In a previous entry[0], I thought the author was writing against some antagonist. Now I see it was Niall Ferguson (who is almost a professional contrarian).
Well, it's easy to dunk on Ferguson, trivial to show Rome was multi-ethnic, and it's widely accepted the failure to deal with the Germanic tribes was a major factor in the events to follow. I even agree with him regarding Diocletian. But IMHO Devereaux stretches his argument a bit too thin.
The blog entry makes it sound as if foederati arrangement was something entirely new and bad. The term however dates to the Republic, when it often referred to the socii. As he describes it, their arrangement wasn't all that different from the socii arrangement.
Both cases allowed a sovereign mini-state under Roman rule which contributed soldiers (the difference in the 4th century was indeed giving the foederati land to sustain on, but that only made it closer to the socii arrangement). The Romans were building on a successful arrangement. Yet this time the arrangement fell flat. That's a messy story, and I doubt it has a simple answer.
There was a long period of very successful socii service beforehand, and even the author mentions the policy's positive outcomes in his previous posts. Here, incorporation had significant problems almost from the get go. Yet it's almost the same policy...
More importantly, the author portrays it as some horrible deal, but late feodrati arguably got a better deal than the socii did: there was a problem when the rewards went mostly to Rome following conquest of Italy while socii still had to serve, but the feodrati got land and tax exemption for service.
The author's story basically lays all the blame on Rome's lack of inclusiveness (and none on the various 'barbarians'), yet I don't see that many evidence for it in the post. The author doesn't show that inclusion was closed off, or all that worse than in any of Rome's earlier period.
Evidently by resettling the 'barbarians' the Roman ruling class intended to integrate them, and the self-ruling status they got was more likely their demand rather than Rome stubbornly refusing to accept them. Plenty of Germans did integrate into Rome and Roman customs, arguably even after the fall of Rome.
Well, it's easy to dunk on Ferguson, trivial to show Rome was multi-ethnic, and it's widely accepted the failure to deal with the Germanic tribes was a major factor in the events to follow. I even agree with him regarding Diocletian. But IMHO Devereaux stretches his argument a bit too thin.
The blog entry makes it sound as if foederati arrangement was something entirely new and bad. The term however dates to the Republic, when it often referred to the socii. As he describes it, their arrangement wasn't all that different from the socii arrangement.
Both cases allowed a sovereign mini-state under Roman rule which contributed soldiers (the difference in the 4th century was indeed giving the foederati land to sustain on, but that only made it closer to the socii arrangement). The Romans were building on a successful arrangement. Yet this time the arrangement fell flat. That's a messy story, and I doubt it has a simple answer.
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27627376