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ahorbinskiBibliographic Data: Eckstein, Arthur M. Mediterranean Anarchy, Interstate War, and the Rise of Rome. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006.
Main Argument: "International politics in the ancient Mediterranean world was long a multipolar anarchy–a world containing a plurality of powerful states, contending with each other for hegemony, within a situation where international law was minimal and in any case unenforceable" (1). The Republic of Rome, however, did establish a system of unipolarity in the Mediterranean by the 160s BCE at the latest, a unipolar system with Rome as the hegemony that lasted for six hundred years. Rome did not establish this hegemony because it was exceptionally bellicose; indeed, it was no more or less warlike than its state-level competitors and what gave it its comparative advantage was its ability to leverage its allies through the flexible management of Roman identity (i.e. the citizenship and various other statuses), eventually being able to field far larger armies and command much greater resources than its competitors. But it is a fatal mistake to ignore the effect of its interstate environment on Rome's development, and on the exact character of the Romans' achievement; "the stress here is–and given the condition of scholarly analysis it must be–on acknowledging the previously unacknowledged role of system-level factors, both in the causation of warfare in the ancient Mediterranean and in the rise of Rome to world power" (35).
Historiographical Engagement: Mommsen, because everything old is new again and nothing ever dies; lots of "realists" throughout history--Thucydides, Hobbes, Arendt, Kissinger, Zakaria
Chapter 1: Argument, Sources, Examples
Chapter 2: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter rehashes the basic tenets of the Realist paradigm, which can be summarized in three key points: "the prevalence of anarchy in the world of states (i.e. the lack of international law); the resultant grim self-help regime imposed upon all states and its impact upon the constellation of state actions (including especially power-maximizing conduct); and the importance of the stability or instability of balances of power" (12). Eckstein concludes that "we must see the causes of large changes in the interstate structure as the result of the interplay of both system-level and unit-level factors" (35).
Chapter 3: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter looks at the state of the state of nature (which is a state of war) among αἰ πόλεις in classical Greece:
Chapter 4: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter looks at the "anarchic structure of interstate relations in the Hellenistic age" and argues that "we find nothing in the character of the interstate system has changed [since the era of classical Greece] except that the scale of states, the resources available to them, and the scale of the constant wars among them have all increased" (79). Rather than the "era of good feelings" that was earlier portrayed by scholars, "the fact is that competition was as unrestrained among states in the Hellenistic age as in the Classical period, and tensions among them usually ran huh; warfare was almost constant, and often on an enormous scale" (80). The problem was in part one of legitimacy; since the Hellenistic successor states were established by conquering generals, military success and "the consequent royal ideology of strength, meant that successful warfare and conquest were necessities for Hellenistic kings" (88). But this unit-level factor does not explain why warfare was endemic to the Hellenistic state system, from the smallest city-state to the largest monarchy, with very real stakes of survival and prosperity for players at every level; "the Hellenistic state-system thus actually fostered militarism, conflict, and aggression, and made interstate competition ferocious, and war likely" (94). These tendencies were exacerbated by three new developments: the persistent multipolarity of the state-system; "the offensive as ideology, strategy, and technique;" and "the primitive character of interstate diplomacy" (97). Eckstein reviews the power-transition crisis in the system after 203 BCE, in which the Ptolemaic regime was no longer able to maintain its role in the rough trilateral balance of power and in which the Roman Republic eventually emerged as hegemon after weaker Greek states turned to Rome as "the least threatening great power," knowingly opening the door to "empire by invitation" (113). In this, then, their actions were typical of states in such situations, but they were also predicated on the creation of a unified Mediterranean sphere after 217 BCE, instigated by Macedonian aggression against Rome. The Greek East was no longer simply East, and crucial, Philip and Antiochus in the crisis after 203 had their geopolitical horizons framed too narrowly.
