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I'm afraid democracies are inherently unstable. Athenian lasted 200 years and got swallowed up by Macedonian autocracy. Roman lasted 500 years and got overthrow

by lrem 6y ago

I'm afraid democracies are inherently unstable. Athenian lasted 200 years and got swallowed up by Macedonian autocracy. Roman lasted 500 years and got overthrown by the army. Polish lasted 350 years and the parliament voted to allow neighbouring empires to divide the country. The US is at 250 years and people are seriously worried about it devolving into either Gilead or Cyberpunk any moment now.

Gravityloss 6y ago
Most things have finite lifespans. The benchmark for a form of government is certainly not that it should be eternal and continuous. Look at some cities in Europe. Many have waxed and waned, some even many times. They have been parts of different countries and empires. Many have influenced the world greatly for the better.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
simonh 6y ago
That’s quite plausible. It may be that the only super-stable form of government is a high tech invasive AI powered surveillance state that knows everything about everybody and brooks no dissent. China is very hard at work building exactly that right now. In which case, in the long term were probably in trouble. The AIs might not need to take over, we might actively hand ourselves over to them.
TeMPOraL 6y ago
It's not just democracies. I can't think of a system of governance that's stable over centuries. Oppressive regimes tend to implode once amassed suffering reaches a peak of rebellion, or evolve into something more benign (and potentially get conquered then). Even Rome, the long-lasting empire, wasn't ruled the same way throughout its history. I think that's what GP meant when they wrote that "we could end up in a super-stable oppressive regime". Because the oppressive regimes so far weren't oppressive for long.
- qubex 6y ago
  The millenary histories of the Egyptian and Chinese empires disagree. Yes, dynasties came and went, but those polities endured for thousands of years—indeed one could argue that the ongoing governance of China by the Communist Party is just the latest dynastic swing.
  - TeMPOraL 6y ago
    I'll have to read up on Egypt and pre-XX-century China. How oppressive were these dynasties typically? What did the life look like for a regular subject?
    - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
      The Vatican has almost a couple of millennia of continuance, but I'm not sure I'd want to say continual stability per se.
      - jlg23 6y ago
        Yes, for any "couple of" smaller two. And more than once it was not clear whether the Vatican was still relevant at all.
        ianai 6y ago
        The Vatican is also not the same size and breadth as the US or China.
        ben_w 6y ago
        The Vatican as a country, I would agree. The Vatican as the Catholic Church, does seem to be on-par with those, at least in terms of head count.
    - coldtea 6y ago
      Compared to today's bureaucracy, taxes, etc, they were free as birds...
WalterBright 6y ago
Lasting 250 years is remarkable stability.
- Koshkin 6y ago
  Not if compared to 3000 years of Egypt.
  - AnimalMuppet 6y ago
    Divide by 30 dynasties, though. And they were overrun by the Sea Peoples, who set up their own dynasty. Overrun by Kush, who set up their own dynasty. Overrun by Persia, who set up their own dynasty. Overrun by Macedonia. Overrun by Rome. Each of those was an end of an established government.
KineticLensman 6y ago
> Roman lasted 500 years and got overthrown by the army Byzantium (and the rest of the Eastern Roman Empire) disagrees [0]. They lasted until 1453 - incidentally only 50 years before Columbus sailed. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_Empire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_Empire
- leetcrew 6y ago
  in context, I think they are referring to the republic.
- Mediterraneo10 6y ago
  The parent is talking about the Roman Republic, not the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire and its continuation the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire were not democracies.
- ByteJockey 6y ago
  Look, I love the Roman Empire just as much as anyone (and get more than a little miffed whenever someone denies that the Eastern Roman empire was legitimately Roman), but it was in no way a democracy.
  - bernawil 6y ago
    It's funny -and not counter to your point- but several of the succession struggles that plagued the Eastern Empire are characterized as "almost elections", by historians. Since its inception, the empire never had an official succession system and hence every new ruler was contested. Constantinople was so easily defendable that a popular usurper had great chances of making himself with the throne if he could take control of the capital. More than once, pretenders rose to power by popular acclaim at the hippodrome.
    - ByteJockey 6y ago
      That's actually kind of a fair point. Another thing to consider is that if you consider only the military (which wouldn't have been that weird for a pre-enlightenment democracy), there are quite a few times during the empire that approached democracy (relative to the time period). I guess, really, I meant to imply some sort of a modern interpretation of democracy, wherein a single city (or military) voting for the entire empire wouldn't exactly cut it.
JumpCrisscross 6y ago
> democracies are inherently unstable. Athenian lasted 200 years and got swallowed up by Macedonian autocracy. Roman lasted 500 years and got overthrown by the army. The Roman Republic learned from Athens’ democracy. Even late Republicans like Sulla and Cicero and Caesar recognised the Republic’s overuse of checks and balances, as well as its lack of a state army. Caesar almost uniquely recognised Rome’s broken voting system. Unfortunately, they were too late. America’s founders were not. The lessons of the Republic gave us our strong executive and state-funded armed forces. Our Constitutional amendment process is sclerotic, but there is nothing to suggest our Republic is inherently flawed in the way Athens or Rome were.
- zeegroen 6y ago
  > Our Constitutional amendment process is sclerotic, but there is nothing to suggest our Republic is inherently flawed in the way Athens or Rome were. Analyses abound about [what's wrong with American democracy](https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Essay:Problems_with_the_current_US_Constitution https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Essay:Problems_with_the_curren...). The nail in the coffin though, will be the first part of your sentence. The American Constitution is notoriously hard to amend, which means that it is just too easy to maintain as it is by those who benefit from the status quo. We can already see this by how the will of the majority is routinely ignored through unequal representation. My opinion is that this is not sustainable and will have to be resolved through unlawful means, exactly because of the unflexibility of the law.
andi999 6y ago
I am intrigued, can you refer me to where Polands parliament voted for the empires to devide the country?
- garaetjjte 6y ago
  Well, it's not like there was much choice. It was formality at this point, with foreign armies already inside the country. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_Sejm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_Sejm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Partition_of_Poland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Partition_of_Poland

