In a well-known passage, the Greek historian Polybius, writing in the mid-second century BC, attributes Rome's success as a republic to a perfect balance of power between its constituent elements, army, senate and people (Histories6.11); and indeed, the Republic's long survival was an achievement worth explaining. On another note, over a century later, Livy remarked how Republican Rome, with its rambling street plan and miscellany of buildings, compared unfavourably with the magnificent royal cities of the eastern Mediterranean; he put this down to hasty rebuilding after a great Gallic conflagration around 390 BC. Few scholars now accept his explanation. A handful of scholars argue for underlying rationales, usually when setting up the early city as a foil for its transformation under Augustus and subsequent emperors, and their conclusions tend towards characterizing the city's design as an unintended corollary to the annual turnover of magistrates. This article, likewise, argues for the role of government in the city's appearance; but it contends that the state of Republican urbanism was deliberate. A response, of sorts, to both ancient authors' observations, it addresses how provisions to ensure equilibrium in one of the Republic's components, the senatorial class, in the interests of preserving the res publica, came at a vital cost to the city's architectural evolution. These provisions took the form of intentional constraints (on time and money), to prevent élite Romans from building like, and thus presenting themselves as, Mediterranean monarchs. Painting with a broad chronological stroke, it traces the tension between the Roman Republic in its ideal state and the physical city, exploring the strategies élite Romans developed to work within the constraints. Only when unforeseen factors weakened the state's power to self-regulate could the built city flourish and, in doing so, further diminish the state. Many of these factors — such as increased wealth in the second century and the first-century preponderance of special commands — are known; to these, this article argues, should be added the development of concrete.

中文翻译：

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共和党的困境：城市还是州？或者，重新审视混凝土革命

希腊历史学家波利比乌斯在公元前二世纪中叶的一篇著名文章中将罗马作为共和国的成功归功于其组成要素、军队、元老院和人民之间的完美权力平衡（历史6.11); 确实，共和国的长期存在是一项值得解释的成就。另一方面，一个多世纪后，李维指出，与东地中海宏伟的皇家城市相比，共和罗马以其漫无边际的街道规划和杂乱无章的建筑而处于不利地位。他将此归结为在公元前 390 年左右的高卢大火之后仓促重建。现在很少有学者接受他的解释。少数学者争论潜在的基本原理，通常是在将早期城市设置为奥古斯都和随后皇帝的转变的陪衬时，他们的结论倾向于将城市的设计描述为地方官员年度更替的意外推论。本文同样主张政府在城市面貌中的作用；但它认为共和党的都市主义状态是经过深思熟虑的。作为对两位古代作者的观察的某种回应，它解决了为了保护公共资源而确保共和国组成部分之一的元老院平衡的规定如何为城市的建筑演变付出了重大代价. 这些规定采取了故意限制（时间和金钱）的形式，以防止精英罗马人建造地中海君主，从而将自己展示为地中海君主。它以宽泛的年代笔触描绘了理想状态下的罗马共和国与实体城市之间的紧张关系，探索了精英罗马人为在约束范围内工作而制定的策略。只有当不可预见的因素削弱了国家' 自我调节的力量可以使建成的城市蓬勃发展，并在此过程中进一步削弱国家。其中许多因素——例如第二世纪财富的增加和第一世纪特别命令的优势——是众所周知的。本文认为，除此之外，还应添加具体的发展。