Roman Empire: Slavery, Economy, and the Rise of the Bourgeoisie
The Slaves and the Economy of the Crisis
The Roman economic system was based on slavery, which involved legal and economic relations with different rights for Roman citizens and non-citizens, and also between freemen and slaves. This created an elitist society that was, in general, very productive.
In the slave economy, Romans living in cities or rural areas were idle, and the slaves worked for them. This eventually led to a clear separation of intellectual and physical work, with physical labor considered unworthy of a free man.
The slave economy was not productive, as slaves were not engaged in production.
From the second century AD, Rome ceased to conquer territories. This caused a shortage of prisoners, and thus slaves became scarce. This was further exacerbated by the short lifespan of slaves due to their living conditions and the process of manumission (converting a slave into a free man).
Maintaining the slave system became increasingly difficult. There were not enough slaves, yields were very low, and their price rose. Slave revolts arose that were difficult to quell. For example, Spartacus, in the first century BC, freed gladiators and raised an army of over 90,000 men.
Roman society was not productive, and the third-century crisis, compounded by internal problems, caused a progressive ruralization of the Roman world. The owners of large estates hired settlers to work their land, finding it more profitable than having slaves. For many free citizens, colonization was a viable solution to their problems and tax increases to fund campaigns against the barbarians or civil wars, as it offered them the possibility of meeting their needs.
Links of dependency began to form between men and land and between farmers and owners of large estates. This marked the transition from the economic system of slavery, characteristic of ancient times, to one based on labor and exploitation of the land, a historical prelude to what would become feudalism in the Middle Ages.
The Emergence of the Commercial Bourgeoisie
The inhabitants of the towns, the bourgeoisie (a word derived from “village”), were people with economic and political independence with respect to the feudal structures.
- Traders
- Merchants
- Craftsmen
- Bankers
- Professionals
They formed a new social class that grew progressively larger.
Despite being an increasingly large social group, and although some of them had great economic power, the bourgeoisie remained in the lowest stratum of the pyramid. They could not claim the privileges of the nobility, to which one belonged by birth. The estate society was impervious to social change.
The group with the greatest weight and influence was undoubtedly the merchants. The bourgeois who got rich in business, and in some cases amassed huge fortunes, wanted to live like the nobility. Soon, they also captured the most important political offices. They had no rights acquired by birth but became increasingly powerful and influential economically and politically.
Small traders and craftsmen bore the burden of production and trade. Two groups were organized. Artisans were organized around guilds.
The development of universities led to other independent professionals benefiting from training and education. Doctors, teachers, and lawyers formed a very independent social group, necessary to articulate the performance of all the new institutions for managing political and economic life.
Besides, urban activities required workers who, unlike workers in the field, were free men working for wages.
The emergence of cities generated different types of people who had little in common. The commercial bourgeoisie was the smallest group but also the most important.
Civil Strife: The Foederati
Rome was a military empire, an expansionist power that took territory for centuries and defeated its enemies with relative ease thanks to its strategy, military superiority, and the boldness of its emperors.
But apart from wars with foreign enemies, the Roman Empire was also characterized by continuing civil strife within its borders. More than once, slaves formed rebel armies with authentic dissidents and outcasts of Roman society that caused many problems for the Roman emperors.
In most cases, the internal struggles in the Roman Empire were struggles for power among various Roman governors or generals, especially since the end of the imperial era when the succession to power was not clearly defined. Some of these wars were particularly destructive and led the Roman state to a state of virtual civil war.
This happened, for example, in the first century AD after the death of Nero, and also from the late second and early third centuries with the death of Commodus. When Commodus died in 192, a bloody power struggle ensued, and a dynamic of change did not solve the problem of succession. The reigns of the emperors became shorter and shorter. Most of the emperors during the third century were murdered, executed, or poisoned by conspiracies or rivals.
Seeing the impossibility of governing an empire in chaos politically, with many economic and social problems and constant military pressure on the borders, Diocletian launched a major military, administrative, and political reform of the Empire with a power-sharing system called the Tetrarchy in 293. Up to four emperors (two Augusti, Diocletian and Maximian, and two Caesars, Galerius and Constantine) ruled an empire divided into two parts (East and West) but still maintained political unity.
The Tetrarchy envisaged a system of succession in which, after twenty years, the Caesars had to relieve the Augusti in power. Succession did not work, and as many as seven candidates fought for power militarily again. Constantine eventually imposed himself in 326, taking office alone after defeating his rivals Maxentius and Licinius. Constantine customized and centralized power and re-established an absolute and hereditary monarchy. He arranged again to make a major internal reform of the Empire and sought in the Christian church and religion a support to achieve a unity that the Empire had lost politically and socially.
Since the death of Commodus in the late second century until the victory of Constantine in the early fourth century, Rome did not know a clear authority, and civil war between different factions of the Roman army was an added problem (pressure on the borders from barbarian peoples, economic and social crisis, ruralization of society, etc.).
During this period of anarchy, different Roman provinces seceded, and some barbarian kingdoms were created in the interior of the Western Roman Empire. Constantine recovered some of these provinces and reunited most of the empire under his power but carried out a reform of the army with a change in military strategy that left the external borders more unguarded.
The incursions of the barbarians within the Roman frontiers became constant, requiring great efforts to defend themselves, precisely at a time when the external borders had been neglected to deal with internal conflicts. Given the evidence of the impossibility of ending raids and defending against other barbarian invaders, the Romans decided to ally with some Germanic peoples.
The first were the Visigoths in 376 AD, and their installation on the inside of the imperial borders was accepted in order to serve as a containment for other invading peoples. Later, the Romans accepted associations with the Ostrogoths, the Vandals, and the Franks.
Political pacts of alliance were established with the heads of some of these tribes, under which the barbarians agreed not to fight the Romans and, above all, to defend the imperial borders from attacks by other barbarians. In return, the Romans received land in usufruct in which they could settle and live. These deals were called Foedus, and the peoples involved became foederati (federated) of the empire.
In theory, this maintained control and Roman rule over the lands, preserving their property and ensuring peaceful coexistence. In practice, the system showed clear evidence of Roman impotence to expel the invaders and the real weakness of the Empire, especially in its western part.
From the outset, this system showed its shortcomings. The federated Visigoths revolted and defeated the Romans in the famous battle of Adrianople (378) just two years after federation.
Between the fourth and fifth centuries, the Romans could not do anything to defend the integrity of the Western Empire, and even if they had wanted to, they could not have forcibly removed those federated peoples. It was a process of disintegration and transformation that culminated in the year 476 AD when the empire disappeared completely from the West, scattered, canceled, and destroyed by its own federation, which in theory were to be its subjects and allies.
During the years of coexistence between barbarians and Romans, the seeds of the future Germanic kingdoms that were formed in Western Europe began to be sown.