How To Preserve The Roman Republic
- Thread starter SlyDessertFox
- Start date
The problem is that slavery was widely regarded as both a good thing, a part of the natural order and the will of the Gods. Remember Romans did not have Judeo-Christian morality and the idea that we are all equal in the eyes of the Lord. On the contrary from the Roman perspective we were unequal in the eyes of the Gods, some were favoured and some were cursed and that's just the way things were.
You can`t really ban slavery, firstly slavery in roman was different from the chattel slavery we seen in early modern times, secondly you are talking about a culture were slavery was so ingrained that the definition of a citizen being destitute was that he did not own a single slave.
Slavery was a issue, and Cesar`s conquest of gaul made this worse as it flooded the market with huge numbers of cheap slaves. This allowed more accumulation by large landholders and drove more people into the urban centers. Urban centers it should be noted that were primarily administration and cultural centers, not production ones. Combine this with an need to protect the border, with professional soldiers, who are dependent on their generals to get their pensions, not enough silver and the lack of efficient financial institutions, a cultural and political bias against any wealth that is not based on land, and well it is a disaster waiting to happen.
"The most likely candidates are Carthage or Macedonia." Erm... Zama, Cynocephalae, Pydna? Even after Cannae, Hannibal lacked the ability to capture Rome. The manpower the Republic and Socii could call on was in excess of half a million men. Rome conquered the central Mediterranean and and dominated the periphery because of its sheer staying power and a military system that wasn't reliant on a narrow pool of competent generals. Plus they would coopt more Friends and Allies to offset deficiencies, ie: Rhodes=navy, Pergamon=cavalry when they knocked down Antiochus and posed as the liberators of the Hellenistic world. Of course after this Pergamon, Rhodes and the Greeks had no offsetting power to call on when Rome came for them.
Whatever/whenever your POD, you can't "save" the Roman Republic. Whatever you do you will wind up with something that isn't a republic or isn't Roman. This was a Warfare State that had no other doctrine than Unconditional Surrender and that coud not tolerate rivals or independent states and the same went for the individuals in that state. Given that, there wasn't going to be anyother outcome than despotic, absolute monarchy. You might have had the various stages having different names and extents of time, but I think you would wind up in the same place and by more or less the sme route.
Whatever/whenever your POD, you can't "save" the Roman Republic. Whatever you do you will wind up with something that isn't a republic or isn't Roman. This was a Warfare State that had no other doctrine than Unconditional Surrender and that coud not tolerate rivals or independent states and the same went for the individuals in that state. Given that, there wasn't going to be anyother outcome than despotic, absolute monarchy. You might have had the various stages having different names and extents of time, but I think you would wind up in the same place and by more or less the sme route.
That's easier though still difficult as has been pointed out. I stick to my previous position which is stop the Marian reforms. Rome is going to lose some wars because it will be militarily less powerful but it isn't going to get wiped out and without the economic effects of conquest or the political effects of poverty stricken legionaries dependent on their generals then Rome has a much longer lifespan.
If Rome is going to have an extensive territory then it absolutely needs a professional standing army, whether established by Marius or another military reformer. Without the ability to station legions for long periods of time in distant frontier regions, the Roman state can't expand permanently beyond a stone's throw from Italy. It's not just a matter of 'losing a few battles', it's literally an existential question for the Roman polity.
So it isn't so much a question of handwaving Marius. Those reforms had to be enacted given the extent of Rome's conquests, and whether Marius is gone or not these changes are going to happen. The only way you'll really stop this change is by scaling down Rome's expansion - and given the militarism and aggressive nature of the Roman civilization, combined with the relative power vacuum in the Mediterranean region, this seems a tall order.
I agree. While I think Rome can hold Spain, Greece, Dalmatia and Transalpine Gaul with a citizen army Asia Province, Crete etc. require a professional army. However considering the nature of the Roman state I can't see a plausible way to create a professional army without having pretty disastrous political consequences. Add to that the disastrous effect of moving to a plunder based economy and a Big Roman Republic=A short lived Roman Republic.
Which isn't really surprising, frankly the institutions which were designed for a small city state were never going to be appropriate for an Empire and large scale democracy simply isn't practical with Roman technology which leaves autocracy.
If you want Rome to survive you need the Marian Reforms and anything similar to them to be stopped and Rome placed under the control of the ultra-conservatives who are willing to lose territory in return for maintaining the status quo. It wouldn't be pretty and you'd miss the extraordinary cultural flowering that was the last years of the Republic but that's the problem with stasis, it's boring. Still it would fulfil the OP.
Plenty of states have maintained professional armies without them leading to those armies being so dependent on their generals as to demolish civilian government. Why can't the Roman Republic?