Question Time!

[Beet]

"Oligarchies end up in various aristocratic factions fighting against each other and the one which is able to mobilize populist support in the end wins"

True or false?

[dead0man]

true 87.2% of the time

[Torie]

That makes sense to me, unless the oligarchy devolves into a one man dictatorship where power is maintained by force of arms.

[opebo]

False.

[The Mikado]

"Oligarchies end up in various aristocratic factions fighting against each other and the one which is able to mobilize populist support in the end wins"

True or false?

So...what's the sample size here?  This is a fairly decent (if nowhere near in depth enough) argument for what happened to the Roman Republic.  Which other oligarchies does this apply to?

[Torie]

That makes sense to me, unless the oligarchy devolves into a one man dictatorship where power is maintained by force of arms.

A la Napoleon.

Every oligarchy has an expiration date, as one of those cruel, ambitious aristocrats will eventually attempt to seize power for himself. I would say that, yes, the faction that is able to mobilize populist support usually ends up in power, but merely because the non-career military usually follows the will of the people (as was the case of the August Coup in the former USSR). When the military is more independent (as in the Roman legion, post-Marius), popular support is hardly the deciding factor, it becomes about troop morale and an air of inevitability.

Stalin sort of did that as well, sans populist support. Saddam is another.