"Twisted Transfers": Discursive Constructions of Corruption in Ancient Greece and Rome

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Filippo Carlà-Uhink
• Subject Area: Ancient History
• Term: from 2019 to 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 428918466

• Final Report Year: 2024

Final Report Abstract

The project has investigated in 11 subprojects the discursive construction of corruption from classical Greece to late Antiquity. The main focus resided in studying how corruption is shaped in ancient sources as a form of deviance situated in the specific field of transfers, and on how accusations of corruption are deployed for Othering and Character Assassination. The project, which also consisted of intensive cooperations with other disciplines within Humanities and Social Sciences, as well as intense communication outside academia within various outreach and impact initiatives, has shown that corruption, when considered as discourse had in Antiquity (and not only in Antiquity) a stabilizing function, as the description of deviance and the performance of anti-corruption measures reinforced the existing norms and the dominant social and political order. As originally planned, part of the project was the organisation of an international conference in London; additionally, two further international conferences have been co-organized by the conferences’ PIs. The project also generated a publication series for de Gruyter.

Publications

• Domum pestilentem vendo: Real Estate Market and Information Asymmetry in the Roman World. Palgrave Studies in Ancient Economies, 117-134. Springer International Publishing.
  Rosillo-López, Cristina
  
• Managing Information in the Roman Economy: Introduction. Palgrave Studies in Ancient Economies, 3-20. Springer International Publishing.
  García Morcillo, Marta & Rosillo-López, Cristina
  
• Managing Uncertainty and Asymmetric Information in Roman Auctions. Palgrave Studies in Ancient Economies, 61-88. Springer International Publishing.
  García Morcillo, Marta
  
• Das „öffentliche Vertrauen“ als Rahmenbedingung des wirtschaftlichen Handelns: das Beispiel Rom, in P. Reinard – C. Rollinger (Hg.), Cum magna fide? Vertrauen und die antike Wirtschaft / Trust and the Ancient Economy, Gutenberg 2023, 117- 148
  F. Carlà-Uhink
  
• Sacred Gifts, Profane Uses? Transfers and the Roman Religious Sphere. The Economy of Roman Religion, 245-266. Oxford University PressOxford.
  García Morcillo, Marta
  
• Corruption and the Public Sphere in Late Republican Rome. Cultural History, 13(1), 12-28.
  Engel, Niklas
  
• Discursive Constructions of Corruption in Ancient Rome: Introduction. Cultural History, 13(1), 1-11.
  Carlà-Uhink, Filippo & García Morcillo, Marta
  
• Financial Wealth, Value and Moral Corruption in Seneca's Economic Thinking. Cultural History, 13(1), 71-93.
  García Morcillo, Marta
  
• Problemas y desafíos de la investigación histórica sobre la corrupción. La República romana. EUNOMÍA. Revista en Cultura de la Legalidad(26), 146-164.
  Carlà-Uhink, Filippo & García Morcillo, Marta
  
• ‘He had thoughtlessly accepted certain gifts’: Corruption and Normative Behaviour for Roman Magistrates. Cultural History, 13(1), 52-70.
  Carlà-Uhink, Filippo