Chapter 5: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter looks at Rome's rivals for power in Italy and the Western Mediterranean, arguing that "the societies with which Rome competed for power and security in this long period–power and security being of course integrally linked under conditions of interstate anarchy–were themselves very militaristic, warlike, and diplomatically aggressive" (118-19). One common tendency of this anarchy (as it was in classical Greece and the Hellenistic East) was the habit of weaker states "putting themselves into the hands" of the stronger, also known as empire by invitation, which in a world of terrores multi is in fact eminently sensible, and indeed it appears that "militarized anarchy was the common culture of Tyrrhenian Italy" (122). The Romans saw their world this way, and they were not being paranoid about it; the security problem was real, and the stakes consistently high and cruel; "the Roman experience of competition for influence, power, and security…was a harsh experience, against formidable and warlike rivals" (177). Nor was Rome different from its rivals in these respects; where Rome did differ was how often weaker states seemed to choose the Romans as the least worst choice–which draws attention again to the real Roman advantage, namely its ability to incorporate allies politically without totally destroying their local autonomy. From this advantage grew the Republic's advantage in mobilizing military manpower for the incessant wars the security situation demanded. At the same time, however, weaker states could often play a destabilizing role in the system as "multiple and simultaneously expanding spheres of influence and simultaneously expanding definitions of acceptable security" on the part of great states came into conflict in these instances, and along these borders.
Chapter 6: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter attempts to evaluate whether the Roman decision of 200 BCE to respond to the pleas of Greek city-states for help against Philip and Antiochus was motivated by the characteristics of the anarchic state-system and its emerging inter-connectedness (συμπλοκή) (the hypothesis of Polybius), or whether it was motivated by Rome's special unit-level characteristics of being an exceptionally warlike state. It is incontrovertible that "Rome, then, was a highly militarized, militaristic, and assertive state, led by an aristocracy imbued with a strong warrior ethos, which in turn was backed by a populace that accepted war as a fact of life" (183). Here Eckstein is arguing with Harris, whose book is an excellent example of unit-attribute theory and its flaws, namely the fact that it ignores "that states exist not in isolation, but rather as the actors as well as the acted-upon with systems of states" (186). Relationships among states aren't linear, war and expansion require no special explanation in an anarchic state system, and unit and system level causes are both reciprocal and structured by the system. Rome was a fairly typical example of warlike Hellenistic societies at this period, and indeed it appears possible that the Romans were in fact somewhat less bellicose than many of their neighbors, who lacked, for example, the tradition of bellum iustum, among other possible examples. As Eckstein sums it up: "without the development of militarism, bellicosity, and assertiveness, Rome would not have survived as a state. But there are other reasons why it prevailed" (237).
Chapter 7: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter examines Roman exceptionalism and nonexceptionalism, about which Eckstein concludes bluntly that "it is not stern militarism but Rome's ability to assimilate outsiders and to create a large and stable territorial hegemony that makes Rome stand out from other city-states" (245). Rome's domination was not dominated by one figure or dynasty, not coincidentally; it "was by far the largest, most successful, and least fragile of these political entities, the only alliance system in antiquity founded on the domination of a single city-state that was also successful over the long term. Importantly, it was also the most integrative in character" (246). This integrative character had both external and internal aspects: the Roman political system, which is sometimes undersold as a democracy, nonetheless had enough plebeian participation that it resulted in a relatively unified society, which "made the survival of the city possible amid the violence and indeed disasters of interstate anarchy" (250). The external aspects involved the integration of the allies into the Roman polity on fairly favorable terms, although the Social War eventually resulted when those terms were seen as in need of violent revision in the period after that considered here. Equally importantly, by 200 the leaders of the Roman Republic were receptive to the evidence the embassy from the Greek city-states presented for a "worst-case scenario" of Philip and Antiochus' secret pact to destroy Ptolemaic Egypt and conquer the known world, and their recent experiences with Hannibal in the Second Punic (Hannibalic) War had also most likely disposed them to carry the fight to the enemy rather than await it on home ground, as well as sensitized them to the possibility of losing recent gains. That members of the embassy came from Rome's old ally Pergamum certainly didn't hurt. By 197/196, Rome and Antiochus were the only two major powers left, and it is no real surprise, given the anarchic system in which they operated, to see them engaging in hegemonic war in 192 after the unquestionable Senatorial strategic error of withdrawing the armies from Greece in 194, leaving a power vacuum that Antiochus was only too happy to fill.
Critical assessment: This is an excellent book, although it's rather trippy to be reading something in 2006 going on about how Mommsen was right and unironically citing Henry Kissinger. And if we are led in the end back to unit-level factors by this thorough examination of the anarchic interstate system in which Rome existed and over which it ultimately triumphed, it is very nice to know that we can weight those factors and select them correctly, having carried out the exercise.
