in what way did ancient rome compared to america

If you were a Roman denizen effectually, say, 200 BC, yous probably would have assumed Rome was going to last forever.

At the time, Rome was the greatest democracy in homo history, and its institutions had proven resilient through invasions and all kinds of disasters. But the foundations of Rome started to weaken less than a century later, and by 27 BC the republic had collapsed entirely.

The story of Rome's autumn is both complicated and relatively straightforward: The country became besides big and chaotic; the influence of money and private interests corrupted public institutions; and social and economic inequalities became so large that citizens lost organized religion in the system birthday and gradually fell into the arms of tyrants and demagogues.

If all of that sounds familiar, well, that's because the parallels to our electric current political moment are striking. Edward Watts, a historian at the University of California San Diego, published a 2018 book titled Mortal Commonwealth that carefully lays out what went incorrect in ancient Rome — and how the lessons of its decline might assistance save fledgling republics like the United States today.

I spoke to Watts virtually those lessons and why he thinks the American republic, along with several others, is in danger of going the manner of ancient Rome. This conversation took place in January 2019, long earlier the coronavirus pandemic or the recent social unrest post-obit George Floyd'southward killing at the hands of police, but the broader questions he raised remain as relevant today as they were when we initially spoke.

A lightly edited transcript of our conversation follows.

Sean Illing

Why write a book about Rome'southward pass up at present?

Edward Watts

When I started teaching Roman history, the main questions from students were always near comparing the end of the Roman empire with the country of the American empire, and this was commonly tied to the Iraq State of war.

In the by 10 years, those sorts of questions have died downwards. Now students are interested in Rome equally a commonwealth, and whether the American republic is collapsing in the same mode. They see lots of parallels there, especially in how the 2 systems are structured.

Sean Illing

Tell me about some of those parallels, the ones you recall are almost relevant.

Edward Watts

Starting time, we have to remember that the The states is a representative commonwealth. We tend to drop the representative function when nosotros're talking about what political organisation we live under, simply that's actually quite important. This is not a direct democracy, and Rome was not a straight democracy either.

What you take in both cases is a arrangement where people are chosen by the voters to make decisions, and and then there'south a period of time when they make those decisions, and so they're held accountable for how those decisions turned out.

But the representatives are making the choices — and people have noticed that that works fine until those representatives either stop making principled decisions or become paralyzed past the vicissitudes of popular stance.

Both of those things started to happen when Rome began to decline, and both of those things are happening in the Usa right at present.

Sean Illing

Rome didn't have to fail; it failed because Romans foolishly believed Rome would last forever. What could they take done differently, and when could they have done it?

Edward Watts

They could've recognized what their system was designed to do, which was produce compromise and consensus. Ultimately, it'southward better to make no decision than to make a bad decision. What the Romans failed to appreciate was that their processes were slow and deliberative for very good reasons: That's how representative systems avoid disaster, how you get people to the tabular array to piece of work out compromises.

For 300 years, this system worked quite well in Rome, just for the past century or so of its existence, these tools of deliberation were used not to facilitate compromise merely to obstruct and punish political enemies and basically prevent annihilation from happening. That destroyed the goodwill within the system and really poisoned it in the minds of the voters.

Sean Illing

Well, that sounds familiar!

Edward Watts

Indeed.

Sean Illing

Shortly after Donald Trump'south ballot, I wrote about Plato'southward alarm near the decline of commonwealth. Basically, he believed that democracies fall into tyranny when too much freedom leads to disorder and citizens choose the stability of autocracy over the chaos of democracy.

This is what happened in Rome. Do y'all believe the same thing is happening correct now?

Edward Watts

I remember that nosotros're in the early stages of a procedure that could lead to that. The point at which Romans were willing to make that merchandise occurred after nearly 150 years of political dysfunction, only it also occurred after a generation of really savage civil war.

And the procedure that started that was one of economic inequality and the inability and unwillingness of the people vested in the upper, successful parts of the Roman state to address that economical inequality.

Merely equally people'due south needs were not beingness addressed for decades, the tensions heightened to the point where violence started breaking out. And once violence starts to pause out, it'due south very difficult for a republic to regain control of itself.

Information technology's like shooting fish in a barrel to see how the US and other established republics could be in the starting time states of a similar process. I don't call back we're there quite yet, but there are reasons for genuine concern.

