Why The Roman Empire Collapsed

[r3volution 3.0]

My theory in a nutshell:

Political Instability --> Illiberal Economic Policy --> Economic Decline --> Military Decline --> Conquest

Here is an excellent article from Cato summarizing the illiberal economic policies of the Roman State.

I'll have more to say later, especially about political instability.

In the meantime, post anything you like about the collapse of the Roman Empire: your own arguments, interesting articles, etc.

[oyarde]

Yeah , Nero putting his personal guard on the food stamp roll .You would think he may want to pay them a little better .Rome is the classic story of failure, debased money , welfare , taxes , slavery , inflation etc

[Chester Copperpot]

debasing the money and then all the laws made to force people to buy and sell at pre-inflation prices and stay in their occupation or face death im sure helped end the empire rather quickly

[otherone]

My theory in a nutshell:

Political Instability --> Illiberal Economic Policy --> Economic Decline --> Military Decline --> Conquest

Here is an excellent article from Cato summarizing the illiberal economic policies of the Roman State.

I'll have more to say later, especially about political instability.

In the meantime, post anything you like about the collapse of the Roman Empire: your own arguments, interesting articles, etc.

The empire started to collapse the moment it ceased expansion. Rome went from being aggressor to defender. Ironically, the roads that made it expedient to expand the frontier made it easier for outside forces to pressure Rome.

[oyarde]

debasing the money and then all the laws made to force people to buy and sell at pre-inflation prices and stay in their occupation or face death im sure helped end the empire rather quickly

Yeah , price controls and govt picking occupations is no recipe for success .

[timosman]

They $#@!ed themselves to death.

[Danke]

No universal healthcare.

[Natural Citizen]

Oh gosh. This guy with his better to bow to kings spew again. Heh. Is this another thread to promote Monarchy at Individual Liberty's sacrifice, rev? You don't care for the idea of a true Republic? Surely it must be. You have a couple dozen of these around here.

Read my sig again. I put it there just for you. Ya fraud. You have a lot of people around here who may not know better fooled, though. I'll give you that much.

As has been said before, "instead of inquiring why the Roman empire was destroyed, we should rather be surprised that it had subsisted so long."

[r3volution 3.0]

Quantifying political instability in the Roman Empire:





The first chart is fairly self-explanatory.

I post the second because it shows a decline in the average length of imperial reigns over time, especially during the 3rd century.

The 3rd century is considered to mark the beginning of the decline by many historians.

[dannno]

It was a confluence of things, the OP isn't wrong, but it is missing the issues related to immigration and mercenary armies made up of immigrants:

[r3volution 3.0]

As a basis for comparison, here is a quantitative analysis of political instability in monarchical France:

Kings of France 1380-1792, the lengths of their reigns and their causes of death:

1. Charles VI - 42 years - natural causes
2. Charles VII - 39 years - natural causes
3. Louis XI - 22 years - natural causes
4. Charles VIII - 15 years - natural causes
5. Louis XII - 18 years - natural causes
6. Francis I - 32 years - natural causes
7. Henry II - 12 years - natural causes
8. Francis I - 1 year - natural causes
9. Charles IX - 14 years - natural causes
10. Henry III - 15 years - assassinated
11. Henry IV - 21 years - assassinated
12. Louis XIII - 33 years - natural causes
13. Louis XIV - 72 years - natural causes
14. Louis XV - 59 years - natural causes
15. Louis XVI - 18 years - assassinated

So,

At least 38.5% of Roman emperors over the period in question were assassinated/executed/died in captivity.

20% of French Kings were assassinated/executed/died in captivity over a comparable period of time.

34 of 68 Roman emperors (50%) reigned for less than 5 years; the average length of reign was 6.2 years.

1 of 15 French Kings (6.7%) reigned for less than 5 years; the average length of reign was 27.5 years.

Conclusion: We really should (and maybe I will) do more research, but I think it's fair to suppose that the Roman Empire was unusually unstable.

...which raises the question: Why?

To Be Cont.

