Applying this approach to Roman Republican imperialism allows us to analyse the broader systemic factors behind the growth of Roman power. The paper will present two illustrative case studies. First, it will explore how Network Analysis can explain the long recognised, drastically different character of Roman territorial expansion within peninsular Italy down to 264 BCE, compared to Rome’s overseas campaigns after that date, by identifying two structurally-different types of networks at play in each of these distinct arenas. Second, it will discuss Cato the Elder’s (in)famous display of Carthaginian figs in the Roman Senate, arguing that the effectiveness of Cato’s gesture was facilitated by the reduction, in the decades between the Hannibalic War and the early-140s BCE, of the network distance between Rome and Carthage, separate from any escalation of the Punic military threat to the Roman Republic.