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The last secession was in 287 BC. Why were there not secessions after it? The reason has to do with the growth of the Roman Empire. Rome’s conquests really went
by RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago
The last secession was in 287 BC. Why were there not secessions after it? The reason has to do with the growth of the Roman Empire. Rome’s conquests really went into overdrive after that and they conquered many kingdoms. Along with those conquests, there came a lot of slaves. This totally changed the dynamics. After a while, the wealthy depended not on their poor fellow Romans to farm or make goods, but on slaves. Now it did not matter if the plebes didn’t not show up.
I fear that globalization may have served the same function in the United States. The wealthy don’t depend on their poor fellow Americans to provide goods for them and work for them. They depend on good produced oversees and even for domestic production on immigrant labor(look at who gets employed in fame labor or domestic help). They have an alternative to their fellow poor Americans.
Now, a strike in the US has a good chance of resulting not in long term employee benefits like it did before, but in the plant being moved oversees.
Unfortunately, this has bad consequences. When the relatively peaceful secession was no longer an option, Rome devolved into outright violence in the Roman Revolutions which saw demagogues and authoritarians mobilize the disaffected poor to kill their enemies and establish their power. When it all ended with the ascension of Augustus in AD 31, Rome was a republic in name only, but in reality a military dictatorship. And the people were generally happy with it because it brought peace after decades of violence and bloodshed.
I hope our democracies can find a better solution to the issues of wealth inequality, before this story happens to us too.
- bottled_poe 7y agoI agree. The service industry seems like the last bastion of connection between the haves and have-nots. However, the more we automate the more control we transfer away from unions and society generally.
- toyg 7y agoS/oversees/overseas
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- simion314 7y ago>The last secession was in 287 BC. Why were there not secessions after it? The wikipedia article concludes that the final law "eliminated the political disparity between the two classes" so I am asking(not contradicting you because I don't have the knowledge) if your conclusion is based on something solid or just your own guess? I am not convinced about your agument.
- chewz 7y agoSecessio plebis could be compared to XVIII century emancipation of middle class. It was a struggle between hereditary wealthy (aristocracy) vs acquired wealth of middle classses. Like American revolution and similiar emancipation in England and Europe. Both sides were relativly wealthy people but birth rights were giving them unequal status. So not really a conflict between rich and poor. But of course populist side claimed tactical class solidarity with city's poor people. Later on bipartisan system of optimates and populari stayed for years but the division lost its practical meaning. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Optimates-and-Populares https://www.britannica.com/topic/Optimates-and-Populares
- simion314 7y agoI am not sure if you added any more information then in the article, nothing that would help me believe that slavery is the thing that ended secessio plebis.
- chewz 7y ago> nothing that would help me believe that slavery is the thing that ended secessio plebis. It's like saying that steam machine and industrial revolution bancrupted landowning class and abolished serfdom in Eastern Europe in XIX century.. It is perhaps true but it is also complex, multidimensional dynamics.
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- lidHanteyk 7y agoThere's also the viciousness with which strikes are broken in the USA. We are no longer in the era of Pinkertons [0], exactly, but Reagan still fired the air traffic controllers [1]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinkerton_(detective_agency) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinkerton_(detective_agency) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Air_Traffic_Controllers_Organization_(1968) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Air_Traffic_Contr...
- heliheliheli 7y agoStriking by government employees was made illegal with good reason. If you're willing to strike you must be willing to do so under the real risk of being fired. It's a scorched earth tactic entirely equivalent to your employer withholding your pay without you having broken the contract.
- distances 7y agoDon't you have the concept of legal and illegal strikes? In most European countries striking is alive and well, but not for willy-nilly reasons. There exist a specific framework for strikes.
- heliheliheli 7y agoRight, the strike mentioned by the post above mine was illegal. But additionally striking is ultimately a negotiation tactic. Scheduled legal strikes are like demonstrations in which workers make a show of their bargaining power to the employer, but prolonged strikes which cause massive losses of revenue for the business are a scorched earth negotiation tactic and those engaging it should expect a proportionate response.
- orestarod 7y agoI mean, you will probably have to FORCE the employer to do something, so yeah, surprise - people do actual strikes that hurt the employers' profits,and that's the only reason anything gets done. "Scheduled legal strikes that are like demonstrations of bargaining power" only hold their meaning if you are ready to follow with a real strike if not taken seriously. Else, it's just begging the employer to show a kind heart.