[r3volution 3.0]

It was a confluence of things, the OP isn't wrong, but it is missing the issues related to immigration and mercenary armies made up of immigrants:

I'd argue that the transition from professional standing armies to mercenaries was an effect of the decline, not its cause.

Mercenaries are cheaper (in the short term, anyway) than standing armies; it's like renting versus owning.

The Romans started using mercenaries more and more as their financial situation deteriorated.

We see the inverse process in early modern Europe; as states became wealthier, they abandoned mercenaries in favor of standing armies.

[Chester Copperpot]

there was a theory once I read that said Rome collapsed because of the lead in the water and everybody became stupid... i guess its like Idiocracy 1.0

[PierzStyx]

The Romans collapsed from a confluence of issues. While most of them have been mentioned (currency debasement, social unrest, political instability, etc.), the idea that one led to the other is kind of incorrect. It just isn't that neat. In reality it is all those things at once, all happening at the same time. Indeed, the Eastern Roman Empire, which had long eras of political instability, actually managed to last a thousand years longer than the Western Roman empire. All of them kind of fed on each other and made everything worse.

I'l tell you what it wasn't though: Immigration. In fact, for most of its history Rome had really lenient immigration rules. Able to tell the difference between immigrants and invaders (unlike some on these forums) the Romans had open borders. Trade could come and go as it pleased and the empire was wealthy because of it. You see, Rome wasn't really interested in forcing foreigners to adopt Roman ideals and live like Romans. Just the opposite. As long as you paid tribute you got to continue your own religion and social and ethnic lifestyles. This worked well until the Romans changed it. Only after the Romans became more insular and aggressive towards foreigners, drafting their men while raping their wives and forcing them to sell their children into slavery for survival as they did with the Romans, did immigration even become an issue. Closed Gallic borders caused more problems for Rome than open borders did.

At the end of the day, if I HAD to pinpoint a reason for the fall of the Western empire, I suppose it would be size. It was simply WAY too big for anyone to manage successfully. The larger it got, the more problems it had. With no forms of quick communication and travel the problems of sheer size and numbers began to overwhelm the resources of the government and society to provide for the military necessary to dominate the people of the Empire and defend against invaders. Spread out too thin they were vulnerable to attack along any number of points, which is exactly what happened when the Goths invaded. The center could not hold and everything fell apart.

As a Liberty lover, I'll tell you that I'll never understand the obsession with Rome. It was not a place of freedom. It was essentially a military dictatorship, especially in the last few hundred years of the Western Empire's existence.

[r3volution 3.0]

At the end of the day, if I HAD to pinpoint a reason for the fall of the Western empire, I suppose it would be size. It was simply WAY too big for anyone to manage successfully. The larger it got, the more problems it had. With no forms of quick communication and travel the problems of sheer size and numbers began to overwhelm the resources of the government and society to provide for the military necessary to dominate the people of the Empire and defend against invaders. Spread out too thin they were vulnerable to attack along any number of points, which is exactly what happened when the Goths invaded. The center could not hold and everything fell apart.

IMO, the two major underlying problems (which were primarily responsible for the political instability which seems to have set in motion all the other, more proximate causes of the decline) were the empire's extent, as you mention, and the failure of the Roman monarchy to develop an unambiguous succession rule; i.e. sometimes the succession was adoptive, other times hereditary, other times "elective" (in a chaotic, raising-the-general-on-the-shields kind of way), or some combination of the three. Why was that, do you think?

The emperors (unlike other monarchs in other states) never seemed able to escape their origins as mere military dictators. The army was never effectively subordinated to the civilian authorities. Later European monarchies had their share of succession crises, but it's inconceivable that an Austrian army would have auctioned off the Habsburg crown, or a French army the Bourbon crown, etc. I suspect this unique instability had something to do with the unusual origins of the Roman monarchy - i.e. from a civil war in a republic. The Roman emperors look less like traditional monarchs than modern military dictators, who likewise find their origin in republican civil wars.

