Fall of Venice: Corruption
by The corruption case in Venice during the 13th century which led to its downfall.
During the 13th century, Venice faced with corruption in the government system. The Venetian government suspended the salaries of civil servants due to the large amount of money needed to finance the cost of wars with the ottomans and neighboring states. Some members of nobility thus lost their source of income, causing a division in nobility class as some nobles become poorer. Many poor nobles were willing to sell their votes at a high price; hence leadership was now determined by how much the nobles could afford to pay to be elected.
As a result, rich incapable leaders could also become elected to be a member of the government. This led to incapability of Venice government to make decisions that would benefit Venice. Many decisions were made to serve nobility’s interests instead. This eventually led to the fall of Venice.
One external challenge faced by Venice is the need to protect its territories and commercial interests. To achieve this, Venice took advantage of the rivalry among mainland states where Venice tried to achieve balance of power by act of switching alliances. However, this act of switching alliances proved that Venice was treading on fragile relations with larger states that could come under attack should negotiations fail. Venice’s security was compromised and many enemies were made which caused Venice to be at a high risk.
Also, to deal with this challenge, Venice had to recruit mercenaries to fight its war. The mercenaries were soldiers employed to fight in war and would work for anyone willing to pay for their services. Hence there was a lack of loyalty to Venice in its army. The lack of strong army as well as poor relations wit other countries led to the eventual fall of Venice.
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