The Roman Empire and the Grain Fleets:

The application of contemporary public sector management concepts and theories allows us to rethink some of our perceptions of the Roman Empire’s rôle as a service provider and the way in which the provision of services was made more efficient. This paper uses the imperial grain supply as a case in point to demonstrate that contracting out allowed the state to take advantage and build on its core competencies, whilst at the same time leveraging the core competencies of the service providers; in this case, the owners of merchant ships. Furthermore, the contracting régime undertaken by the Empire served to increase the transport capacity of the state by means of the establishment of regularised control mechanisms.