[dannno]

The Romans collapsed from a confluence of issues. While most of them have been mentioned (currency debasement, social unrest, political instability, etc.), the idea that one led to the other is kind of incorrect. It just isn't that neat. In reality it is all those things at once, all happening at the same time. Indeed, the Eastern Roman Empire, which had long eras of political instability, actually managed to last a thousand years longer than the Western Roman empire. All of them kind of fed on each other and made everything worse.

I'l tell you what it wasn't though: Immigration. In fact, for most of its history Rome had really lenient immigration rules. Able to tell the difference between immigrants and invaders (unlike some on these forums) the Romans had open borders. Trade could come and go as it pleased and the empire was wealthy because of it. You see, Rome wasn't really interested in forcing foreigners to adopt Roman ideals and live like Romans. Just the opposite. As long as you paid tribute you got to continue your own religion and social and ethnic lifestyles. This worked well until the Romans changed it. Only after the Romans became more insular and aggressive towards foreigners, drafting their men while raping their wives and forcing them to sell their children into slavery for survival as they did with the Romans, did immigration even become an issue. Closed Gallic borders caused more problems for Rome than open borders did.

At the end of the day, if I HAD to pinpoint a reason for the fall of the Western empire, I suppose it would be size. It was simply WAY too big for anyone to manage successfully. The larger it got, the more problems it had. With no forms of quick communication and travel the problems of sheer size and numbers began to overwhelm the resources of the government and society to provide for the military necessary to dominate the people of the Empire and defend against invaders. Spread out too thin they were vulnerable to attack along any number of points, which is exactly what happened when the Goths invaded. The center could not hold and everything fell apart.

As a Liberty lover, I'll tell you that I'll never understand the obsession with Rome. It was not a place of freedom. It was essentially a military dictatorship, especially in the last few hundred years of the Western Empire's existence.

So you just skipped over the 3 hour video explaining why immigration was such an important factor by saying that they had loose immigration?

[r3volution 3.0]

@dannno

Could you summarize the argument presented in the video?

Immigration ---> ? ---> Collapse

[r3volution 3.0]

As promised, another case study, Kings/Queens of Denmark, 1376-1808

Margaret I - 25 years - natural causes
Eric VII - 53 years - natural causes
Christopher III - 8 years - natural causes
Christian I - 33 years - natural causes
John - 32 years - natural causes
Christian II - 10 years - died in captivity
Frederick I - 10 years - natural causes
Christian III - 25 years - natural causes
Frederick II - 29 years - natural causes
Christian IV - 70 years - natural causes
Frederick III - 22 years - natural causes
Christian V - 29 years - natural causes
Frederick IV - 31 years - natural causes
Christian VI - 16 years - natural causes
Frederick V - 20 years - natural causes
Christian VII - 42 years - natural causes

So,

6.25% died unnaturally (compared to 38.5% for Roman emperors).

0% of reigns were less than 5 years (compared to 50% for Roman emperors).

The average reign was 28.4 years (compared to 6.2 years for Roman emperors).

The Danish figures are very similar to the French, and both much better than the Roman.

The question remains: why?

stay tuned

[Chester Copperpot]

i like that you posted this thread... its very interesting and though-provoking

[r3volution 3.0]

I agree with Pierz that sheer geographical extent was a major source of political instability in the pre-telecomm era.

But was size the only important factor? Let's look at some other, huge states:

Unified China, 960-1856
--56 emperors over 952 years, for an average reign of 16 years
16/56 (28%) reigned for less than 5 years

Ottoman Empire, 1281-1861:
--31 Sultans over 580, for an average reign of 18.7 years
--9/31 (29%) reigned for less than 5 years

Unified Russia, 1547-1845:
--27 Tsars/Emperors over 371 years, for an average of 11.3 years
--10/27 (37%) reigned for less than 5 years

So, these were less stable than France/Denmark, as we would expect due to their size, but still much more stable than Rome.

One might infer that size was an important factor in Rome's chronic political instability, but far from the only one.

We're still in search of other causes.

N.B. I stop mid-19th century because that's about the time telegraphs were being introduced.

i like that you posted this thread... its very interesting and though-provoking

Thanks Chester, glad you're enjoying it.