual movements of thought that emerged from the Romans? Any great cultural works of art that have been worth noting after the fall of the republic? (One could of course argue that Roman art took the form of great buildings and monuments, but personally I think that is like pointing to the statues of any other great dictator and claiming this to be art. It was usually crude propaganda, even though admittedly there was great craft in the buildings). Any radical political ideas or discourse that evolved post the onset of empire? Any great advances in medicine, in science that weren't linked to military conquest or engineering works built for the agrandisment of the emperor? Can anyone think of great Roman philosophers, or any renown centres of Roman learning? The only great thinker after the fall of the republic I can think of was Augustus, but can anyone name any others? (Thats not a rhetorical question, I would be interested to know).

 

When I review the Roman period it seems to me that they had clever engineering for their public buildings which were the most advanced in the world at the time, and great discipline and organisation militarily. They had a developed administration and legal system which seemed to function quiet effectively. Apart from these three areas I can't think of any great other really achievements.

 

 

In fact I would go further and suggest that under the Roman empire there was little impetus for development. Most of the public works had been sponsored directly by the emperor, which seemed to be the main driver for new building projects, but this flagged if the emperor wasn't interested or too busy staying alive, or fighting wars. So what we see is an period of rule that lasts for nearly 1000 years which is a very stable plateau of knowledge and technology because the main driver for investment in this was the state itself, and namely the emperor.

 

So, if we asked what would Europe look like today if the Romans had maintained their hegenomy for another 1000 years? I would suggest that - all things being equal (which they are not) - we would never have developed the innovative, dynamic, technologically advanced society we have today - socially, politically, economically and technologically. Today we have more innovation and change take place in one month than the Romans had in 300 years.

 

I would suggest that the break up of the roman empire allowed divergent social and political communities to emerge, competing with each other, which had to adapt and change to survive. In that fall were the seeds of the rebirth of western civilisation - which didn't truely kick off until the renaissance. But by then there were enough new drivers in society to drive change - centres of learning, patronage by nobility, states vying for power, business models emerging, trade as a driver for social change etc. Through this period/process we eventualy developed a discourse around human rights and political rights which the republic had in nascent form but which had been crushed by empire.

 

It is true that we had to rediscover the things that the Romans had had to get there, but the Romans having all of that never used it to go anywhere else, and thats the point.

 

 

I'd be very interested to hear what others think of this perspective.

[caesar novus]

Why does Rome have to evolve to be good, if in fact it was a what mathematicians call a significant "local optimum"? That means across time and space there may exist a better, more global optimum but this one is a towering achievement across a vast sea of mediocrity or even degradation.

 

Even looking at the arts, I think Roman sculpture has never been equaled, despite it's resemblance to Greeks or even being done by Greeks - there is a cultural reason for that meditative look which I have described before. I recently heard a couple lectures on Roman comedy theater which again was distinguished from the superficially similar Greek by a number of special things, which really come out in a movie version "something happened on the way to the forum".

 

Why do styles have to change to be good - read the expert's description of Ella Fitzgerald's voice in

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ella_Fitzgerald#Voice ... regardless of whether you like that style or not, just the physics and master craftswomenship can hardly hope to be topped in another 2000 years. Same might be said for impressionist paintings, or maybe Roman wine or life in their villas - that's maybe "good enough" of a lifestyle that beats 98% of alternative human experiences.

 

Throw a dart at a timeline and choose a continent, and imagine life there compared to Rome How about the Ukraine under Stalin or under Hitler. Anywhere under Mao, who massacred 45 million as recently as around 1960. There weren't freak things pop up now and again - it was quite a close run thing to shut down some of those recent dark empires. Maybe the mauler of Italy, general Kesselring, alone tipped the balance when he earlier cancelled a bomber design capable of deep penetration of Russia into the factory zone.

