"'Pompeii had a fair and effective form of government' Discuss"

The government could also be seen as effective as there was evidence of several offices discovered inside the Curia and Basilica so jobs in government must have been seen as important in Pompeian society. The government in Pompeii may have also been fair as everyone with a position in government had been chosen by the general public. The ‘duovirs’ were in charge of the everyday running of the city and shared power so that all important decisions were made collectively. They also managed the public funds, made legal decisions and oversaw the meetings of the town council. The ‘aediles’ were in charge of road maintenance, organising public games, upkeep of public temples and supervision of the markets. The town council was made up of 100 members (decurions) and were responsible for public contracts, religious rituals, entertainment, ensuring order and the supervision of local tax collection. As the roles were shared amongst many people the workload was divided so the government worked more effectively in the running of Pompeii.

However, even though all governmental positions were chosen through voting at in Comitium, only free men were actually allowed to vote which shows the Pompeian government to be unfair. Furthermore, only wealthy men were able to stand for election as to earn the peoples votes, you had to win them. Many men standing for election would hold public entertainment events for free for advertisement purposes. Often friends of the candidate who worked in a guild would graffiti messages on the sides of their work buildings with words supporting their friend and encouraging others to vote for their candidacy.

Overall I think that the Pompeian government was a very effective organisation due to its ability to recover after such a huge earthquake in 62AD but was unfair in its selection of government officials, favouring only those who were male with high status and money. This meant that the public interests would have played very little part in the selection of candidates as most people simply voted for who had provided the best free public entertainment and had the greatest amount of graffiti praising them. Votes would also have come down to which candidate had the most friends to vote for them so the system for the selection of people for government roles would have been very biased and unfair.