Western Roman Empire Research Paper

All good things come to an end. Rome was a seamlessly powerful empire, but just like any powerful civilization, it was bound to come to a halt eventually. After centuries of peace and prosperity and being the center of the world at the time, the empire was doomed to fall. It took many years of bloody wars, government reforms, and economic power to reach its peak; therefore, it would take many more years of wars and deterioration of the economy to a dwindling civilization. This phenomenal empire declined for many factors such as religious, political, health, and technological factors. Most of the factors came from within the city, which led to internal decay. Many foolish decisions and revisions caused the heart and soul of Rome to crumble.
Numerous aspects led to Rome’s downfall, but the military, economy, and social elements correlated specifically to a powerful empire’s downfall. Due to a number of military aspects and intruders, Rome had major dilemmas in stabilizing and keeping order in their civilization.
Since the third century C.E., Rome faced many problems and was weakened by barbaric invasions from 100-500 C.E. Around 476 C.E, most of the Eastern Roman Empire was still intact, but the Western Roman Empire was covered by barbarians. External enemies, such as the Saxons, Vandals, and Ostrogoths engaged with Rome, which enabled the empire to wear out slowly. On the other hand, this powerful empire was not only weakened by external rivals but by internal decay as well. The increase of enemies contributed to the problematic issue of recruiting soldiers. Rome had difficulty recruiting male boys from Rome into their military, which resulted in the government to promptly pay German foreigners to join the army. Low funding from citizens did not give the military supplies or resources they needed to protect Rome. Consequently, citizens rarely paid for the army, even though Rome kept on paying German foreigners for their army. This caused a major conflict. Lastly, many foolish decisions made by the emperors and government caused the aspects of the military to slowly
crumble. However, the lack of military funding was not the only instrument in the decline of Rome, for the cease of the economic provinces contributed as well.
Many rich citizens, known as Patricians bought slaves to do their work. As a result, the abundance of slaves took away farmers’ jobs. In addition, they promoted the increase of latifundias, or ranches that slaves work in, which was a factor to the growth of slaves dominating agriculture and causing farmers to flee to cities. Therefore, this added to the rate of unemployment in Rome. For that reason, low pay was given to workers, another jab at the falling economy. Part of the money went to the army and government, so it hindered Rome to a suppressing taxation. Tenants fled from their farms, and businessmen fled from their jobs. Private businesses were disintegrated. For that reason, the state government had no other choice but to take over countless companies. Now the government has to juggle with their own problems and the private businesses too. Even though slaves were taking away jobs, Rome still depended on them. But, when expansion ground to a halt, Rome’s supplies and slaves began to dry
up. Lastly, social factors affected Rome’s dwindling empire. The loss of jobs and businesses motivated citizens to rely heavily on the government welfare system. People lost faith in the government. Because they had trouble finding work, people depended on the welfare system to sustain them. As a result of the government taking over so many responsibilities in businesses and jobs that workmen avoided, the core of what Roman citizens stood for slowly vanished. With overpopulation in the empire, people could not organize their roles and responsibilities. In reality, people really did not care anymore. The old Roman virtues of self-reliance and drive, founded by Romulus and Remus, were lost from the population. Very few inhabitants believed that the empire was worth saving. The other overwhelming majority of the population excluded themselves from serving in the military or working for the government. Their intellectual sense declined; no one made any more inventions or reforms. Their economic condition was hopeless. The only question left for inhabitants was, is Rome worth saving?
The Roman Empire did not fall in a day but rather fell as a victim to a gradual decline in prosperity and wealth. However, Rome’s deterioration was caused by internal decay in what was once considered the world’s greatest army at that time, the inevitable fall of the economy, and the lost of social strength and moral from Roman citizens. Unqualified rulers caused major problems, and the invasions from barbarians were caused from the mistreatment of foreigners. Poor management of infrastructure and government responsibility from lack of funds had a significant effect on the economy. The overall lack of moral support did not allow the empire to stand a chance of overcoming this obstacle. Rome had to juggle an excessive amount of slaves and the accumulating amount of enemies. Its resources and manpower kept dwindling to a point where it could no longer defend itself. There was no one single cause; it was many things happening at once, which caused the fall of Rome. Although the empire’s downfall was caused by many factors, it was sparked by overexpansion, whose various effects multiplied and combined with outside problems to bring once-mighty Rome to its knees.