 

I believe historian Lukacs proposes these are a natural progression of power being devolved to the "everyman" which has spawned numerous populist revolutions from the left or right. Tyrannies of the majority arose from Lenin to Hitler to Mao, although supporters may not be numerically in the majority their energy made up for it. I might even rather be a typical household slave in Rome, working on buying my freedom in a few years... instead of being under the 2014 US health care mandate which will empty out my savings to give freeloaders luxury care, with a bankrupted me forced back into wage-slave occupations to avoid becoming a welfare case myself.

 

Well, there is some progress over time that is hard to deny. Steve Pinker documents violence being in huge decline over history, with it being worst with those sentimentalized hunter and gatherers. I wonder if he saw a temporary special reduction with the pax romana. I guess the Guns, Germs, and Steel book shows that more organized societies do win evolution because they are more productive, but not always associated with furtherment of peace.

 

Some modern civilizations may be fragile flowers that are too darn utopian to survive. The EU is recently being stressed by populist pressures from France and Netherlands. Germany is strangling recoveries of the periphery due to populism wanting to avoid inflation with high bank rates. Only UK and Greece ever remotely paid their dues for defense spending, and all firehosed unsustainable amounts into social freeloading. Even though it temporarily offers the good life, can it sustain that better than Rome?

 

Actually I think Rome had a flawed republic, and a very flawed empire. I wish they developed a sort of British commonwealth instead, but it was a darn good try for so long ago. And with such good architecture I just can't believe they were as bad as some of their hostile writers said (often getting back at deposed regimes). After all, look at the hideous bolshevik or fascist architecture compared to Rome's...

[caldrail]

Me and Polybius agree completely on social science. Nation states are analogues of biological life and exhibit birth, growth, aging, and eventual death. It was inevitable that Rome would eventually disappear off the radar. As societies mature they become ritualistic and less able to respond dynamically to the threats from the world around them. It is interesting that you see Rome as a flawed republic because Polybius was admant that his republic was by far a superior model for society. Perhaps he would do.

 

Rome was never really a technologically minded society anyway. Partly on religious grounds, being a superstitious lot, partly because of the slave economy, but also because there was no encouragement of science from those holding the purse strings. Patronage was geared toward politics and wealth, not the extension of knowledge.

 

The problem with the Roman Empire is that it generates all sort of imagery, mostly to do with power, excess, and glory, which is attractive to us on an instinctual level. Being part of a strong tribe has definite advantages in survival and prosperity. What that blinds us to all too often is the other side of the equation. Rome was a greedy society, a ruthlessly exploitative society, one that Mary Beard says "sucks people in". It regarded itself as the centre of civilisation yet in the same way that people were used up by the potential and demands of society, so was culture. Rome absorbed culture from everyone it encountered to a greater or lesser degree. They placed their own stamp on it. Played with it a while, used what was thought useful, and cast away anything left over.

 

Notice that the barbarian invasions of the late empire were not inspired by a desire to get rid of Rome, but rather to grab a share of it for themselves.

[Kosmo]

I'd be very interested to hear what others think of this perspective.

 

I fully agree with your idea.

Still, I must point that Roman society did produce a major innovation, Christianity, that resulted in major changes (for good or for worse) across society from art and philosophy to political ideas and diplomacy. The Roman Empire produced many new technologies like glass, water-powered mills, paved roads and domed buildings but the greatest effect it had was to spread sophisticated technologies in new areas.

The divided remnants of the Carolingian Empire were the birthplace of the Western civilization and modernity. This space was linguistically unified by Latin and that made communication much easier. Religiously it was united under the Catholic church. Similar feudal institution were adopted across the West. Soon this political-religious-cultural system was adopted from Portugal to Finland and from Iceland to Transylvania. The West was never again unified politically and that allowed for vigorous competition that spawned innovation, but the main advantage was a certain degree of uniformity across Europe that allowed unprecedented connections between different areas.

[caldrail]

Still, I must point that Roman society did produce a major innovation, Christianity, that resulted in major changes (for good or for worse) across society from art and philosophy to political ideas and diplomacy.