- chewz 7y ago> After a while, the wealthy depended not on their poor fellow Romans to farm or make goods, but on slaves. Now it did not matter if the plebes didn’t not show up. Also small landholders and artisans in Italy could not compete with large latifundia [1] and manufactures using 'free' slave labour and cheap grain from Egypt and cheap financing (gold from conquests). The Roman conquest had been financed by the state but the spoils benefitted mostly wealthy citizens (tax farming in provinces). But plebs still had voting rights and every year there were held elections on Mars Fields and keeping the apperances of democracy was important for Roman Republic (also during the what we know as Imperial period). So the giveway of food and coin and entertainment to citizens had became a new norm.[2] [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiberius_Gracchus https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiberius_Gracchus [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_circuses https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_circuses
- dmurray 7y agoThis is a tempting explanation, but other developed countries still have powerful labour movements and the ability to take collective action, despite a similar level of dependence on Chinese imports. I'm thinking particularly of France with both the gilets jaunes movenent and its frequent strikes, though it's true that those are more common in service industries and the public sector than in manufacturing. For better or worse, Americans have long identified more with businessmen and less with the working poor than their counterparts in the rest of the West. At least back to the 1920s and the quip about "temporarily embarrassed millionaires".
- nradov 7y agoWas the French yellow vest movement really a labor movement? Their grievances were more about government taxes and economic policies rather than wages and working conditions. Many of the protesters weren't employees but rather farmers and small business owners.
- dmurray 7y agoA fair point. But increasing the minimum wage and taxing the rich were two of the main planks of the movement.
- chewz 7y ago> I hope our democracies can find a better solution to the issues of wealth inequality, before this story happens to us too. Do you see any chance for revolution in United States? People are too meek, too intimidated and cleverly divided by ruling class in my opinion. And people with mortgage do not do revolutions.
- hhs 7y ago> People are too meek, too intimidated and cleverly divided Sometimes this is done intentionally with the strategy of divide and rule [0]. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divide_and_rule https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divide_and_rule
- arminiusreturns 7y agoChristopher Hitchens called America "the last revolution that stands a chance." So I certainly hope so. The problem is the same systems that are weakening us have extended tendrils across the world, so there is no where to run to. I think it will be interesting to see if the human spirit is able to rise up against the already partially here but ever increasing technetronic dystopia.
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- ashtonkem 7y agoAlso worth mentioning was the consolidation of small free-held farms into large estates held by senators and run by slaves. This consolidation was partially driven by war debts; Roman citizens accrued debts during the wars of conquest, while the generals won the spoils with which they could purchase the land of indebted citizen farmers. It was also driven by economies of scale; the larger estates were more efficient, had lower costs of operation, and had the market contacts to grow the crops that generated the best profit when shipped. Of course this means Italy basically stopped making food when senators could sell oil at higher margins, and began to depend on Sicily and Egypt to produce the grain for Rome, with the latter eventually becoming the personal property of the emperor. This would cause serious problems later, but the senators profiting neither knew nor cared.
- chewz 7y ago> Nexum was a debt bondage contract in the early Roman Republic. Within the Roman legal system, it was a form of mancipatio. Though the terms of the contract would vary, essentially a free man pledged himself as a bond slave (nexus) as surety for a loan. He might also hand over his son as collateral. Although the bondsman might be subjected to humiliation and abuse, as a legal citizen he was supposed to be exempt from corporal punishment. Nexum was abolished by the Lex Poetelia Papiria in 326 BC, in part to prevent abuses to the physical integrity of citizens who had fallen into debt bondage.[26] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_bondage https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_bondage
- pbhjpbhj 7y ago>This would cause serious problems later, but the senators profiting neither knew nor cared. // Strikes me that this is about comparative level of development. As long as large inequalities exist then richer countries can feed off the labour of less developed countries. When those countries develop sufficiently they can't be [ab]used in that way. This is a big issue in UK at the moment as we've kicked out loud of foreign workers, and now have harvest locally produced food, in part because farmers won't pay wages at UK subsistence levels.
- bernawil 7y ago> and began to depend on Sicily and Egypt to produce the grain for Rome Later in the fourth century there were lots of shenanigans around securing the grain supply for the capital which in that period had shifted to north africa. I don't think we can rule out soil degradation as the reason for the shifts in the productive regions across ancient history, like how Paestum turned into a swamp due to soil erosion.
- dimitar 7y agoWell, a big part of not most of the plebs in the city of Rome literally lived off handouts from their patrons. They also got free grain from Egypt. They definitely benefited from the conquests and willingly participated in them for the spoils of war. I'm not saying you are not right, but it is a too broad generalization to be useful, especially as the imperial expansion phase took more time than the entire history of the US.
- vondur 7y agoNo need to have another secession, the Roman Republic crashed and burned from around 150 BCE until 17 BCE. That’s how the Empire came about.