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06634_Field_TCUM T199.txt
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1996-04-10
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means of paper messages and road transport. Such speedup
means much more control at much greater distances.
Historically, it meant the formation of the Roman Empire and
the disruption of the previous city-states of the Greek world.
Before the use of papyrus and alphabet created the incentives
for building fast, hard-surface roads, the walled town and the
city-state were natural forms that could endure.
Village and city-state essentially are forms that include all
human needs and functions. With greater speed and, therefore,
greater military control at a distance, the city-state collapsed.
Once inclusive and self-contained, its needs and functions were
extended in the specialist activities of an empire. Speed-up
tends to separate functions, both commercial and political, and
acceleration beyond a point in any system becomes disruption
and breakdown. So when Arnold Toynbee turns, in A Study of