Further reading: Hobbes, Leviathan; Kant, Perpetual Peace; Harris, War and Imperialism in Republican Rome; Mattern, Rome and the Enemy
Meta notes: Rome is a black swan. Mommsen was right. Ditto Thucydides. And Polybius was right too, don't forget about him.
"We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time."
Main Argument: "International politics in the ancient Mediterranean world was long a multipolar anarchy–a world containing a plurality of powerful states, contending with each other for hegemony, within a situation where international law was minimal and in any case unenforceable" (1). The Republic of Rome, however, did establish a system of unipolarity in the Mediterranean by the 160s BCE at the latest, a unipolar system with Rome as the hegemony that lasted for six hundred years. Rome did not establish this hegemony because it was exceptionally bellicose; indeed, it was no more or less warlike than its state-level competitors and what gave it its comparative advantage was its ability to leverage its allies through the flexible management of Roman identity (i.e. the citizenship and various other statuses), eventually being able to field far larger armies and command much greater resources than its competitors. But it is a fatal mistake to ignore the effect of its interstate environment on Rome's development, and on the exact character of the Romans' achievement; "the stress here is–and given the condition of scholarly analysis it must be–on acknowledging the previously unacknowledged role of system-level factors, both in the causation of warfare in the ancient Mediterranean and in the rise of Rome to world power" (35).
Historiographical Engagement: Mommsen, because everything old is new again and nothing ever dies; lots of "realists" throughout history--Thucydides, Hobbes, Arendt, Kissinger, Zakaria
Chapter 1: Argument, Sources, Examples
…the Mediterranean interstate system, when considered as a whole, was structurally what modern political scientists call a "multipolar anarchy"; that it possessed little or no international law, and was regulated solely by complex and fluid balances of power (primarily, and very crudely, military power); and that the compelling pressures toward bellicosity and aggressiveness exerted by this exceptionally harsh and competitive interstate environment upon all the states within it are visible throughout the entire warlike history of Mediterranean interstate life. (4)Moreover, "the regional system of states in the eastern Mediterranean after 207 BC specifically experienced what scholars of international relations call a 'power-transition crisis,'" to which all the state-level actors including Rome reacted opportunistically, and which eventually resulted in a major systemic transformation, which are quite rare historically. Thus considering what we might humorously call "the first 3rdC crisis" offers an important test case for the Realist paradigm of international relations, which is supposedly universally applicable. Indeed, "although detailed distinctions and qualifications must always be made, the systems of warlike and aggressive states that existed in the ancient Mediterranean conformed from the beginning to the grimmest and most unforgiving of Realist paradigms" (10).
Chapter 2: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter rehashes the basic tenets of the Realist paradigm, which can be summarized in three key points: "the prevalence of anarchy in the world of states (i.e. the lack of international law); the resultant grim self-help regime imposed upon all states and its impact upon the constellation of state actions (including especially power-maximizing conduct); and the importance of the stability or instability of balances of power" (12). Eckstein concludes that "we must see the causes of large changes in the interstate structure as the result of the interplay of both system-level and unit-level factors" (35).
Chapter 3: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter looks at the state of the state of nature (which is a state of war) among αἰ πόλεις in classical Greece:
…a constellation of heavily militarized and diplomatically aggressive societies among which war was common. The character of those societies no doubt contributed to the general atmosphere of interstate violence, but the fact of pervasive interstate war is to be attributed in great part to the prevailing system of militarized anarchy in which all these states had to live, and in which they struggled to survive. Thus it is not surprising that Hellenic intellectuals, in particular Thucydides, were the ultimate founders of the grim Realist view of relations among states under anarchic conditions. (37)[Indeed, in ancient Greek one declares peace rather than war.] Indeed, conditions of competition were so fierce that one of the cardinal points of modern interstate relations--that democracies do not make war on one another--did not hold in ancient Greece. Indeed, alleged particularities of Athenian democracy have been used to explain Athens' aggressive foreign policy, the first instance of the "unit-attribute theory of empire" which has also attributed the rise of Rome to Roman bellicosity. Comparing Athens with Corcyra and Corinth, however, demonstrates that the unit-level explanation is insufficient to account for the fact that "states with similar domestic systems often act differently in the foreign policy sphere" and it only really works when scholars focus entirely on one state and entirely neglect others (74). "In a word: the lesson of Thycydides and the Classical poleis is that state decisions about security arise primarily from real concerns about security" (78).
