Political Succession - A lesson from the Roman Empire
Enormous quantities of historical treatises have been written about the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, including but certainly not limited to Edward Gibbon's famous 18th century work by that name. Do the experiences of the Roman empire have any lessons for us, for our western civilisation or specifically the United States, the world's remaining superpower? I think it does.
First, let me summarise some proposed causes and lessons that have frequently been applied to the fall of the Roman empire, and briefly explain why I think they are faulty at worst and very simplistic at best.
Moral decline: It is a common misconception that Romans became too busy with orgies of sex and wine to successfully defend themselves. Rome truly had a strong family orientation, it was strictly patriarchal, and it built a system of patronage and clientage that was crucial for the empire's organisation. Romans also had a very strong sense of honour, dignitas, that undoubtedly was crucial in some very rough times. At the time of the Second Punic War, under the Roman Republic, when Hannibal had successfully demolished every legion sent against him and roamed the Italian countryside at will, any state without an iron morale would have crumbled. Rome grew stronger.
The problem for those who want to attribute the eventual fall of Rome to a decline in family values, to corruptions and the haraballus, is that the eastern Roman empire, ruled from Constantinople, went on for almost a thousand years longer than the western empire. The history of the east does not indicate any less corruption and decadence than that of the late Rome. It must also be added that the popular conceptions about wild orgies are often based on the history of Rome under the incredibly incompetent and insane emperors Caligula and Nero. And Rome actually had yet to reach its greatest power under these early Julio-Claudian emperors.
Immigration: Always a popular conception, occasionally brought up by modern opponents of immigration, is that Rome crumbled because it allowed too many foreigners to move into the empire. These people, the argument goes, had split loyalties, thus undermining the Roman empire. This argument ignores the fact that Rome was from the early empire consisting mainly of foreigners. After Caesar's conquest of Gaul, countless men from all across the empire served in the legions, and quite a few of them reached quite prominent positions. Greco-Roman culture had a massive influence in these areas, making the new inhabitants over time Romans. Remember what language people are speaking today in Spain, France and Romania. If the Celtic Gauls posed no threat to the unity of the Roman empire, surely an argument against immigration cannot be made on the basis that later, Goths and Germanic tribes would pose a fatal threat. The problem was the failure of the later empire to 'romanize' the new inhabitants in the same way it had done with countless tribes earlier. Surely, this problem is a symptom and not a cause of the fall.
Christianity: It has also been argued that the victory of Christianity in the Roman empire, following Constantine's famous conversion, softened the people with "turn the other cheek" morality that was inferior to the ruthless pagan religions on which the Roman empire was built.
This argument flies in the face of the fact that the eastern empire, again, was able to survive and thrive for centuries after adopting Christianity. Later, Christian Europe was able to totally dominate the world. I don't think anyone could seriously argue that a meek "turn the other cheek" morality was a prevalent characteristic of the 19th century British armed forces, the German army during World War II, or for that matter the US armed forces today.
It is undoubtedly reasonable to argue that the religious conflicts between Christians and Pagans, and between competing Christian sects, was another factor weakening the empire. But from the very start the empire was constantly threatened by ruthless civil war. Julius Caesar came into power through civil war, his successor Octavian, who became Augustus, also prevailed through defeating domestic opponents. Only decades after Augustus' death, in 69 AD, the empire experienced four would-be emperors battling it out until one prevailed. It is dubious to argue that the later religious quarreling was more serious than the conflicts that occurred regularly all through the Roman era, notwithstanding Pax Romana being on the whole a period of unprecedented peace and prosperity compared to other eras.
I am not arguing a single cause of the fall of the Roman empire, but I have come to believe that there is one main cause, along with a myriad of minor causes, that meant the vast empire was essentially doomed from the start.
That cause, which I alluded to above, is the succession problem inherent in the office of the principate, the emperorship, itself.