Christianity was hardly an advance. It was not a roman invention to begin with and remained one mof many foreign cults (with an extremely poor reputation) until Constantine patronised for political reasons. Christianity wasn't interested in advancing Roman culture but profitting from it. In any case, the Romans had long been skilled diplomats before christianity turned up.

 

The divided remnants of the Carolingian Empire were the birthplace of the Western civilization and modernity.

I disagree vehemently. Both Ine and Alfred of Wessex were great lawmakers in Britain, with architecture and the first english navy resulting from the prosperity following the victory over the Danes. Other kings of the early medieval period developed cultural aspirations in Britain. At the other end of the scale, it was in Britain that religious orders very nearly kick started an industrial revolution in the 15th century. Modernity was also affected by the spread of islamic science following the crusades plus the favourable (if somewhat risky) societal enviroment of the increasingly prosperous Europe in its entirety.

 

The Roman Empire produced many new technologies like glass, water-powered mills, paved roads and domed buildings but the greatest effect it had was to spread sophisticated technologies in new areas.

Such knowledge was only in the hands of specialists and treated as such. In some ways this was to avoid rivals capitalising on someone elses expertise, but on the other hand there are examples of skilled knowledgeable people being put to death so their knowledge did not pass elsewhere. In fairness I don't see much of this from the Roman sphere but all the same the Romans had not advanced much further than any other society. They were for instance still using exactly the same siege warfare assets that the greeks had pioneered before them.

 

The existence of a three bladed water powered stone cutter is a proven remnant of their cleverness - but there was only one. These machines were not in common use, just unique examples of such mechanical devices here and there. That to me is merely the evidence of human ingenuity, not an advancing Roman science.

[wryobserver]

Thanks Kosmos, I agree with you, with maybe the exception pointed out by Princeps about Christianity. This came out of Judaism rather than Roman culture. The idea of a Christian State came uniquely from Constantine and the jury is still out in my view as to whether this was a good thing or not.

 

I definately think that the post Roman empire and the competivity that it bred became an environment for greater innovation and social change than had ever been available under Roman rule, whether this was in the Carolingian Empire or any other fiefdom.

[wryobserver]

Caesar Novus,

 

I have a different view of the Roman empire to you. I indeed see it as a early - maybe even the original - fascist dictatorship. It had many of the nasty hallmarks of the 20th century Fascist ideologies that looked back to empires like the Roman one for inspiration.

 

For example, it was led by a big deified personality who weilded absolute power and who used public budgets to build massive buildings and statues everywhere in crude propaganda to his greatness and that of the empire. Have you seen the monuments built celebrating the massacres and the enslavement of conquored peoples?

 

Their foreign policy was purely intended to expand the emperor's power and wealth, and they didn't mind a spot of genocide if it was necesary to grab resources. It believed in the inate superiority of the Roman over the Barbarian, almost a racism (even though Roman citizenship was made up of a wide mixture of tribes and origins).

 

It was a militaristic society, with little discourse around human rights, although the propertied classes enjoyed some civil rights and some protection from the justice system.

 

It was a society where the collective ruled over the individual.

 

All of these are characteristics of fascist totalitarian dictatorships.

 

I would suggest that whether being alive in the Roman empire was a great thing depended on who you were in that empire. I'm interested in the status of slaves, but I doubt that being a Roman slave was a lot of fun. I think most people who were not rich land owners probably had quite a tough life, and it would make paying Obama's health reform taxes look like a very reasonable proposition from a quasi paradisical civilisation that one couldn't even dream about under Roman rule.

[caesar novus]

I have a different view of the Roman empire to you. I indeed see it as a early - maybe even the original - fascist dictatorship. It had many of the nasty hallmarks of the 20th century Fascist ideologies that looked back to empires like the Roman one for inspiration.

