Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is fascinated by Augustus Caesar

Augustus
brought about peace — but it came at a high
cost.
Drew Angerer / Getty Images,
Till Niermann / Wikimedia Commons

• Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is an
  ancient history buff.
• He recently discussed his fascination with the Roman
  emperor Augustus in a New Yorker profile.
• Zuckerberg’s interest in the ancient historical figure
  shouldn’t come as a surprise — the two share some interesting
  traits.
• The Facebook CEO’s professed interest raises a few
  questions about how he feels about trade-offs. 

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is a history
buff at heart.

In a recent New Yorker profile, the tech
mogul revealed that his fascination with the ancient Roman
emperor Augustus even figured into his 2012 honeymoon in Rome.

“My wife was making fun of me, saying she thought there were
three people on the honeymoon: me, her, and Augustus,” Zuckerberg
told the New Yorker. “All the photos were different sculptures of
Augustus.”

Zuckerberg’s enthusiasm for classical history reportedly dates
back to his time at Phillips Exeter Academy, where he studied
Latin and immersed himself in learning about the civilization’s
“good and bad and complex figures.”

On his fascination with Augustus, Zuckerberg
said, “Basically, through a really harsh approach, he
established two hundred years of world peace. What are the
trade-offs in that? On the one hand, world peace is a long-term
goal that people talk about today. Two hundred years feels
unattainable.”

Zuckerberg’s deep interest in another young upstart who disrupted
— and connected — the world like never before doesn’t come as a
surprise. But it might raise some questions about how far the CEO
is willing to go in order to achieve Facebook’s mission to
“bring the world closer
together.”

Because, as Facebook’s controversial role in the 2016 US election demonstrated, whether
you’re uniting the world through conquest or clicks, everything
comes at a price.

Augustus’ triumph came at the cost of the Roman Republic

Before Augustus was declared the first citizen of Rome or the son
of the divine or a god among men, he was just a teenager named
Octavian.

Granted, he was the adopted son of the powerful dictator Julius
Caesar. But he wasn’t the only power player on the block in the
bloody political circus that followed his adopted dad’s
assassination.

The young man fared well, however. He accrued power and
successfully waged war against the assassins, and, eventually,
his early allies, like Mark Anthony.

Octavian’s victory in the 31 BCE Battle of Actium sank the hopes
of Mark Anthony, Cleopatra, and their supporters — the power
couple committed suicide shortly after the loss. And so the path
was cleared for Octavian — who eventually took on the honorific
“Augustus” — to become the sole ruler of Rome.

Let’s be clear — Augustus didn’t single-handedly murder the Roman
Republic. Nor was the Republic some sort of perfect, equitable
utopia. The entire system was falling apart long before Augustus
came onto the scene. And the republican facade endured during his
reign.

But his rule marked the death knell of the Republic and the dawn
of the Roman Empire.

The Pax Romana wasn’t entirely peaceful, either

Augustus gets a ton of credit for the Pax Romana — or “Roman
peace.”

And, sure, his reign did kick off a period of relative calm that
stretched from the beginning of his rule in 27 BCE all the way
into the reign of his five successors, the Five Good Emperors.

Before his time, the Roman Republic had been roiled by a number
of civil wars: Rome faced down its various Italian allies during
the Social War; generals Marius and Sulla wrestled for control;
Julius Caesar squared off against his rival Pompey. And, of
course, Augustus himself seized power through violence, and
snuffed out his rivals along the way.

But it’s inaccurate to think of the Roman Empire during the
subsequent Pax Romana as as war-free zone.

In “Rome’s Fall and After,”
historian Walter Goffart writes, “The volume of the Cambridge
Ancient History for the years A.D. 70–192 is called ‘The Imperial
Peace,’ but peace is not what one finds in its pages.”

There were revolts in Judea, Mauretania, and Illyricum during
Augustus’ reign, alone. He also annexed Egypt and northern Spain
during his stint as emperor.

Reflecting on the darker side of Augustus’ rise to power

Comparatively, it’s fair to say the Pax Romana did represent a
time of peace for Rome. But, as historian Arnaldo Momigliano
wrote in the Journal of the
Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, “Pax Romana is a simple formula
for propaganda, but a difficult subject for research.”

What’s more, there was a dark side to the Roman Empire’s very
definition of peace. Ancient Romans didn’t think of peace as some
sort of tranquil kumbaya-fest between nations. According to
Momigliano, they conceived of peace more as a state in which all
of Rome’s rivals had been vanquished.

In the New Yorker interview, Zuckerberg rightfully concluded that
the Pax Romana “didn’t come for free” and vaguely acknowledged
that Augustus “had to do certain things” in order to secure the
peace.

Today, people around the world are beginning to question the
impact that tech giants like Facebook are
having on democratic societies. That’s not to say that Zuckerberg
is a calculating ancient despot like Augustus. But social media
platforms are having a real impact on the political realm.

Heck, the title of the New Yorker profile in which he’s quoted
is “Can Mark Zuckerberg Fix Facebook Before It Breaks Democracy?”