It is far beyond this article to even outline the complex constitutional problems and issues that made it very difficult to create a stable system of succession in Rome. When Augustus (picture) instituted the principate, he used rhetorical arguments and titles from the old, abandoned Republic, which was set up precisely to avoid a despotic monarchy where leadership was inherited. Augustus had created a very crafty unwritten constitutional system to play pretend with old consular and tribunal titles. So when Augustus wanted to assure a stable succession, he not only adopted his preferred heirs (a number of them, all dying before him, until Tiberius finally became his heir), he had them 'elected' to these consular and tribunal powers by the yes-men in the Senate first. The Romans were regicidal by nature, not admitting being run by a king, and this clever ploy from Augustus also meant that any future would-be emperor had no serious claim to the throne beyond an appeal to the sword.
The principate in Rome rested on no generally accepted constitutional powers. It rested exclusively on pure force, on the loyalty of the legions. Augustus surely knew this. Like Alexander's death was followed by the spoils being fought over by his generals, almost all emperors in the century-long era of the Roman empire were brought to power by being commander of the troops, and also ended their reign by being killed by rebellion or treachery among the soldiers.
In the time of the soldier emperors, this fact became so obvious it was almost comical. Shortly after the death of emperor Commodus in 192 AD, the Praetorian Guard let go all pretence of being the emperor's bodyguard and explicitly auctioned off the throne to the highest bidder, sparking fury around the empire and throwing it into a cruel civil war. For quite some time after that, emperors effectively ruled at the mercy of the soldiers around them, and the job was the most short-lived and dangerous in the world.
In conclusion, the Roman empire had no mechanism for effective, let along peaceful, succession of power. There was one source of power, and that was the armed forces. This caused corruption not only among the political leadership, but also diverted the army away from its defensive purposes and drained it of power and professionalism.
In contrast, the long-term success of the western world, in my opinion, rests less on its technological superiority than the fact that we eventually found a stable solution to this problem. In the western world, it is simply not feasible that the loser of a presidential election runs off to the nearest army camp to start a coup. Our armed forces are fiercely loyal to our system of government, not individual leaders. Whether servicemen greatly admire or utterly detest the democratically elected commander in chief, it doesn't enter the mind of the generals or the soldiers to overturn the government by force of arms. Even the sorest loser of a democratic election, like Al Gore or Silvio Berlusconi, eventually bites the bullet and concedes defeat, not entertaining the possibility of resorting to violence.
Rome effectively rose to power after defeating the Carthaginians in 202 BC, and Augustus became its supreme ruler from the naval battle off Actium in 31 BC. The city, and thus the western empire, fell in a succession of sackings by barbarian kings starting with Alaric in 410. Rome thus was a regional superpower, to use a modern expression, for 600 years, and a powerful empire for around 400 years.
The western world, Europe at first, rose to preeminence with the naval battle of Lepanto in 1571. Through the colonial conquests Europe's power grew dramatically over the next centuries, culminating in the British empire in the 19th century. It would eventually be surpassed by one of the British colonies, the USA, carrying on what is called a hegemony until this day. The western power, arguably a successor of the Roman empire, has lasted approximately equally long as a power, but is so different in composition and forms of dominance that further comparisons would be quite useless.
If it is true that the main reason for the decline and fall of the Roman Empire is the unstable succession system at its core, one the west world has since found a solution to, it is certainly not impossible that our civilisation will last far longer than the Roman empire. That, of course, rests entirely on our will and ability to preserve and defend our democratic institutions.
It is far beyond this article to even outline the complex constitutional problems and issues that made it very difficult to create a stable system of succession in Rome. When Augustus (picture) instituted the principate, he used rhetorical arguments and titles from the old, abandoned Republic, which was set up precisely to avoid a despotic monarchy where leadership was inherited. Augustus had created a very crafty unwritten constitutional system to play pretend with old consular and tribunal titles. So when Augustus wanted to assure a stable succession, he not only adopted his preferred heirs (a number of them, all dying before him, until Tiberius finally became his heir), he had them 'elected' to these consular and tribunal powers by the yes-men in the Senate first. The Romans were regicidal by nature, not admitting being run by a king, and this clever ploy from Augustus also meant that any future would-be emperor had no serious claim to the throne beyond an appeal to the sword.