Dear Rick,

Originally Posted by Finch

> "Exponentially"? How many years to double? That word, I do not
> think it means what you think it means.

Doubling time appears to be about 2-3 years, based on news stories
I've seen about mass riots in China over the last 10+ years.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Dear Nathaniel,

• The top strip of countries ("white Africa") seem to have had
  their crisis wars after WW II, so they're mostly in Unraveling
  eras.
  
• The next strip of countries (the top of "black Africa") seem to
  have participated in WW II, so they're mostly in crisis eras. Sudan
  is, of course, is in a crisis era past the regeneracy, and Somalia is
  very close.
  
• Southern Africa, from the Congo on down, had their crisis wars in
  the 60s or later, so they're in awakening eras. However, Rwanda had
  its crisis war in 1994, so it's in 1T. This cycle was generated by
  the Mfecane of the early 1800s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Congo_War

Dear Matt,

Originally Posted by MichaelEaston

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Congo_War

So have you taken a closer look and come up with a better breakdown of
the southern half of Africa?

John

I have put up a slightly different map, in both bitmap and GIF format (the GIF format looks checkered, for some reason), that is slightly more careful (there are countries like Egypt, Morocco, Croatia, and Libya that I have put back in the blank due to confusion). So more clarification and talk is needed about some countries.

Several European countries near the Balkans are blank (Croatia included). Are these on the Kosovo timeline (i.e. now in 1T) or the WWI/WWII timeline (i.e. now in 4T)? Central and much of Southeast Asia remains unsure. Most of Africa and Latin America are still unsure too.

Long process. But I'm still very interested in learning. I await Matt's response about southern Africa. BTW, yesterday's Somalia vs. Ethiopia article on GD made me put Somalia and Cote d'Ivoire in red. Ethiopia I haven't colored yet.

I just colored in all the Balkans blue -- Albania, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia/Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, and Macedonia. Everything else is the same. Thus all of Europe is now colored, all of it red except for these countries. Please tell me if you think this information is wrong; if I should re-color one of the European countries.

Originally Posted by 1990

I have put up a slightly different map, in both bitmap and GIF format (the GIF format looks checkered, for some reason), that is slightly more careful (there are countries like Egypt, Morocco, Croatia, and Libya that I have put back in the blank due to confusion). So more clarification and talk is needed about some countries.

Several European countries near the Balkans are blank (Croatia included). Are these on the Kosovo timeline (i.e. now in 1T) or the WWI/WWII timeline (i.e. now in 4T)? Central and much of Southeast Asia remains unsure. Most of Africa and Latin America are still unsure too.

Long process. But I'm still very interested in learning. I await Matt's response about southern Africa. BTW, yesterday's Somalia vs. Ethiopia article on GD made me put Somalia and Cote d'Ivoire in red. Ethiopia I haven't colored yet.

Egypt and Morocco are 4T, in the sense that they are in a generational crisis era. They had their crisis wars in the 1920's. I believe Libya is on the World War II timeline. Tunisia is less certain, but I'm leaning towards it being part of Libya's timeline rather than Algeria's (War of Independence, End 1962), just because of its strategic importance in World War Two.

As for the rest of Africa, I am looking into the past 200 years or so to try and get a feel for their timelines.

I just colored in all the Balkans blue -- Albania, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia/Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, and Macedonia. Everything else is the same. Thus all of Europe is now colored, all of it red except for these countries. Please tell me if you think this information is wrong; if I should re-color one of the European countries.

No, I'd agree with all of that. Where can I see the new map?

Originally Posted by MichaelEaston

No, I'd agree with all of that. Where can I see the new map?

http://generationaldynamics.com/gdgr...20improved.GIF

Originally Posted by MichaelEaston

Egypt and Morocco are 4T, in the sense that they are in a generational crisis era. They had their crisis wars in the 1920's. I believe Libya is on the World War II timeline. Tunisia is less certain, but I'm leaning towards it being part of Libya's timeline rather than Algeria's (War of Independence, End 1962), just because of its strategic importance in World War Two.

As for the rest of Africa, I am looking into the past 200 years or so to try and get a feel for their timelines.

So then, you see Algeria as isolated in northern Africa as the only 3T country, surrounded by 4Tness?

Phases of a crisis war

Many crisis wars appear to go through phases that are roughly
equivalent to the generational eras that the whole society goes
through.

I'm giving the phases of a crisis war the same names as the
generational eras because I can't think of any better names, and
because each of the war phases tends to occur in the corresponding
era, though that's probably not always the case.

Here's a summary of the phases of a crisis war:

• Awakening phase - the beginning of low-level violence, possibly a
  non-crisis civil war. This can last several decades.
  
  Examples: Palestine/Israel: 1989 intifada. Sudan: First Darfur War,
  1987. Sri Lanka: Tamil Tigers and terrorism, 1976. Iraq insurgency:
  2005. Chechnya: War with Russia, 1994. China 1990s: Begin regional
  rebellions. Haiti: Riots, 1994. Mexico: Early 2000s, drug wars on
  border.
  
• Unraveling phase - Desperate attempts to avoid war - "peace
  process" - peace treaties.
  
  Examples: Palestine/Israel: 1994 Oslo peace treaty. Sudan: May 2006
  Darfur peace treaty. Sri Lanka: 2002 peace treaty.
  
