Universal Empire (concept)
Stage 5 of Quigley's seven-stage civilizational model — the consolidation of a whole civilization under a single political unit, usually a peripheral state, ending the Age of Conflict and inaugurating administered peace before Decay
Also known as: Universal Empire, Age of the Universal Empire, Stage 5, Stage V, stage of universal empire
The Universal Empire is the stage in which a single political unit — almost always a peripheral state — finally conquers the whole area of a civilization, ending the imperialist wars of the Age of Conflict and inaugurating a long period of administered peace before Decay sets in (T&H 21; EoC 140-141). The Roman Empire after Augustus is the prototype; the Han dynasty in Sinic civilization, Assyria-then-Persia in Mesopotamian civilization, and the Aztecs and Incas in the Americas are Quigley's other principal cases.
Definition and Place in the Sequence
The Universal Empire is Stage 5 in Quigley's seven-stage civilizational model: Mixture → Gestation → Expansion → Conflict → Universal Empire → Decay → Invasion (EoC 133). It arises out of the Age of Conflict: "As a result of the imperialist wars of the Age of Conflict, the number of political units in the civilization are reduced by conquest. Eventually one emerges triumphant. When this occurs we have one political unit for the whole civilization" (T&H 21). The defining feature of the stage is the political unification of the civilization. Internal warfare ends; the relief produces what Quigley elsewhere calls a "golden age" feeling, with peace, prosperity, and a flowering of cultural production — but the underlying instrument of expansion has already institutionalized, so this peace is administered rather than generated, and prepares the way for Decay.
The Conqueror is Almost Always Peripheral
Quigley's most distinctive claim about Universal Empires is that they are forged by peripheral, not core, states. "When this occurs the core empire is generally a semiperipheral state, while the Universal Empire is generally a peripheral state" (T&H 21). The pattern recurs: Mesopotamia's core was taken by semi-peripheral Babylonia about 1700 B.C., the whole civilization by more peripheral Assyria about 725 B.C. (replaced by fully peripheral Persia about 525 B.C.). In Classical civilization, the core was taken by semi-peripheral Macedonia under Alexander about 336 B.C.; the whole civilization was consolidated by peripheral Rome about 146 B.C. (T&H 21). In Sinic civilization, the Han dynasty rose from the southern periphery (202 B.C.–A.D. 220) (EoC 142). In the Americas, the Universal Empires of the Aztecs (Mayan civilization) and Incas (Andean civilization) both centered in peripheral highlands — the Aztec heartland in central Mexico, distant from the Mayan core in Yucatán and Guatemala (T&H 21).
Rome as the Prototype
Rome after Augustus is Quigley's archetypal Universal Empire. The Roman Republic, originally a peripheral state on the western edge of the Classical core, rose through the wars of the Classical Age of Conflict to unify the whole Mediterranean world by 146 B.C. The transition from Republic to Principate under Augustus completed the consolidation politically. The next three centuries — the Pax Romana — supplied the prototype of every later Universal Empire: a single law and language across the civilization, an enormous administered peace, a flowering of literature and engineering, and an underlying loss of dynamism that left the civilization defenseless against the invasions that ended it. Quigley returns to Rome again and again as the standard reference for what a Universal Empire looks like in practice.
Western Civilization's Escape — So Far
Quigley's most provocative argument is that Western civilization is the only civilization to have escaped a Universal Empire — three times. "Western Civilization did not pass from the Age of Crisis to the Age of Universal Empire, but instead was able to reform itself and entered upon a new period of expansion. Moreover, Western Civilization did this not once, but several times" (T&H 19). Each earlier Western Age of Conflict — the Hundred Years' War (c. 1300-1430) and the Second Hundred Years' War (c. 1650-1815) — looked headed for consolidation under a single hegemon (Spain in the late 16th century; revolutionary and Napoleonic France in 1789-1815) but was reformed or circumvented before the Universal Empire could be sealed. Whether the third Western Age of Conflict — beginning around 1893 and continuing through 2024-and-beyond — will likewise be reformed or circumvented, or whether it will instead produce a Universal Empire under some peripheral successor (Quigley's contemporary candidates were the United States and the USSR), is the question Tragedy and Hope leaves open.
The Quality of the Peace
Quigley is careful about the character of Universal-Empire peace. It is real peace — internal war ends, trade and travel are easy, codified law is administered uniformly — but it is also brittle and unproductive in a particular way. "Any large social aggregate, especially a highly politicized one as a Universal Empire must be, has to operate through artifacts, general rules, abstractions, permanent status, and generalized, non-personal (that is, not 'face-to-face') behavior. All these things are obstacles to the unique, existential relationships among persons and with nature required by human emotional needs. The effort to make a Universal Empire into a community, or to pretend that it is, is bound to fail from the cumulative frustration of unexpressed emotional energies" (Quigley Lectures, p. 55). The peace is a managed peace of strangers, not a community; this is why, in Quigley's account, Universal Empires inevitably pass into the deeper anomie of Stage 6 — Decay — and from there into Stage 7 — Invasion.
Cited in
- tragedy-and-hope · p. 19 Quigley
The Age of Expansion was followed by an Age of Crisis, and this, in turn, by a period of Universal Empire in which a single political unit ruled the whole extent of the civilization. Western Civilization, on the contrary, did not pass from the Age of Crisis to the Age of Universal Empire, but instead was able to reform itself and entered upon a new period of expansion.
- tragedy-and-hope · p. 21 Quigley
In most civilizations the long-drawn agony of the Age of Conflict finally ends in a new period, the Age of the Universal Empire. As a result of the imperialist wars of the Age of Conflict, the number of political units in the civilization are reduced by conquest. Eventually one emerges triumphant.
- tragedy-and-hope · p. 21 Quigley
When this occurs the core empire is generally a semiperipheral state, while the Universal Empire is generally a peripheral state. ... In Classical Civilization the core area was conquered by semiperipheral Macedonia about 336 B.C., while the whole civilization was conquered by peripheral Rome about 146 B.C.
- evolution-of-civilizations · p. 133 Quigley
These seven stages we shall name as follows: 1. Mixture 2. Gestation 3. Expansion 4. Age of Conflict 5. Universal Empire 6. Decay 7. Invasion.
- evolution-of-civilizations · p. 140 Quigley
Eventually one unit emerges triumphant. When this occurs we are in Stage 5, the Stage of Universal Empire. Just as the core area passes from Stage 3 to Stage 4 earlier than the peripheral area does, so the core area comes to be conquered by a single state before the whole civilization is conquered by the universal empire.
- evolution-of-civilizations · p. 142 Quigley
The whole of Sinic society was then brought into a single universal empire by the Han dynasty from its southern periphery (202 B.C.—A.D. 220).
- quigley-lectures · p. 54 Quigley
The Age of Conflict continues, and the civilizational process continues into growing frustration and weakness, until a single political unit, a Universal Empire, conquers the whole area of the civilization. At that point, Stage IV ceases, and is replaced by Stage V.
- quigley-lectures · p. 55 Quigley
Any large social aggregate, especially a highly politicized one as a Universal Empire must be, has to operate through artifacts, general rules, abstractions, permanent status, and generalized, non-personal (that is, not 'face-to-face') behavior. ... The effort to make a Universal Empire into a community, or to pretend that it is, is bound to fail from the cumulative frustration of unexpressed emotional energies.