I called the empire very flawed, yet intuitively cuddly due to what it's art and engineering suggest. I think we were in agreement there. But John Lukacs book "Democracy and Populism - fear and hatred" seems kinda persuasive in contrasting pre-1917 dictatorships as top down in origin, but later ones borne bottom up by a "tyranny of the majority". Sure, eventually a secret police can take away influence of the rabble, but this takes a while to gel. In mid 1930's Hitler and his nicer policies were wildly popular and the teen suicide rate fell by 80% and childbirth rose by 50%. He cultivated support to consolidate power, even becoming a hero to the female and youth demographic. Lukacs goes on to extrapolate to recent US politics where a populist right and left bully in a way that the founders hoped to avoid by emulating Roman republic rather than Greek kinds of democracy.

 

Surely John Lukacs proves you slam-dunk wrong about the nature of fascism in the third chapter of "The Hitler of History", although it is an understandable stereotype that had some truth in it. He surveys all biographies and histories of Hitler, and especially primary sources like Speer's memoirs and Borman's "table talk" of Hitler's private comments (which I have read). Chapter 3 shows Hitler as the opposite of a reactionary, who viscerally hated the backward looking conservative elements in Germany which he felt a need to pander to. He stifled himself from the failed putch untll a victory at war, when he had specific plans for a revolution of society such as the civil service, industry, leisure (now partly adopted by EU). He hated the German bourgeoisie worse than the German far left, which he was in for a time. He privately ridiculed Himmler and Goering's old mystical symbolism. Goebbels early on tried to push Hitler out of the Nazi party to turn it leftward but amazingly Hitler just embraced him and convinced him left or right is the same thing - revolution. Mussolini also was extreme left and didn't feel it was a meaningful change when switching to the rightwing demographic to boost his opportunities.

 

For example, it was led by a big deified personality who weilded absolute power and who used public budgets to build massive buildings and statues everywhere in crude propaganda to his greatness and that of the empire. Have you seen the monuments built celebrating the massacres and the enslavement of conquored peoples?

Out of context it may appear that. An architecture course proposed that in the context of the times, depicting the bashing of enemies advertised a willingness to defend the peoples safety and well being, it's wealth being a magnet to invaders at times. Sometimes rebels need to be put down even for the good of their region. I have heard of the group in the Masada being called fringe terrorists threatening their own people, although now we turn them into noble underdogs. I think the peace in the interior outweighed the jostling at the fringe. Cabeza de Vaca got stranded alone in the US around 1527 and partly made a living as a trader because only an outsider could cross the myriad tiny tribal borders without triggering a war. He depicted it like a thousand countries always standing by for war.

 

I would suggest that whether being alive in the Roman empire was a great thing depended on who you were in that empire. I'm interested in the status of slaves, but I doubt that being a Roman slave was a lot of fun. I think most people who were not rich land owners probably had quite a tough life, and it would make paying Obama's health reform taxes look like a very reasonable proposition from a quasi paradisical civilisation that one couldn't even dream about under Roman rule.

Mining or galley slaves aside, wasn't the typical Roman slave more like an indentured servant of a couple hundred years ago? Not locked into a role based on race, they could often earn their freedom in about 7 years. Romans even volunteered to be slaves, such as to escape consequences of debt for instance.

 

O-care is not a reform or a tax, but a populist abomination signaling the end of the enlightment. The fact that the supreme court is only "probably" going to throw it out shows disregard of the constitution and it's protection of state residents from overbearing central gov't. It doesn't tax some proportion of money you have coming in anyway, it mandates pure confiscation of your vital nest-egg property (for example to fund sex change operations and medical pot recoveries for your lazier neighbors). Bring on health reform, breadth of coverage, etc - but certainly not o-care.

 

Unlike other countries, you cannot escape federal payments when leaving the country and it's benefits - the reach is worldwide http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/16/business/global/for-americans-abroad-taxes-just-got-more-complicated.html?_r=1 . That is why the states originally united only reluctantly, with shields in place that the central gov't would not dominate european style. You can always move to a saner state or US territory, but you cannot escape the fed by moving to Paraguay or Bhutan. Now we all must live in extensions of kook Kalifornia.

