60. Passages from Antiquity to Feudalism Pt. 1 | Perry Anderson

DISCORD: https://discord.gg/Ym8Bwmaz LINKTREE: https://linktr.ee/AuxiliaryStatementsPodcast This week Jack and Dan cover the first half of Anderson’s classic book on the transition to feudalism. They cover the rise of the slave mode of production in Antiquity from its initial emergence as a solution to class struggle in Greece to its peak during thee Roman Empire. Whilst this mode of production allowed the ancient states to reach stunning cultural heights it was also wracked with internal contradictions that would be its undoing. The eventual crisis was one of an under supply of slaves and whilst the eventual demise of Western Roman Empire was a protracted affair, when the invaders came, their fate was sealed by weaknesses stemming from the mode of production. According to Anderson a new synthesis developed over the next several centuries, a synthesis of two political economies in crisis and decay. It was the melding of Roman and Germanic ways of life that gave rise to the feudal mode of production. Reading - Part 1 - ''Passages from Antiquity to Feudalism'' (1974) by Perry Anderson