Old habits die hard: Samnites, Rome, and the perception of international relations in Republican Italy, c. 350–200 BC

Abstract

This article discusses how International Relations theory can contribute to our understanding of Roman hegemony, by examining Samnite responses to the early Roman expansion in view of Jervis’s concept of misperception in international politics. While Rome was arguably the hegemonic power in Italy by 272 BC, Samnite polities continued treating Rome as just another player, not as an overwhelming game-changer, until the Hannibalic war. This apparent gap between perceived and de facto international order may be understood in view of the Samnites’ potential misperception of the international environment, since they continued behaving as if they were still independent players in an international anarchy. These conclusions affect how we conceptualize the Roman conquest.