Sean Illing

The inequality problem is maybe the most striking for me. What yous saw in Rome, and what you see quite clearly today, is the wealthy undermining the very system that made them wealthy, and a total failure to run into how ruinous that is in the long term.

Edward Watts

Yeah, it's a real trouble today, and it was a real trouble in Rome. At that place'south a pivotal period in Rome, around the middle office of the second century BC, in which there'due south an economical revolution that displaces a lot of people who had belonged to a hereditary elite and moves them off the top economical rungs of the state.

At the same fourth dimension, information technology's creating economic weather that prompt people in the centre to basically become very frustrated that their economic prospects are not increasing either. And what ends up happening is the people who win from this economic revolution try to preserve their gains through just about whatever means they tin can, and that includes gross political obstructionism, the rigging of elections, and a total unwillingness to compromise.

This kicking-starts a death spiral that ultimately undoes the Roman system from within — and nosotros'd practice well to learn from it. Considering the story of Rome shows that one time you reach that breaking point, that point of no return, yous cannot unwind the clock.

Sean Illing

Why couldn't the Roman organisation reply to these disastrous trends chop-chop enough? What brusque-circuited in their process?

Edward Watts

There are signs that the organisation was trying to respond to this new economical reality between 140 and 130 BC. There are efforts to reform the electoral process and so that information technology'due south harder to purchase votes and rig elections. But the reforms just get halfway considering they're undermined by entrenched interests, and then the decline just continues rapidly.

Sean Illing

You spend a lot of time mapping the decline of norms and political community in Rome. Was this the result of Roman politicians elevating their own self-involvement over the expert of the republic, or was it something deeper happening in the civilisation?

Edward Watts

I call back the erosion of norms really starts when Roman politicians convince themselves that their personal ambitions and the good of the democracy are ane and the same. In other words, they started acting in their ain self-involvement but deluded themselves into thinking that it was really for the betterment of Rome.

The other matter you see is that Roman politicians, much like American politicians today, started to believe that all they needed was 51 percent of the people to back up them, and that the other 49 percent didn't matter. But that's not how the Roman system was supposed to work, and it's non how the US arrangement is supposed to work.

Representative democracies are designed to cool down the passions of a pure democracy and find representatives who can think more long-term and arts and crafts policies that solve bug in ways that as well have broad support.

Sean Illing

The thing that worries me the most is the loss of faith in public institutions, something that occurred in Rome and in many ways signaled the commencement of the finish. It'south hard to look at the American political landscape and non see something similar afoot.

Edward Watts

I think that'due south definitely a way to read the political moment in the U.s. correct at present, where people who need things from the system and from the government are not getting them, whether information technology'due south health care or job training or economic opportunities or infrastructure. You see this in the late Roman Republic, likewise — it simply got too large and lacked the infrastructure to support its population.

What the Roman story shows is that in a democracy that's old, where people have a lot of faith in that republican system, people like Donald Trump popular up every generation or and so when things reach a tipping point. You accept these cycles where the organization reboots, and people are shocked past what happened, and they stride dorsum and allow things to autumn dorsum into some sort of normal rhythm before they get frustrated over again.

And I call up this is the cycle that is perhaps most scary. If the reject of a republic is something that doesn't accept v years, simply instead takes 50 years, or 70 years, or 120 years, Trump is likely not the last of these kinds of figures.

Sean Illing

The title of your book is a reminder that all political systems are finite and will, eventually, die. Rome lasted centuries before it ultimately imploded. How worried are you nigh the trajectory of the American republic?

Edward Watts

I'm extremely worried. Just I still believe our decline is reversible. I trust that plenty people recognize that it'south better to have a dysfunctional republic than to have nothing at all. And in Rome, you lot practice have these moments of retrenchment, where people step back and say this is quite bad, this is likewise much, nosotros have to pull back.

Only it'south upwards to Americans, only like information technology was up to voters in Rome, to defend our institutions and to punish people who are misusing the tools that are supposed to arrive strong to instead undermine it. No ane else volition do information technology on their behalf.

So I remember it'southward by no ways a foregone decision. History doesn't piece of work that mode. And in that location take been moments where the US looked to exist in grave problem and managed to bounce back. But we have to be really vigilant and defend the integrity of the republic, and defend the integrity of our system, and punish those who corruption our institutions and violate our norms.

This article was originally published on January ane, 2019.

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Source: https://www.vox.com/2019/1/1/18139787/rome-decline-america-edward-watts-mortal-republic

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