Peter Turchin is doing a round of interviews to promote his new book, and this morning he appeared in the Financial Times (FT).
His book looks at the cyclical structures of societal breakdown. A theory that led him to predict in 2010 the instability we are seeing in Europe and the US since 2020.
The interesting note he makes in the article is the current state of US elite power.
Having failed to turn off the "wealth pump" of the rich (i.e. unfettered neoliberalism), those at the bottom are unhappy. Meanwhile we have also seen an expansion of the wealthy and overeducated fighting over limited power. A process we can see in then nation’s ruling classes’ assault on the "Counter-elite" figure of Trump.
The latter for Turchin is critical, because in 85-90% of cases of “intra-elite infighting” the outcome is the collapse of the state. Whether that is due to “civil war, revolution, territorial breakup or foreign invasion”.
At the moment, to me, it looks like civil war is the most likely to happen first, with some kind of combination of the rest to follow.
Though what kind of timescale we are talking about is beyond me.
Links:
- https://www.youtube.com/embed/gLiN2fcXUGA?t=141 (10 minute audio book preview)
- https://www.youtube.com/embed/C7rLZejDznI (Novara Media interview 2023)
- https://www.youtube.com/embed/PXXj23UL8zk?t=108 (King's College lecture 2023)