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May 14, 2007
I have been working my way through the Roman Constitutional system on ssr, in part to answer whether a written constitution is superior to a non-written one, but also to explore where the analogies between Rome and an Australian Republic coincide. Pax Romana was real, and Italy did benefit from the Roman commercial and civil view of citizenship and half-citizenship. Prior to Roman dominance of Italy there was constant warring between city-states, tribes, towns and the immigration of Gauls from the north. Rome's military extension halted the incursion of this violence - this is the Roman Peace or pax Romana.
None of that is constitutionally relevant though. These Roman gains were achieved through the sword and military dominance. The democratic systems extended back in structure to regal rome and were established for the purposes of military organisation and land-taxation. With the removal of the King, the Consul position that replaced the monarch were military positions. All the magistrate positions, other than the praetors, were expected to be generals and lead Rome in provincial expansion.
This is where the Roman system becomes alien to a liberal democratic nation-state. Rome was an agrarian martial state. Wealth came from land, and expansion meant greater wealth. A downside of this process was that pro-consuls became wealthier and more militarily capable than the consuls in Rome which was the cause of the civil wars in the late republic, until Augustus strengthened Rome's central military capability. Arguably the English empire was an agrarian martial state as well, and as it moved to a nation-state, the colonies, rather then being a source of wealth to the center, became an expensive drain. Consequently the English exported responsible government which maintained political dependence, but lowered the costs of political influence in an empire that was relying less on land and more on industrial production.
Today a political structure that is for the purpose of expansion has no merit. The technology of a Westphalian nation-state has meant that there is a lot of stability between nations and when there is war, the original boundaries of the nation-states are largely maintained. The military of a nation-state is less for expansion, provincial administration and colonisation than it is defence. Additionally the Commander-in-Chief is a civil position and not intended to directly conduct warfare unlike the Roman Consuls who were generals first and civilian administrators second.
We are currently moving to the Market-state structure courtesy of modern telecommunications and transportation. Rather than the heavily centralised political systems of a nation-state, the market-state rewards local and decentralised innovations. As John Robb wrote:
Whereas the nation-state used centralized control to enable slower regions to catch up, the market-state will need to accelerate (mostly by getting out of the way) innovation at the regional/community level.
The nation-state is constantly having to justify its massive overhead as well as its legitimacy. Smaller semi-political and semi-militaristic movements, such as Hezbollah, have proven that they can fight a larger and more powerful nation-state into stalemate. In Iraq we have seen this type of warfare paralyse a nation-state's civil legitimacy entirely.
So what lessons can a Roman Republic offer a modern Australian Republican? Well not much really. An agrarian martial-state which expanded to empire has little relevance to a liberal republican market-state. One is centralised, militarised and oligarchic - the other is decentralised, civilised and democratic. Rome was pre-Montesquieu and had separation of magistrates (or executives) while a republican principle is separation of powers, not positions. Where a martial-state and nation-state respond to crisis with a centralised military, a market-state responds with decentralised volunteer civil structures such as the Bush Fire Brigade and State Emergency Services.
A republican market-state has a written constitution, decentralised structures, separation of powers, universal rights (not limited by citizenship), political equality and legal equality. Rome lacked all of these.
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Cam,
you may find this interesting and useful.
Re your comment:
Sir Michael Barber, who established and ran the Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit, from 2001 to 2005 for Tony Blair ,argues differently in his recent book. According to this commentary in the Times Online by Peter Riddle, Barber says:
Barber's comments about a mode of governance apply in Australia. The shift to the market as a mode of governance is driven by the centre of the nation-state ie., Canberra. It is what the libertarians ignore ,even though they critique the big state of the conservatives.
Decentralization may happen in the energy sector along the lines argued by John Robb. I reckon it is more complex than this: Howard's shift to nuclear power is centralization; the states shift to renewable energy is decentralization.