Chapter 4: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter looks at the "anarchic structure of interstate relations in the Hellenistic age" and argues that "we find nothing in the character of the interstate system has changed [since the era of classical Greece] except that the scale of states, the resources available to them, and the scale of the constant wars among them have all increased" (79). Rather than the "era of good feelings" that was earlier portrayed by scholars, "the fact is that competition was as unrestrained among states in the Hellenistic age as in the Classical period, and tensions among them usually ran huh; warfare was almost constant, and often on an enormous scale" (80). The problem was in part one of legitimacy; since the Hellenistic successor states were established by conquering generals, military success and "the consequent royal ideology of strength, meant that successful warfare and conquest were necessities for Hellenistic kings" (88). But this unit-level factor does not explain why warfare was endemic to the Hellenistic state system, from the smallest city-state to the largest monarchy, with very real stakes of survival and prosperity for players at every level; "the Hellenistic state-system thus actually fostered militarism, conflict, and aggression, and made interstate competition ferocious, and war likely" (94). These tendencies were exacerbated by three new developments: the persistent multipolarity of the state-system; "the offensive as ideology, strategy, and technique;" and "the primitive character of interstate diplomacy" (97). Eckstein reviews the power-transition crisis in the system after 203 BCE, in which the Ptolemaic regime was no longer able to maintain its role in the rough trilateral balance of power and in which the Roman Republic eventually emerged as hegemon after weaker Greek states turned to Rome as "the least threatening great power," knowingly opening the door to "empire by invitation" (113). In this, then, their actions were typical of states in such situations, but they were also predicated on the creation of a unified Mediterranean sphere after 217 BCE, instigated by Macedonian aggression against Rome. The Greek East was no longer simply East, and crucial, Philip and Antiochus in the crisis after 203 had their geopolitical horizons framed too narrowly.
Chapter 5: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter looks at Rome's rivals for power in Italy and the Western Mediterranean, arguing that "the societies with which Rome competed for power and security in this long period–power and security being of course integrally linked under conditions of interstate anarchy–were themselves very militaristic, warlike, and diplomatically aggressive" (118-19). One common tendency of this anarchy (as it was in classical Greece and the Hellenistic East) was the habit of weaker states "putting themselves into the hands" of the stronger, also known as empire by invitation, which in a world of terrores multi is in fact eminently sensible, and indeed it appears that "militarized anarchy was the common culture of Tyrrhenian Italy" (122). The Romans saw their world this way, and they were not being paranoid about it; the security problem was real, and the stakes consistently high and cruel; "the Roman experience of competition for influence, power, and security…was a harsh experience, against formidable and warlike rivals" (177). Nor was Rome different from its rivals in these respects; where Rome did differ was how often weaker states seemed to choose the Romans as the least worst choice–which draws attention again to the real Roman advantage, namely its ability to incorporate allies politically without totally destroying their local autonomy. From this advantage grew the Republic's advantage in mobilizing military manpower for the incessant wars the security situation demanded. At the same time, however, weaker states could often play a destabilizing role in the system as "multiple and simultaneously expanding spheres of influence and simultaneously expanding definitions of acceptable security" on the part of great states came into conflict in these instances, and along these borders.
Chapter 6: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter attempts to evaluate whether the Roman decision of 200 BCE to respond to the pleas of Greek city-states for help against Philip and Antiochus was motivated by the characteristics of the anarchic state-system and its emerging inter-connectedness (συμπλοκή) (the hypothesis of Polybius), or whether it was motivated by Rome's special unit-level characteristics of being an exceptionally warlike state. It is incontrovertible that "Rome, then, was a highly militarized, militaristic, and assertive state, led by an aristocracy imbued with a strong warrior ethos, which in turn was backed by a populace that accepted war as a fact of life" (183). Here Eckstein is arguing with Harris, whose book is an excellent example of unit-attribute theory and its flaws, namely the fact that it ignores "that states exist not in isolation, but rather as the actors as well as the acted-upon with systems of states" (186). Relationships among states aren't linear, war and expansion require no special explanation in an anarchic state system, and unit and system level causes are both reciprocal and structured by the system. Rome was a fairly typical example of warlike Hellenistic societies at this period, and indeed it appears possible that the Romans were in fact somewhat less bellicose than many of their neighbors, who lacked, for example, the tradition of bellum iustum, among other possible examples. As Eckstein sums it up: "without the development of militarism, bellicosity, and assertiveness, Rome would not have survived as a state. But there are other reasons why it prevailed" (237).