[Kosmo]

Christianity was created in Roman provinces by subjects of Rome. The central figure is connected with roman administration from birth (the presumed census) till death (sentenced and executed by Roman authorities) The same can be said about the entire New Testament, all of the Apostles and, in Orthodoxy at least, about most saints. The same about Christian theology and art. The Church played a central role in the Empire for more then a millennium, but it was the Empire that shaped the Church.

 

PS Can we keep Hitler and Obama out of this, please?

[wryobserver]

PS Can we keep Hitler and Obama out of this, please?

 

Quite agree! This isn't the "History Channel" after all.

 

As to Christianity being Roman, I'm afraid I still disagree. It was alien to Roman rule, historical roots, culture or religious belief. It grew up inspite of Roman rule not because of it, and was a counter culture, persecuted for 300 years at times ruthlesly. Christians were in conflict with Rome who worshipped the Emperor as a deity in his own right.

 

You can claim that the institutionalisation of christianity as a state religion was a uniquely Roman invention though. The adoption of christianity as the official roman religion by Constantine was an exact replacement of old pagan deities with a new Christian one. Every thing was the same, except the name and exact manner of worshipping the God. The new Christian God was meant to guarantee the success of the Roman state, bless its armies, protect it from its enemies in exactly the same way as the earlier gods were meant to.

 

They had a nasty shock when Alaric sacked Rome, and caused a massive crises of faith throughout the empire. Saint Augustus wrote his best work on the back of the incident in which he wrestled the concept of God away from a paradigm of a Roman god who existed to protect and serve the Roman empire. The christian God had never offered to defend anyone's empires.

[wryobserver]

Caesar Novus,

 

I wasn't defining the domestic political programme of fascism, I was drawing some key similarities between fascist ideology and the roman empire. I wasn't talking about one particular fascist leader either, but the four fascist movements in 1930s Europe which all had several characteristics in common. And if you wanted a 20th century parallel with the roman political system I would suggest that it is closer to facism than an yother model that we have to hand today.

 

The various empires of 19th Europe were not heavily militaristic, ruled by one man, dictatorships, dominated by the cult of personality, rule of the collective good over the individual good, although they were all imbibed with an inate sense of their own cultural/racial superiority.

 

 

I live in the heart of ex Roman territory, in Southern Gaul. Twenty minutes from here you can see the most complete roman colliseum in the world, the greatest Roman aqueduct surviving today, roman fortresses, complete roman temples, and entire roman towns that have been excavated, along with its Arc of Triumph.

 

I used to love this Roman stuff, and whilst I am still in awe of it, I have come to realise that this was a nasty macho, testosterone feuled empire that was publishing its own ego where it went.

 

If I could work out how to load up photos i'd show you guys some of the examples I am talking about. For some reason I am not permitted to do that here. Do I have to pay for that or something?

 

Anyway, I think we need to reappraise how we see the Roman empire.

[Kosmo]

The various empires of 19th Europe were not heavily militaristic, ruled by one man, dictatorships, dominated by the cult of personality, rule of the collective good over the individual good, although they were all imbibed with an inate sense of their own cultural/racial superiority. I live in the heart of ex Roman territory, in Southern Gaul. ..

 

It is in 19th century France where we find the regime that resembles most that of Imperial Rome and it was a very deliberate copy. Bonapartism had all the characteristics you listed above. Also, a comparison between the Roman Empire and the First French Empire it is between two fairly similar societies, even the Second Empire can be compared a bit, but XXth century Europe was already a very different place.

[Artimi]

Greek kinds of democracy.

 

I have always had a problem with idea of Greece as the birthplace of democracy, maybe the idea yes.

But in Ancient Greece who had the freedom to vote, to actually Do..

 

not women, not slaves, not people from another city.

