"Bread and Circuses" (or bread and games) (from Latin: panem et circenses) is a metaphor for a superficial means of appeasement. It was the basic Roman formula for the well-being of the population, and hence a political strategy unto itself. In the case of politics, the phrase is used to describe the creation of public approval, not through exemplary or excellent public service or public policy, but through diversion, distraction, and/or the mere satisfaction of the immediate, shallow requirements of a populace.[1][2][3] The phrase also implies the erosion or ignorance of civic duty amongst the concerns of the common man (l'homme moyen sensuel).
In modern usage, the phrase has also become an adjective to describe a populace that no longer values civic virtues and the public life. Or as famous American author Robert Heinlein said, "Once the monkeys learn they can vote themselves bananas, they'll never climb another tree." To many across the political spectrum, left and right, it connotes a supposed triviality and frivolity that characterized the Roman Republic prior to its decline into the autocratic monarchy characteristic of the later Roman Empire's transformation about 44 BCE.
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This phrase originates from Rome in Satire X of the Roman satirist and poet Juvenal (circa 100 AD ). In context, the Latin metaphore panem et circenses (bread and circuses) identifies the only remaining cares of a new Roman populace which cares not for its historical birthright of political involvement. Here Juvenal displays his contempt for the declining heroism of his contemporary Romans.[4] Roman politicians devised a plan in 140 B.C. to win the votes of these new citizens: giving out cheap food and entertainment, "bread and circuses", would be the most effective way to rise to power.
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… Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses[5] |
[...] iam pridem, ex quo suffragia nulli / uendimus, effudit curas; nam qui dabat olim / imperium, fasces, legiones, omnia, nunc se / continet atque duas tantum res anxius optat, / panem et circenses. [...]
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Juvenal here makes reference to the Roman practice of providing free wheat to Roman citizens as well as costly circus games and other forms of entertainment as a means of gaining political power. The Annona (grain dole) was begun under the instigation of the popularis politician Gaius Sempronius Gracchus in 123 BC; it remained an object of political contention until it was taken under the control of the autocratic Roman emperors.
Indeed, Spanish intellectuals between the 19th and 20th centuries complained about the similar pan y toros ("bread and bullfights"). It appears similarly in Russian as хлеба и зрелищ ("bread and spectacle").
The film Gladiator includes a scene where the crowds are showered with loaves of bread just as the gladiators enter the ring.
Aldous Huxley used the phrase in Brave New World Revisited as an example of one of the ideas he used as a theme in Brave New World.
Suzanne Collins also used it in her trilogy The Hunger Games as the name of the nation where the characters lived. This is also a reference to the plot of the book, in which the government keeps the general populace of the Capitol City from knowing the slave-like lives of the citizens throughout the country by keeping them content with a once-yearly fight to the death on live television.
Jeffrey Eugenides used the phrase in The Marriage Plot in the line her behavior that night had been the erotic equivalent of bread and circus, with just the circus. Implying a pandering to the lowest denominator, and insufficient at that.