DEBT + DOLLAR + DELUSION + DEPLETION = DECLINE
Every previous Fourth Turning in U.S. history was triggered by an economic conflict or devastating financial event. The current Fourth Turning was activated by the collapse of our housing market, the subsequent revelations of Wall Street fraud and excessive risk taking and the actions of politicians to protect Wall Street from their hubristic exploits. The choices by leaders after these triggers will have a dramatic impact on the future course of the Crisis. George Washington decided to fight and stayed on the battlefield for eight years before succeeding. Abraham Lincoln could have let the South secede. He decided to fight in order to retain the Union. The result was 600,000 dead and abolition of slavery. Franklin Delano Roosevelt decided to implement massive social welfare programs to keep Americans employed. These programs planted the seed for our current Crisis. He also committed 16 million American men in World War II, with 450,000 dying for their country and another 670,000 wounded. All previous Fourth Turnings began as financial episodes and eventually led to total wars of destruction. There is nothing about this current Crisis that would lead me to an alternative picture of our future.
I could propose a number of logical Crisis scenarios based on the facts at hand, but the truth is that no one knows how the next fifteen years will play out. We do know there will be much upheaval, worldly peril, and cataclysmic changes to the exiting institutional and social order. I believe the financial crisis will transform into a Depression as the layers of new debt piled upon the old debt ultimately collapse our economic system. It could be a deflationary collapse or an inflationary collapse. Both scenarios would lead to further destruction of the middle class. When the U.S. dollar is no longer viewed as the reserve currency for the world, America's worldwide influence will wane. How global economic rivals like China, Russia, and the Middle East react to our economic and social weakness will determine the next phase of the Crisis. When countries are experiencing severe domestic problems, they seek out or invent a foreign threat. The likely flashpoint which could lead to foreign conflict would be a terrorist attack on U.S. territory and/or a clash over depleting worldwide oil supplies. Strauss & Howe explain the nature of Fourth Turnings:
"The "spirit of America' comes once a saeculum, only through what the ancients called ekpyrosis, nature's fiery moment of death and discontinuity. History's periodic eras of Crisis combust the old social order and give birth to a new. A Fourth Turning is a solstice era of maximum darkness, in which the supply of social order is still falling--but the demand for order is now rising. It is the saeculum's hibernal, its time of trial. Nature exacts its fatal payment and pitilessly sorts out the survivors and the doomed. Pleasures recede, tempests hurt, pretense is exposed, and toughness rewarded--all in a season."
Personally, I have grave apprehensions about the coming years. As a libertarian minded person I will not be happy, as it is highly unlikely that government will willingly get smaller. The last two Crisis periods resulted in a much more powerful Federal government. It is difficult for me to conceptualize how the country will come out the other side of this Crisis as a stronger society. The likelihood of the citizens rallying around the flag and following a Boomer Prophet into a world war seems farfetched to me. I fear the angry have-nots are more likely to rise up against the ruling elite, with potential dire consequences as the military may have to choose sides. My principal fear is that Crisis periods always rely on the Hero generation to make the greatest sacrifices. An entire generation of Heroes was wiped out in four years during the Civil War. A million Heroes were either killed or wounded in World War II. My three sons are all part of the Hero generation. I'm not prepared to sacrifice them for a cause that I do not believe in or agree with. The Boomer generation has been discredited in my eyes. Following a Boomer leader into battle seems out of the question today.
My guess on the end result of this Crisis is that Americans will need to localize. Reduced fuel availability will force people to depend on their neighbors and locally produced food. Forging closer relationships with family and neighbors will stand you in good stead during the remainder of this crisis. This Fourth Turning has only just begun. Strauss & Howe do not predict the outcome, only the challenges that await us and the hope that we will rise to the occasion.
Thus might the next Fourth Turning end in apocalypse or glory. The nation could be ruined, its democracy destroyed, and millions of people scattered or killed. Or America could enter a new golden age, triumphantly applying shared values to improve the human condition. The rhythms of history do not reveal the outcome of the coming Crisis; all they suggest is the timing and dimension.
A Fourth Turning harnesses the seasons of life to bring about a renewal in the seasons of time. In so doing, it provides passage through the great discontinuities of history and closes the full circle of the saeculum. The Fourth Turning is when the Spirit of America reappears, rousing courage and fortitude from the people. History is seasonal, but its outcomes are not foreordained. Much will depend on how tall we stand in the trials to come.
Strauss & Howe The Fourth Turning
Will America in 2025 look anything like the America of today? Will the country resemble a dictatorship? Will it resemble socialist Europe? Will it break apart into regions? Will it reaffirm its roots as a Constitutional Republic? Or, will it no longer exist? The choice is ours.
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