The Postclassical Era

During the Postclassical Era, the social and political order is restored, after the internal and external pressures of the Classical Era. Centralized governments return to China, Persia, and in the eastern half of Europe, the Byzantine Empire holds over from the previous period. However, India and western Europe develop smaller local governments. The Postclassical Era leads to an unprecedented amount of trading, and the numbers of traders and manufacturers increase. Plant species are traded as well. The trading leads to increased innovation and then inventions which shape history. Newly developed religions take over, like Islam, and others spread, like Buddhism. Some religions, like Christianity, branch off. Literacy and education increase as well. The period will be one of structure and formation,  mainly of peace, and with a large amount of trade.

Silk Road Map

The map we had to make today was rather challenging to me not because of technological challenges (I had two devices on me to save the effort of switching), but rather error on my own part. The places mentioned on the reading are very old, and thus their names have changed. However, that was not the biggest error that occurred while trying to make this map. The best error was trying to map the places accurately after looking at them. It took several minutes trying to plot every place and even then they were not as accurate as I hoped it would be. I have a new found respect for map makers.

Marriage and Divorce in the Roman Empire

My view of the Roman Empire is negative. Not only was their upper class very greedy and caused a lot of conflict, but they treated their women very badly as well. Marriage was just a motive for the guys to get a male child to manage and take care of their wealth. There was little meaning in the relationship, and their society was not even monogamous, with many concubines and slaves. The woman was not even able to escape the relationship if it was not a favorable one, unless under extreme circumstances. Laws were harsher for women, compared to men. Overall, this led to a very degrading treatment of women in the Roman Empire.

Rome's transition

      Rome's transition from a republic to an empire was marked by the conflict between their peoples and others. The Romans had severe laws in place to control their citizens and the peoples which they conquered. The upper class of Rome killed those that tried to reform the government to give the lower classes more rights. The Romans had a large extent of roads that aided their delivery of troops, information, and goods throughout the empire. The factions within the government often led to conflict, as in the case of Marius and Sulla. In the end, the conflict would eventually lead to the assassination of Caesar, then the Caesarian civil war. The conflict between the peoples led to the development of the Empire, but also led to the government with Augustus having all of the power.

Alexander the Great's campaign

Although Alexander has many admirable features like honesty and being able to do what he says he will, Alexander the great would not be electable in today's society. He seems like he is too aggressive for today's world. Today most things are negotiated peacefully and having a leader that seems or is too aggressive may not be helpful for any country. Based on reports, Alexander sounds very arrogant. He refers to himself as a son of god. Also, most people in our country like their leaders to be practical, and Alexander has proven on several occasions not to be. He dumped out a helmet-full of water because he wanted to prove a point. He risked a lot when he tamed his horse as well. These types of risks are not acceptable in today's society. 

Democracy in the Middle East

After reflecting on what has been written about democracy in other blog posts, and after considering what happened when surrounding areas tried to implement Democracy, I still think that King Abdullah II of Jordan can be successful. This is because he and the government have experience of watching the countries around them fail. They can find out where exactly the other countries failed, and thus can avoid them. As long as they are careful in their footsteps, and do not anger the majority of people, they should be successful. 

On Democracy

True democracies are best reserved for smaller societies for several reasons. The burden of finding out what each and every citizen, in a society where there are 330 million people, wants would severely slow law-making, to the point where it is dysfunctional. On top of that, there would most likely be a lot of error in this type of system, where the votes of a few unfortunate citizens are incorrectly changed. Also, the disagreement between the different people and their opinions would make law-making chaotic and unreasonable. On top of that, unless there was a rigorous education system, there is no way you could count on every citizen to make the educated and best decision, rather than what is best for them or popular. Thus the true voting should be left up to the people that are educated and can pick the best decision for the people they are representing.