4. The Slave Economy¶
Core Argument¶
The motor force of history is the development of the productive forces, and a socio-economic system’s viability depends on its capacity to provide for material necessities. The fall of the Roman Republic is traced to a fundamental transformation in the mode of production: the rise of chattel slavery, which liquidated the free peasant class that had been the Republic’s backbone. Before the Punic Wars, slavery was not decisive; slaves worked alongside their masters and manumission was common. The destruction of Carthage and the influx of wealth, however, transformed the economy from free peasant agriculture to slave-labour-based latifundia producing for the market. Cheap slave labour displaced free peasants, who were expropriated and ruined by debt. By 134 BC, no free farmers remained in Etruria.
Though merchant capital, usury, and commodity production developed, Marx rejected the notion of ‘Roman capitalism’ because the capitalist mode of production—commodities produced by free wage labour—never developed significantly. Roman proletarians became a mob of do-nothings, not wage labourers, existing alongside a slave-based mode of production. Urban craft production remained underdeveloped, as slave labour drove out free labour. The low cost of slaves made their industrial products cheap, since slaves required no money outlay and were fed by the estate. This competition prevented the development of a strong free craft sector; Roman craftsmen remained poor, dependent on landowners, and often sank into the lumpenproletariat.
The demand for slave labour forced Rome into constant wars to replenish supply. This abundant cheap labour removed any incentive for labour-saving technology and explains both the brutal treatment of slaves and the mass revolts that followed. Slave labour was less productive per individual than free peasant labour, but became profitable when employed on a vast scale, with slaves worked to death and quickly replaced. The only costs were initial purchase and minimal subsistence. This system inhibited technological development, as only the crudest tools could be entrusted to slaves who would deliberately damage better implements. The slave economy contained a fundamental contradiction: it raised aggregate productive power but kept individual productivity low. Since slave-owners had no use for productive investment in machinery, they consumed their entire surplus in lavish personal consumption—banquets, games, and public buildings—rather than reinvesting it.
The first great slave revolt, led by Eunus in Sicily, saw the rebel army reach 200,000, winning numerous battles. News sparked uprisings in Rome, Attica, and Delos, quickly suppressed. In Sicily, the revolt grew until Roman commander Rupilius besieged Tauromenium, reducing rebels to cannibalism. After suppression, mass crucifixions followed—20,000 in Sicily alone. Roman society’s economic base had transformed, but the political superstructure remained an exclusive aristocratic club; this contradiction was resolved through savage class struggle.