Are We Doomed? Are We Going the Way of the Roman Empire?
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Jun 9, 2026 
Monty Marshall, former senior consultant who modeled political instability, and Ian Morris, Stanford historian of long-run civilizational change, discuss parallels between Rome and modern America. They explore how wealth, polarization, pandemics, and political short-termism can create cascading crises. Conversation focuses on signs of fragmentation, how infrastructure and cities suffer, and whether resilience or collapse is more likely.
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How Rome's Strengths Sowed Its Weaknesses
- Rome combined vast population, trade networks, and cultural prestige to become seemingly invincible.
- Ian Morris emphasizes that those exact strengths created stresses that later undermined Rome as it expanded and became costly to maintain.
Legions Brought Back A Pandemic
- Soldiers brought back a novel disease after distant campaigns, triggering a pandemic that killed millions and worsened Rome's budget and manpower problems.
- That pandemic, combined with expensive overreach, led to inflation, unrest, and new invasions that stressed the empire.
Short Term Politics Eroded Rome's Stability
- Political survival became the core concern of emperors, driving short-term fixes like devaluing coinage and buying soldiers' loyalty.
- Ian Morris links this short-termism to growing internal fragility and the empire's inability to fight mounting crises.
