Had the Western Roman Empire not fallen would feudalism in any form have developed?
Having existed before can hardly be a criterion for exclusion from the list of defining traits. The defining characteristic of feudalism as given by larpsidekick below:Serfdom emerged in the WRE as well as in the ERE. It was not a characteristic of feudality since it existed before.
has also existed before; it was common in the Sasanian Empire, it was practiced in Zhou China etc.The defining characteristic of feudalism is the exchange of land for a promise of future military service.
It depends.
If the West doesn't falls and keeps all it's territory, they would have to develop some form of feudal monarchy. It would be impossible for the Emperor to administrate all the Empire, let alone face all possible attacks on the borders.
Eventually the Ducces would receive large amounts of autonomy to face those attacks, with the border areas being divided into some kind of personal domain of the Ducces (maybe called Duxia or Ducia?).
So the borders would become under the control of the Ducces, with the Emperor controlling the safer, and more richer, lands.
Imagine a kind of Theme system, but only in the borders, and with the Dux in charge with much autonomy.
But if the West survives, but LOSES all the lands except Italia, the Southern Gallic coast and the Iberian Mediterranean coast (you might add northern Africa, but only the part near Italia, if you wish), then they can keep the governor system.
The main borders would be more close to the capital, and the Imperial Army, and Navy, would be able to fend off attacks more easily, without having to give the commanders huge amounts of autonomy. The ones that would have to get extra powers would be the ones in Africa and in some areas of the Iberian coast, but they wound't have the same powers than those I mentioned in the first case.
So it's possible some kind of feudal system is born, but it must have special circumstances, and it would never developed like in the Carolingian Empire.
Why would the West necessarily have to evolve into a feudal structure ? Feudalism was not an unavoidable evolution.
The empire never was centralized. It was very decentralized with provincial governors that enjoyed a large autonomy and, inside the provinces, there were cities, villages and federations that enjoyed a large autonomy.
It was just that the governors and local magistrates were kind of civil servants that were named for a limited term.
This could perfectly have gone on if the WRE had survived, quite a similar way the the chinese administration lasted.