All empires that rise must fall.

That feels almost like a natural law, like gravity.

It's inevitable. There's nothing that you can do about it.

Now, for the contemporary Western mind, the empire that stands above all others is Rome.

And the collapse of Rome is a theme people return to again and again.

That's particularly the case in recent years, primarily because the West, which is a form of empire in the 21st century,

is suffering major crises of its own. Today's guests think there are massive lessons to learn

for the West today from the Roman experience of the 4th and 5th centuries.

And in fact, they believe that the West right now is facing the possibility of total

civilizational collapse.

Their book is absolutely superb.

Why Empires Fall?

Peter Heather, John Rapley, welcome to Downstream.

Thank you so much.

I think this is the first time we've done an interview with two guests. Is that right? Okay.

Well, we tend to talk over each other and disagree. That's fine. That's good. I insisted on it

because the book we're talking about today,

Wympers Fall, is a work of both political analysis and history. One is a historian. One is a political

scientist. Political economist. Political economist. And obviously, to discuss the book without one of

those perspectives would be quite limiting.

I have to say, it's one of the best books I've read this year.

That's very nice to hear.

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