Prestige Society in Sparta and USSR -- Mimetic Theory and Literary Study

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Date Posted: 20:35:59 04/06/08 Sun
Author: JPJ II
Subject: Prestige Society in Sparta and USSR

Plutarch writes that "the Spartan law-giver Lycurgas seems to have introduced a spirit of ambition and contention into the country's constitution as an incitement to virtue: evidently, he was anxious that good citizens should always be conscious of differences and of an element of rivalry between each other..." Though Spartan society was itself predicated upon an intense sameness between members of the Spartiate class, this sameness naturally went hand in hand with a kind of acute consciousness of difference. Spartans constantly battle each other in competitions for athletic prestige, attempt daring feats in battle to gain military prestige, and do anything else that sets them as different from their sameness-peers. Its almost like the intensely competitive nature of Soviet Russia and Natzi Germany. Both of these societies were also founded upon extreme sameness coupled with extreme competetiveness. Perhaps the competitive nature of these societies allowed them to survive, at least for a time and all external influences aside, despite the total sameness that could eventually lead only to violence.

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