 

I am not sure who said this - romans did seem at that time to have equal opportunity intolerance.

 

You are born, live, die and sometimes the manner in which you do these things influence the future. There in lies the basis for many discussions with no resolutions.

 

I will continue admire some of the things of Roman Republic and Empire with the awareness that Ancient Rome was not perfect. But look at other ancient empires, Assyria, Egypt, Carthegians, etc etc.

 

not sure I will leave this post up.

[wryobserver]

Greek kinds of democracy.

 

I have always had a problem with idea of Greece as the birthplace of democracy, maybe the idea yes.

But in Ancient Greece who had the freedom to vote, to actually Do..

 

Completely agree, it was never universal suffrage. But even our own model of democracy is very recent historically too. In 18th century Europe most men couldn't vote, let alone women.

 

One could critique the extent to which modern democracies really are democratic anyway, once you start to examine the role of corporate interests in determining the selection of candidates, the political agendas, election funding and exten to which elected representatives are allowed to go politically to implement their policies. Most democractic governments in the west run for the benefit of rich corporate institutions more than the demos.

 

But back to Greece - each island was different and had a different political structure. The concept of democracy was Athenian and as you indicate, class and gendre based only. Go south to Sparta and the Greeks were even more militaristic, macho, and fascist than the Romans had ever been. That was probably the nastiest society that we have on record. No sign of democracy there.

 

I am not sure how developed democratic ideals were in the Roman Republic, but I think they were extremely nascient at that time. They did have a balance of powers and revolving ruler system, with a seperate house of wise senators (men) who wielded soft power. Caesar wiped all that away at a stroke though, basing his political power on his military force. His armies were loyal to him and were prepared to kill and wipe out other roman armies to protect him. The strong man won. A few senators were no match for him.

[caldrail]

I am not sure how developed democratic ideals were in the Roman Republic, but I think they were extremely nascient at that time. They did have a balance of powers and revolving ruler system, with a seperate house of wise senators (men) who wielded soft power. Caesar wiped all that away at a stroke though, basing his political power on his military force. His armies were loyal to him and were prepared to kill and wipe out other roman armies to protect him. The strong man won. A few senators were no match for him.

Polybius enthused about the balance of executive and popular power. I'm not sure his views on this were entirely valid since Rome practised democracy with a block-vote system - citizens could vote but it wasn't one man one vote at all. Also the vote was influenced not by political policies or ideals that modern politicians sell to the public, but public generosity, image, and under the table deals. Corruption was part of Roman life and for all the disapproval it could generate, Rome functioned by it.

 

Caesar was unusual in that he was a populist politician and appealed to the public in a more personal manner than the upper classes of Rome generally considered normal. I don't think he swept anything away at all in that respect - he was merely adding to the mix of buisiness that went on regardless. It is of course noticeable that although we call future autocrats of Rome 'emperors', that word is ours, not theirs. The ruler was called 'Caesar', in that he was the new caesar to replace the old in deference to the original, serving as a dictator for life by another name.

 

Also I should point out that the legions loyalty to Caesar was not guaranteed and it wasn't always plain sailing for him. Further, the idea of marching an army into Rome to establish a power base wasn't new - Sulla had already broken that taboo once before and proven it could be done in spite of laws and tradition.

 

What I would say is that whilst the earlier caesars, the infamous Julio-Claudians, spent their reigns in competition with the senate as much as living out dramatic and excessive private lives, and we see each of them (Augustus included) seeing off threats against their lives though in fairness a few of them succumbed to such pressure for one reason or another. Once the stability of government was restored after the Year of Four Emperors, there is more of a partnership in power between senate and caesar, and as the autocracy metamorphosed into a monarchy over time, so the senate receded in influence and this has been identified as one major reason for the economic and governmental decline of the Roman Empire.

 

In other words, Caesar established a precedent, a standard of achievement, a name by which future ruklers would be called. What he did not do was change Rome.