ABSTRACT
In recognizing the political legitimacy of the groupings or factions, Roman republicanism differed from Athenian democracy, which united all citizens in a single assembly and gave much less recognition to differences of wealth. It may therefore be thought of as introducing a form of plural autonomy modifying the communal autonomy claimed as much by the Roman civitas as by the Greek polis. With the resolution of the conflict of orders, all Romans except those foreigners who had been granted conditional citizenship became formally equal citizens with the same civic rights and obligations, though with military and political roles and power corresponding to their wealth. The transition from republic to imperial monarchy was in the first instance a function of the growing inadequacy of the republican form for the management of a far flung empire, but it was also due to internal difficulties which overwhelmed the republic's balance of power.
