The Marxist Historiography: Roman Republic

The Marxist Historiography

Marxist historians emphasise the importance of class struggle and economic constraints in approaching history – their view is generally quite deterministic, as the nature of class relations define the form and pace of development of the productive forces and the historical path taken by particular societies . In this framework, each mode of production is being bound for crisis through its own inherent contradictions and, in particular, social crisis emerges from the clash of productive forces and the relations of production . It is thus internal problems and endogenous causal factors, rather than external forces, which create social crisis and transition: the Roman Empire, for instance, did not collapse because of

those of Solon in 594-1 BCE which abolished debts and debt-bondage in the polis of Athens, and the agrarian laws of the Gracchi in Rome – but once the countervailing power of those below weakened, the land hunger of the oligarchical elite would immediately reassert itself . Therefore, in the Marxist framework, the Roman Republic was being bound for crisis due to the inherent tensions and contradictions of the system, rather than the actions of peculiar individuals. As pointed by Marx, ‘the preservation of the ancient community implies the destruction of the conditions on which it rests’: it was inevitable that the cycle of war and booty (including slaves) would require the armies to call first on lower class Romans, while enabling large proprietors to take over the best agricultural lands, which should then have to be confiscated if discharged veterans were to be re-established as freeholding farmers . There is thus a sharp contrast between the Classical and the Marxist views: in the Classical view, the Gracchi were – partly – responsible of the desegregation of the state due to their ambition and their political actions, while in the Marxist view, there was a class warfare between the wealthy

The Gracchi’s family was a branch of the gens Sempronia, one of the wealthy and distinguished plebeian houses, which contributed several famous citizens to the state as Scipio Africanus – they can hardly be considered as part of the exploited class of impoverished people, and it is not unreasonable to wonder about their real motives. There was unquestionably a struggle between two political factions in the Late Republic: the populares, who – broadly speaking – tended to pay attention to the problems of common people, bringing political issues to popular assemblies and by-passing senatorial approval, and the optimates, who tried to maintain the established order through a united senatorial front against popular demands . If one follows the opinion of Classical authors, especially Cicero, the populares could also be labelled as shameless demagogues, who would do anything to secure power, while the optimates were concerned with preserving the basic institutions of the Senate, which was the core of the Roman Republic. For Yann Le Bohec, both factions were aristocratic by essence and considering the Gracchi to be democrat or revolutionary is an anachronistic interpretation due to an exaggerated focus on socio-economic aspects to the detriment of the event-driven history . The