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Posted by: Dionys 1 year, 7 months ago

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Dionys1 year, 7 months ago

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I guess it depends on who's theory you follow. Bury would argue that a contributing factor was that "the Empire had come to depend on the enrollment of barbarians, in large numbers, in the army, and â;¦ it was necessary to render the service attractive to them by the prospect of power and wealth. "
Well we're letting barbarians in the Army (as evidenced by the lowering of standards and number of rapists in the US Army).
Gibbon points to a general sense of moral decay, which seems overly simplistic but is certainly present in a nation that now allows torture and pre-emptive wars. Toynbee and Burke offer that the Roman system was flawed from its inception (yet we mirror their Republic fairly well, especially where corruption is concerned).
Rostovtzeff and Mises argue for unsound economic policies. Seems pretty apparent if you examine the economy.

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  Dionys1 year, 7 months ago
  
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  Others argue a general social, economic and political decline. Seems like the US isn't picking up fast in any of those areas.
  I like Joseph Tainter's take on it, though.
  I guess we'll see in the next couple of decades how the US fares in the world.
  
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    earthlingerer1 year, 7 months ago
    
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    We also let "barbarians" into the army in the form of foreign citizens who are promised a "fast track" to citizenship.
    http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,151...
    
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