by lrem 6y ago

Gravityloss 6y ago

Most things have finite lifespans. The benchmark for a form of government is certainly not that it should be eternal and continuous. Look at some cities in Europe. Many have waxed and waned, some even many times. They have been parts of different countries and empires. Many have influenced the world greatly for the better.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

simonh 6y ago

That’s quite plausible. It may be that the only super-stable form of government is a high tech invasive AI powered surveillance state that knows everything about everybody and brooks no dissent. China is very hard at work building exactly that right now. In which case, in the long term were probably in trouble. The AIs might not need to take over, we might actively hand ourselves over to them.

TeMPOraL 6y ago

It's not just democracies. I can't think of a system of governance that's stable over centuries. Oppressive regimes tend to implode once amassed suffering reaches a peak of rebellion, or evolve into something more benign (and potentially get conquered then). Even Rome, the long-lasting empire, wasn't ruled the same way throughout its history. I think that's what GP meant when they wrote that "we could end up in a super-stable oppressive regime". Because the oppressive regimes so far weren't oppressive for long.

qubex 6y ago
The millenary histories of the Egyptian and Chinese empires disagree. Yes, dynasties came and went, but those polities endured for thousands of years—indeed one could argue that the ongoing governance of China by the Communist Party is just the latest dynastic swing.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  I'll have to read up on Egypt and pre-XX-century China. How oppressive were these dynasties typically? What did the life look like for a regular subject?
  - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
    The Vatican has almost a couple of millennia of continuance, but I'm not sure I'd want to say continual stability per se.
    - jlg23 6y ago
      Yes, for any "couple of" smaller two. And more than once it was not clear whether the Vatican was still relevant at all.
      - ianai 6y ago
        The Vatican is also not the same size and breadth as the US or China.
        ben_w 6y ago
        The Vatican as a country, I would agree. The Vatican as the Catholic Church, does seem to be on-par with those, at least in terms of head count.
  - coldtea 6y ago
    Compared to today's bureaucracy, taxes, etc, they were free as birds...

