Homogeneous citizenries resist tyranny better than divergent ones

Evidence

In calling the Sicilian cities “filled with motley masses,” Alcibiades wished to characterize them as an easy prey for the conqueror. And, in fact, a homogeneous citizenry offers a more successful resistance to tyranny than a citizenry composed of highly divergent and hence unconnected elements. The leveling most welcome to despotism, therefore, is that of differences in rank, not in character. — Georg Simmel, The Sociology of Georg Simmel, 5220

Categorization

• DEFINE: Simmel distinguishes leveling of rank from leveling of character — only the former aids despotism.
• CANDY: Counterintuitive: the ‘motley masses’ are actually weaker against a conqueror than a uniform citizenry — good cocktail-party rethink of what makes a population conquerable.
• XREF: Reverses a common intuition; connects to debates about ethnic/class heterogeneity and social cohesion (e.g., Putnam-type findings on diversity and trust).