Polybius

1. Polybius The Birth of the Republic

2. Polybius (204-122 B.C.) • 338 B.C. The Greeks become subjects of Macedonia (Alexander, Aristotle’s disciple) • 146 B.C. Greece (a part of Macedonia)is turned into a province of the Roman Empire • A thousand Greek intellectuals deported to Rome (held in prison for 17 years, 300 survived). Polybius was one of the survivors. • Through time, Polybius gets acquainted with Roman leaders and becomes “a friend and ally of Rome” (participates in military and diplomatic missions)

3. Histories • 40 books (only 5 entirely preserved, plus bits and pieces of the others). • Examines the period in between the Second Punic War (219 B.C.) to the Roman conquest of Macedon (167 B.C.) • First “universal political history” • Polybius is the first “institutionalist” • Rome’s dominance resulted from Roman political institutions, values, and practices. • Theorist of “mixed constitutions” and the system of “checks and balances” (precursor of Montesquieu and the Federalists)

4. The Beginnings • “What are the beginnings I speak of and what is the first origin of political societies? When owing to floods, famines, failure of crops or other such causes there occurs such a destruction of the human race as tradition tells us has more than once happened, and as we must believe will often happen again, all arts and crafts perishing at the same time, then in the course of time, when springing from the survivors as from seeds men have again increased in numbers and just like other animals form herds… it is a necessary consequence that the man who excels in bodily strength and in courage will lead and rule over the rest.” (p. 120)  Kinship

5. (Natural) Cycle 

6. “All existing things are subject to decay and change…” (126) Can we avoid political decay?

7. When Democracy degenerates into Mob-Rule, the people…“…institute the rule of violence; and now uniting their forces massacre, banish, and plunder, until they degenerate again into perfect savages and find once more a master and monarch. Such is the cycle of political revolution, the course appointed by nature in which constitutions change, disappear, and finally return to the point from which they started.”

8. “…each constitution has a vice…” • “… In kingship it is despotism, in aristocracy oligarchy, and in democracy the savage rule of violence; and it is impossible… that each of these should not in course of time change into its vicious form.” (122)

9. Fragile Constitutions • “Lycurgus had perfectly well understood that all the above changes take place necessarily and naturally, and had taken into consideration that every variety of constitution which is simple and formed on one principle is precarious, as it is soon perverted into the corrupt form which is proper to it and naturally follows it.” (122)

10. Lycurgus’ Solution • Lycurgus incorporated to the constitution “all the good and distinctive features of the best governments, so that none of the principles should grow unduly and be perverted into its allied evil, but that, the force of each being neutralized by that of the others, neither of them should prevail and outbalance another, but that the constitution should remain for long in a state of equilibrium…” (p 122) Checks and balances, stability, strength… Avoidance of Corruption and Decay

11. Lycurgus + the Romans • Lycurgus theorized what the Romans did. Religion and superstition (“the terrors of hell”) are necessary to stabilize the system

12. How is Polybius’ constitution different from the U.S.? • Republican tradition • Rome • Macchiavelli • The Federalist Papers • Does the Republic achieve its promises? (avoidance of corruption, power equally distributed) • Do you find Polybius’ analysis still valid?

13. Present theoretical applications of Polybius • Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri: Empire (Harvard University Press, 2000) • New decentered form of global sovereignty that gets inspiration in the U.S. constitution and the Republican tradition. • Empire has the form of a Republic