The Economics of Immorality: The U.S. Antebellum South, Stalinist Russia and the Roman Empire

In recent years Roman historians have been presenting the imperial economy as a success story. Justified maybe, but the Romans—imperialist, repressive, exploitative and slaveholding—practiced the economics of immorality. Is it therefore immoral to highlight their economic achievements? This chapter addresses that question by comparing the ethical problems of studying the Roman empire, the U.S. antebellum South and Stalinist Russia. The realization that U.S. slavery was profitable led to a debate about the morality of scholarly approaches among historians of the antebellum South. Among Roman historians, no comparable debate has been held. As for Stalinist Russia, its worst methods were key to the economic progress it achieved. The same was true for the Roman empire. The economic practices of Stalinism have received plenty of moral condemnation but those of Roman imperialism have not. The chapter argues that the reason for the lack of moral scrutiny is the cultural relativism in which Roman historians engage, mostly implicitly. It concludes that although such relativism should not be used to evade moral problems, it provides helpful context on the ethics of Roman economic history.