Chapter 7: Argument, Sources, Examples This chapter examines Roman exceptionalism and nonexceptionalism, about which Eckstein concludes bluntly that "it is not stern militarism but Rome's ability to assimilate outsiders and to create a large and stable territorial hegemony that makes Rome stand out from other city-states" (245). Rome's domination was not dominated by one figure or dynasty, not coincidentally; it "was by far the largest, most successful, and least fragile of these political entities, the only alliance system in antiquity founded on the domination of a single city-state that was also successful over the long term. Importantly, it was also the most integrative in character" (246). This integrative character had both external and internal aspects: the Roman political system, which is sometimes undersold as a democracy, nonetheless had enough plebeian participation that it resulted in a relatively unified society, which "made the survival of the city possible amid the violence and indeed disasters of interstate anarchy" (250). The external aspects involved the integration of the allies into the Roman polity on fairly favorable terms, although the Social War eventually resulted when those terms were seen as in need of violent revision in the period after that considered here. Equally importantly, by 200 the leaders of the Roman Republic were receptive to the evidence the embassy from the Greek city-states presented for a "worst-case scenario" of Philip and Antiochus' secret pact to destroy Ptolemaic Egypt and conquer the known world, and their recent experiences with Hannibal in the Second Punic (Hannibalic) War had also most likely disposed them to carry the fight to the enemy rather than await it on home ground, as well as sensitized them to the possibility of losing recent gains. That members of the embassy came from Rome's old ally Pergamum certainly didn't hurt. By 197/196, Rome and Antiochus were the only two major powers left, and it is no real surprise, given the anarchic system in which they operated, to see them engaging in hegemonic war in 192 after the unquestionable Senatorial strategic error of withdrawing the armies from Greece in 194, leaving a power vacuum that Antiochus was only too happy to fill.
As in the war against Philip V that started in 200, however, the Romans were aided by numerous important Greek polities: Pergamum and Rhodes, Macedon and the Achaean League, many others. Some no doubt acted from fear of the Romans; some no doubt feared both great powers; but others (especially Pergamum) primarily feared Antiochus. Thus emerged a Mediterranean-wide hegemonic war–fought on land and sea, in Europe and then in Asia Minor, a war in which most states in the easter Mediterranean (and states as far away as Carthage in the western Mediterranean) participated in one way or another. This was the war that definitively established the Republic as the arbiter of geopolitics in the East–and as the patron of an artificial balance of power restored after the disruptive energies of Philip and Antiochus. […]Having been socialized in the harsh environment of military multipolar anarchy, the Romans were part and parcel of that harsh environment, but they had also forged an integrative political system that ultimately differentiated them from their competitors, and handed them the victory.
Thus the Pergamenes, Rhodians, and Achaeans (as well as the Ptolemies) had survived the power-transition crisis and the subsequent hegemonic wars out of which the new interstate system emerged; they had even profited substantially in terms of local power. But although in 188 Roman military forces were once again totally withdrawn back to Italy (not to return for almost twenty years), it was the victorious Romans who now dictated the new interstate structure, and were its leaders and formidable patrons. (305-06)
Critical assessment: This is an excellent book, although it's rather trippy to be reading something in 2006 going on about how Mommsen was right and unironically citing Henry Kissinger. And if we are led in the end back to unit-level factors by this thorough examination of the anarchic interstate system in which Rome existed and over which it ultimately triumphed, it is very nice to know that we can weight those factors and select them correctly, having carried out the exercise.
Further reading: Hobbes, Leviathan; Kant, Perpetual Peace; Harris, War and Imperialism in Republican Rome; Mattern, Rome and the Enemy
Meta notes: Rome is a black swan. Mommsen was right. Ditto Thucydides. And Polybius was right too, don't forget about him.
"We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time."