Peak Human

The Swedish historian Johan Norberg has written a fascinating account of seven civilisations, Peak Human: What We Can Learn from the Rise and Fall of Golden Ages. His golden ages are: Athens after the victory over the Persians at Salamis in 480 BC; the Roman Republic and early Empire; the Abbasid Caliphate (750–1258) in what is now the Middle East; the era of the Song Dynasty (960–1279) in China; the Italian Renaissance; the Dutch Republic; and the Anglosphere since the Industrial Revolution.

Open, Tolerant, Decentralised

Norberg’s seven golden ages were all open and tolerant, and decentralised either because power was divided among several institutions or because the rulers chose to restrain themselves. This allowed individuals to learn both through imitation and innovation. It also meant that the system itself was corrigible, constantly reinventing itself, and adapting to new circumstances. Norberg’s account is persuasive. So are his explanations for the end of the six fallen civilisations: they were either defeated by others or by themselves, or both. Athens was conquered by the Macedonian kings. The Roman Empire slowly declined, not least after Emperor Diocletian in 301 AD imposed strict price controls to combat the inflation he had himself caused by debasing the currency. The Abbasid Caliphate, the Song Dynasty, and the Renaissance were all destroyed or adversely affected by Mongol invasions. Indeed, the (classical) liberal philosopher Tom G. Palmer quipped, ‘The lesson from history is: don’t get invaded by Mongols.’ On the other hand, the Dutch Republic, under threat from hostile neighbours, was gradually transformed into a less than liberal monarchy.

Intriguing Examples and Happy Phrases

Norberg provides many intriguing examples to illustrate his story. One example is the contrast between fifteenth-century China and Europe. In China, power was always held by a single person in a single state. The Song Emperors were liberal and tolerant; the Ming Emperors were not. When a Ming Emperor decided in 1433 to abandon all explorations abroad, that was it. But even if Christopher Columbus spent twenty years searching for a sponsor, being turned down by the kings of Portugal, France, and England, he finally found one in Isabella and Ferdinand of Spain, upon which he discovered America in 1492. Europe’s fragmentation of power meant that there was no final decision there on anything; there was always the possibility of appeal. Norberg’s book is full of telling anecdotes and fitting quotations, while he contributes some happy phrases himself: We humans have two basic settings: we are traders and we are tribalists. — History is more than a crime scene. It is also the place where ideas were developed that helped humanity to identify that something is a crime, and how to grow out of it. — Rome was no longer an empire with an army, but an army with an empire. — What is most significant about the Industrial Revolution is that it did not run out of steam.

No Taxation without Representation

Whereas Norberg’s account is generally reliable, so far as I can judge (and I knew very little in advance about the Abbasid Caliphate and the Song Dynasty), I would take issue with his idea that the Glorious Revolution of 1688 was mainly a Dutch project. Norberg holds that the venerable maxim ‘No Taxation without Representation’, which also inspired the American Revolutionaries, can be derived from Roman law through the Dutch legal philosopher Hugo Grotius. It is true that in Justinian’s Digest, there is the rule, Quod omnes similiter tangit, ab omnibus comprobetur, What affects all must be approved by all. But in the Digest, this was not presented as a general principle. It applied, as Norberg notes, to the special case of terminating the joint tutorship of several tutors, to which they were all required to consent. Later, this rule was often interpreted more broadly as requiring the prince to consult his subjects on new laws. But this was quite different from the ancient Germanic idea of law, as developed through the deliberations of popular assemblies, which did not necessarily presuppose any prince. The two main ideas behind the 1688 Revolution in England, and the 1776 Revolution in North America, government by consent and the right of rebellion, were much more strongly formulated in the Germanic legal tradition than under Roman law, where the prince was seen as a legislator, expected to consult his subjects but not necessarily to abide by their laws. Indeed, in the Digest, it says, Quod placuit principi, habet vigorem legis, What pleases the prince has the force of law. Thus, I would suggest that modern representative democracy can be traced to the two Germanic ideas of government by consent and the right of rebellion, rather than to Roman law.