This is an excellent book for anyone interested in the politics and goverenment of the late Roman republic. It is well written. Millar has done an outstanding job. I strongly recommend it.

I think this well-written and engaging book is a major contribution to our understanding of the disturbing and continuing decline in political participation in the world's industrial democracies. A key factor explaining that trend, Milner argues, is the decline in civic literacy - the knowledge and skills individuals need to make sense of their political world and to act as competent citizens. Milner proposes his civic literacy theory as a superior alternative to the social capital theory advanced by Robert Putnam and others. If social capital does not translate into higher levels of civic literacy, Milner contends, it will not motivate and empower citizens to participate in politics. Civic literacy is key. To test his theory, Milner draws upon extensive political research on the U.S., Canada, western Europe, Australia and New Zealand. He measures and compares levels of national civic literacy. He demonstrates the positive linkage between civic literacy and various forms of political participation (including voting). He documents the increasingly negative impact of TV and other media on the quality of civic education. He also shows how political institutions (particularly party systems and electoral rules) can promote or retard the development of civic literacy. He concludes his fine book by exploring the direct and indirect effects of civic literacy on economic performance and social justice in many nations. As a political scientist and an educator, I was particularly inspired by Milner's call for educational and electoral reforms as a means to promote civic literacy, mobilize participation, and improve our democracy.

This book is a thorough analysis of the cultural, social, economic and military history of the Roman Near East from Actium to the victory of Constantine. This includes Cappadocia, Syria, Palestine (Judea), Arabia, and Mesopotamia. Egypt and Anatolia are not covered. The first part is a chronological history of the region. The second part is a survey of every region. The main point of the study is to analyze whether there was a sense of community among the Semitic, Aramaic-speaking peoples of the Near East, shared with Semitic peoples outside the Empire, or whether they felt purely Roman and/or Greek.

This is all very interesting stuff, and probably the state of the art of Roman history in the Near East. Unfortunately, the author is always questioning theories and making tentative assumptions, comparing half-erased archaelogical inscriptions with coins found in the middle of nowhere. This is a very rigorous scientific process (particularly since we know so little about this period), probably very useful for the professional scholar, but boring for the casual reader like me. This is not helped by the use of long chapters where different topics are discussed in succession without clear transitions. I was so bored I did not finish the book.

Millar describes the subject of his book as a threefold analysis, covering geography, chronology and linguistics. One of the major themes of the book is the treatment of data that lends insight into the mutual relations of the Roman government, the settled population and the peoples of the steppe-skenitai (tent-dwellers), nomads, Arabs (Saraceni).

Roman military occupation did not correspond to any definite geographical boundaries due to the vast desert steppes that define the Limes Arabicus. Millar states that one of the primary factors fueling scholarly inquiry into this particular period from the mid-first century BC to the mid-fourth century AD is that, from the point of view of Roman imperial history, the step-by-step advancement of Roman direct control demonstrates that, in the Near East at least, Roman imperialism and expansionism was very much alive contrary to the opposing opinions of some.

It also deals with the period that saw the rise of the "epigraphic habit" (inscriptions and record keeping) as expressed in the Near East, for it reveals a lot about political and communal structures at this time. He deals with politics and ethnicity, i.e. what political formations were present in this precarious desert frontier and how did people identify themselves? Millar defines the "Near East," according to the subject matter of his book, as the region of the Roman Empire where Greek (not Latin) co-existed with the family of Semitic languages.

How far was the settled Roman frontier open to nomadic groups? How far did the inhabitants of a settled region share customs and culture (especially religious beliefs) with the Arab tribes of the marginal zone? These are the questions one is confronted with when studying the subject of the eastern frontier, and Millar treats it thoroughly and comprehensively.

This book is valuable to serious historical investigators in search of scholarly research pertaining to this precarious region. Other important books to consider are: Roman Arabia by G.W. Bowersock, Hellenistic Civilization and the Jews by Victor Tcherikover, and Limits of Empire: The Roman Army in the East by Benjamin Isaacs.