WalterBright 6y ago

Lasting 250 years is remarkable stability.

Koshkin 6y ago
Not if compared to 3000 years of Egypt.
- AnimalMuppet 6y ago
  Divide by 30 dynasties, though. And they were overrun by the Sea Peoples, who set up their own dynasty. Overrun by Kush, who set up their own dynasty. Overrun by Persia, who set up their own dynasty. Overrun by Macedonia. Overrun by Rome. Each of those was an end of an established government.

KineticLensman 6y ago

> Roman lasted 500 years and got overthrown by the army Byzantium (and the rest of the Eastern Roman Empire) disagrees [0]. They lasted until 1453 - incidentally only 50 years before Columbus sailed. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_Empire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_Empire

leetcrew 6y ago
in context, I think they are referring to the republic.
Mediterraneo10 6y ago
The parent is talking about the Roman Republic, not the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire and its continuation the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire were not democracies.
ByteJockey 6y ago
Look, I love the Roman Empire just as much as anyone (and get more than a little miffed whenever someone denies that the Eastern Roman empire was legitimately Roman), but it was in no way a democracy.
- bernawil 6y ago
  It's funny -and not counter to your point- but several of the succession struggles that plagued the Eastern Empire are characterized as "almost elections", by historians. Since its inception, the empire never had an official succession system and hence every new ruler was contested. Constantinople was so easily defendable that a popular usurper had great chances of making himself with the throne if he could take control of the capital. More than once, pretenders rose to power by popular acclaim at the hippodrome.
  - ByteJockey 6y ago
    That's actually kind of a fair point. Another thing to consider is that if you consider only the military (which wouldn't have been that weird for a pre-enlightenment democracy), there are quite a few times during the empire that approached democracy (relative to the time period). I guess, really, I meant to imply some sort of a modern interpretation of democracy, wherein a single city (or military) voting for the entire empire wouldn't exactly cut it.

JumpCrisscross 6y ago

> democracies are inherently unstable. Athenian lasted 200 years and got swallowed up by Macedonian autocracy. Roman lasted 500 years and got overthrown by the army. The Roman Republic learned from Athens’ democracy. Even late Republicans like Sulla and Cicero and Caesar recognised the Republic’s overuse of checks and balances, as well as its lack of a state army. Caesar almost uniquely recognised Rome’s broken voting system. Unfortunately, they were too late. America’s founders were not. The lessons of the Republic gave us our strong executive and state-funded armed forces. Our Constitutional amendment process is sclerotic, but there is nothing to suggest our Republic is inherently flawed in the way Athens or Rome were.

zeegroen 6y ago
> Our Constitutional amendment process is sclerotic, but there is nothing to suggest our Republic is inherently flawed in the way Athens or Rome were. Analyses abound about [what's wrong with American democracy](https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Essay:Problems_with_the_current_US_Constitution https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Essay:Problems_with_the_curren...). The nail in the coffin though, will be the first part of your sentence. The American Constitution is notoriously hard to amend, which means that it is just too easy to maintain as it is by those who benefit from the status quo. We can already see this by how the will of the majority is routinely ignored through unequal representation. My opinion is that this is not sustainable and will have to be resolved through unlawful means, exactly because of the unflexibility of the law.

andi999 6y ago

I am intrigued, can you refer me to where Polands parliament voted for the empires to devide the country?

garaetjjte 6y ago
Well, it's not like there was much choice. It was formality at this point, with foreign armies already inside the country. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_Sejm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_Sejm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Partition_of_Poland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Partition_of_Poland