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Rome got much (most?) of their grain from Egypt (which renews fertility due to annual flooding) and the cause of the Mayan collapse is unknown but I highly doubt it was primarily scarcity driven.

Societies collapse from social factors, not just resource scarcity and social factors are in my opinion a more common cause. War, internal conflict, and political instability.

And my favorite theory, the rise of parasitic and short sighted bureaucracies which snuff out the creative and competitive impulse of a culture.



That link appears to disagree with you regarding the Mayans and even points out that ecological issues can fuel and exacerbate social, political, and cultural problems. Of course these things are multifaceted but it seems obvious that a multidimensional domino effect can occur when kick started by ecological issues. Look at what happened with COVID. Gun and ammunition purchases were off the charts, increases of homicidal crime, civil unrest, unemployment, etc. Such a "simple" thing as a virus destabilized society in multiple ways. Just imagine if it was food and resource scarcity.




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