ARE EMPIRES DRIVEN BY EGALITARIAN DYNAMISM?
An interesting hypothesis by Shannon Love at Chicago Boyz. Reminds me somewhat of Victor Davis Hanson’s belief in the motive force of Western civic militarism.
A topic that is right up the alley of Dr. Nexon and the boys at Coming Anarchy.
February 17th, 2007 at 2:47 pm
Thanks for the interesting link.
February 20th, 2007 at 10:02 pm
Indeed. Very interesting hypothesis; I think “egalitarianism” is simply one input into a more general process of a political community translating some sort of innovation — in social, economic, or military technology — into expansion.
The key issue is whether the rate of diffusion of that innovation is too slow to allow targets to check expansion.
That and a lot of luck.
This is Gilpin’s argument, more or less, in War and Change. If I ever get around to my bloggig backlog, this will have to be high up on my list.