Analysis Of Empires And Their Destructive Tendencies

Empires and Their Destructive Tendencies Since the beginning of history, empires have followed a similar trend that usually lead to their downfall. It was not until roughly the seventeenth century that nations were able to acquire the skills necessary to maintain a country. Because of this, the majority of empires in early history eventually fell due to the lack of focus on political responsibilities, such as the appointing of corrupt, power-hungry tyrants and their determination to expand their empire to an unsustainable size. Corrupt political leaders often become tyrants, and use their power and influence to glorify their lives. This has a tendency to distract the political leadership from focusing on governmental matters to less relevant …show more content…
These traits apply to many ancient empires- an early example is Alexander the Great’s empire, which originally started out as a small Greek kingdom. His lust for more land brought him close to conquering all of the world what was known to exist at his time. It was not until his death that instability issues became apparent, and his predecessors could not sustain the empire. Much later in history, the Roman Empire became one of the largest in history. The civilization was led by a republic, but it was imperfect and therefore corrupt, which led to more power-hungry leaders to expand at an astounding rate. Unsurprisingly, Rome as an empire collapsed soon after its massive growth, and was surpassed in size by the massive Mongolian empire. Mongolian khanates lasted for centuries, but collapsed as expected when leadership became scarce and the empire could not be managed effectively. This continuous pattern is devastating for empires because it prevents the leaders from managing their civilization on a more political level. In addition, the wasting of resources of expansion often led empires into bankruptcy or left them open to attack. Furthermore, larger empires became much more difficult to organize and lead, which often led to a collapse in …show more content…
When Peter the great rose to power in Russia, he was able to implement a standing army, navy, education system, and many other modernizations, effectively leading the Russian empire in to a state of stability. The Qing dynasty, the final dynasty of China, was able to establish a controlled leadership that lasted for three centuries. It did not boast the largest Chinese territory, but the land the Qing claimed was of an easily manageable size, and China has stayed the same size since this dynasty. The Qing dynasty’s ability to claim a perfectly manageable territory was so beneficial that the territory maintained the same size since this empire. In addition, the implementation of modernization across Eurasia brought the Republic governmental system to new places. Although it was not perfect, and political corruption was still an issue, it brought further order and stability to several nations such as the United States, France, Russia, several other European nations, and eventually China. This system improved over time through modernization and the further distribution of power, but overall it helped in preserving the stabilization of many