Editing Classical republicanism (section)

====Ancient Rome====
[[File:Bust of Cicero (1st-cent. BC) - Palazzo Nuovo - Musei Capitolini - Rome 2016.jpg|thumb|Sculpture of [[Cicero]]]]

Both [[Livy]], a Roman historian, and [[Plutarch]], who is noted for his biographies and moral essays, described how Rome had developed its legislation, notably the transition from a ''kingdom'' to a ''republic'', by following the example of the Greeks. Some of this history, composed more than 500 years after the events, with scant written sources to rely on, may be fictitious reconstruction.

The Greek historian [[Polybius]], writing in the mid-2nd century BCE, emphasized (in Book 6) the role played by the [[Roman Republic]] as an institutional form in the dramatic rise of Rome's hegemony over the Mediterranean. In his writing on the constitution of the Roman Republic,<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Histories of Polybius|last1=Polybius|last2=Shuckburgh|first2=Evelyn S.|date=2009|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1139333740|location=Cambridge|doi = 10.1017/cbo9781139333740}}</ref> Polybius described the system as being a "mixed" form of government. Specifically, Polybius described the Roman system as a mixture of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy with the Roman Republic constituted in such a manner that it applied the strengths of each system to offset the weaknesses of the others. In his view, the mixed system of the Roman Republic provided the Romans with a much greater level of domestic tranquillity than would have been experienced under another form of government. Furthermore, Polybius argued, the comparative level of domestic tranquillity the Romans enjoyed allowed them to conquer the Mediterranean. Polybius exerted a great influence on [[Cicero]] as he wrote his politico-philosophical works in the 1st century BCE. In one of these works, ''[[De re publica]]'', Cicero linked the Roman concept of ''res publica'' to the Greek ''politeia''.

The modern term "republic", despite its derivation, is not synonymous with the Roman ''[[res publica]]''.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Mitchell |first1=Thomas N. |title=Roman Republicanism: The Underrated Legacy |journal=[[Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society]] |date=2001 |volume=145 |issue=2 |pages=127–137 |jstor=1558267 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1558267 |issn=0003-049X}}</ref> Among the several meanings of the term ''res publica'', it is most often translated "republic" where the Latin expression refers to the Roman state, and its form of government, between the era of the Kings and the era of the Emperors. This Roman Republic would, by a modern understanding of the word, still be defined as a true republic, even if not coinciding entirely. Thus, [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] philosophers saw the Roman Republic as an ideal system because it included features like a systematic [[separation of powers]].

Romans still called their state "Res Publica" in the era of the early emperors because, on the surface, the organization of the state had been preserved by the first emperors without significant alteration. Several offices from the Republican era, held by individuals, were combined under the control of a single person. These changes became permanent, and gradually conferred sovereignty on the Emperor.

Cicero's description of the ideal state, in ''De re Publica'', does not equate to a modern-day "republic"; it is more like [[enlightened absolutism]]. His philosophical works were influential when Enlightenment philosophers such as [[Voltaire]] developed their political concepts.

In its classical meaning, a republic was any stable well-governed political community. Both [[Plato]] and [[Aristotle]] identified three forms of government: [[democracy]], [[aristocracy]], and [[monarchy]]. First Plato and Aristotle, and then Polybius and Cicero, held that the ideal republic is a [[Mixed government|mixture]] of these three forms of government. The writers of the Renaissance embraced this notion.

Cicero expressed reservations concerning the republican form of government. While in his ''theoretical'' works he defended monarchy, or at least a mixed monarchy/oligarchy, in his own political life, he generally opposed men, like [[Julius Caesar]], [[Mark Antony]], and [[Augustus|Octavian]], who were trying to realise such ideals. Eventually, that opposition led to his death and Cicero can be seen as a victim of his own Republican ideals.

[[Tacitus]], a contemporary of Plutarch, was not concerned with whether a form of government could be analysed as a "republic" or a "monarchy".<ref>see for example ''[[Annals (Tacitus)|Ann]]''. IV, 32–33</ref> He analysed how the powers accumulated by the early [[Julio-Claudian dynasty]] were all given by a State that was still notionally a republic. Nor was the Roman Republic "forced" to give away these powers: it did so freely and reasonably, certainly in [[Caesar Augustus|Augustus]]' case, because of his many services to the state, freeing it from [[civil war]]s and disorder.

Tacitus was one of the first to ask whether such powers were given to the [[head of state]] because the citizens wanted to give them, or whether they were given for other reasons (for example, because one had a [[imperial cult|deified ancestor]]). The latter case led more easily to abuses of power. In Tacitus' opinion, the trend away from a true republic was ''irreversible'' only when [[Tiberius]] established power, shortly after Augustus' death in 14 CE (much later than most historians place the start of the Imperial form of government in Rome). By this time, too many principles defining some powers as "untouchable" had been implemented.<ref>''[[Annals (Tacitus)|Ann]]''. I–VI</ref>