• Shock events - these are sprinkled throughout all phases, but
  they don't cause panic until the Artists have disappeared.
  
  Examples: Palestine/Israel: 2006 capture of Israeli soldier. Sudan:
  Feb 26, 2003, rebel attack on police station in Darfur.
  
• Regeneracy -- A shock event that transitions the war from
  unraveling to full-scale crisis.
  
  Example: Sudan: The Feb 26, 2003, attack caused the regeneracy for
  the Darfur war.
  
• Crisis - Genocidal phase - value of a human life is close to
  zero, as survival of the nation becomes controlling factor in all
  decision.
  
• Climax - The crisis war reaches an explosive climax at
  some point. When the dust clears, the new cycle begins.
  
  Examples: WW II: Nuclear weapons; American civil war: Sherman's march.
  Lebanon civil war: Massacre at Sabra and Shatila. War of the Spanish
  Succession: Battle of Malplaquet.

Using this outline, it's possible to "calibrate" crisis wars, such as
those in Darfur, Sri Lanka, Palestine/Israel, in order to determine
what phase they're in, and when they're likely to move on to the next
phase.

There's an obvious question: Does all this have to happen? Once
low-level violence begins, is a full-scale civil war evitable decades
later in the crisis era?

For the answer to that question, we turn to Polya's Urn.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Pólya's Urn and Kismet

Throughout generational studies, the question of inevitability or
"destiny" or "kismet" always comes up: If A and B have a crisis war,
are they destined to repeat that crisis war in every cycle from then
on?

This kind of question pops up all over the place. Why was there no
American civil war II? Why did England and France sometimes fight
with one another, and sometimes not? Why are we not close to war
again with Japan?

Polya's Urn is a mathematical model that's sometimes used in social
sciences to explain (or model) why groups sometimes act in certain
ways, and sometimes others.

Polya's Urn starts out with one red ball and one green ball.

(In more complex situations, there may be more than one ball of each
color, or they may be more than two colors.)



A "move" consists of removing one ball at random, and then replacing
it with two balls of the same color. When the Urn contains 1000
balls, the game stops.

Example. Suppose the urn starts out with one ball of each
color. Suppose the first move selects a green ball and replaces it
with two green balls. At that point, the urn contains two green
balls and one red ball. On the next move, there is a 67% chance that
the ball selected will be green, and each time a green ball is
selected, the probability of a green ball on the next turn is even
higher.

Thus, if a green ball is chosen on the first move, then there may
quickly be so many green balls that a red ball is rarely selected.
Thus, the color of the ball selected on the FIRST move may well
determine the final outcome when the ball contains 1000 balls.

The analogy is that the "destiny" of two countries after a crisis war
may be determined by the first few acts that each side performs.

For example, after the Japanese surrender, we proceeded to provide
aid and help to the Japanese, much to their surprise. This was a lot
of "green balls," right at the beginning.

Suppose, instead, that a few renegade American soldiers had conducted
hate crimes and acts of terrorism. Or suppose that a renegade
Japanese soldier had shot and killed General Douglas MacArthur. Those
would have been "red balls," and they may have multiplied, and we
might be close to another war with Japan right now.

So Polya's Urn doesn't help you predict what's going to happen in
sixty years, but it does provide a model that helps you understand
it, and what you can do about it.

For example, in the case of the renegade soldiers just given, you
have to find a way to toss a whole bunch of green balls into the urn
to offset the red balls that the renegade soldiers provided. That
might mean extra aid or money or whatever.

Here's another example: Some Chinese claim that North America would
be Chinese if a Chinese sailors had "discovered" America, rather than
a Europeans.

That may or may not be true. If a Chinese sailors had landed in
America first (one red ball), China would have had to follow up with
aggressive program of exploitation (more red balls), in the same way
that Portugal and other European countries exploited North America
(green balls). Without that, there would still have been a
preponderance of "green balls," and North America would still have
been mostly ethnically European.

Another example: Ever since Yasser Arafat died, there was a brief
period when the "peace process" seemed to be working, especially when
Mahmoud Abbas was elected Palestinian President. Since that time,
things have gotten worse almost every day.

On my web site I've been explaining this in terms of chaotic
"attractors" (from Chaos Theory). Day to day political events are
chaotic events that fall like snowflakes in random ways. But just as
millions of snowflakes get "attracted" to large snow drifts, millions
of individual political events get attracted to the impending Mideast
war, since war is a "chaotic attractor" at this time, 57 years after
the end of the 1940s genocidal war between Arabs and Jews.

The theoretical concept of "attractor" come true on a day to day
basis. It's been happening every since Yasser Arafat died, and has
evidently accelerated ever since Ariel Sharon became incapacitated.

Look at the day to day political events as they've occurred in the
last year and a half. Pick almost any day and look at the headlines
for that day, and you'll see that it most likely moves the Mideast in
the direction of war. There are a few exceptions of course, like the
period when Mahmoud Abbas was elected and took office, and hopes were
raised at that time.

But those brief intervals are like a heat wave in New York City in
November -- just because the weather gets warm for a few days doesn't
mean that winter isn't coming. Once the heat wave is over, the
weather starts getting much colder again. Similarly, there are brief
periods when things seem to get better, but they pass quickly, and
then political events move back towards war.

That what "attractor" means in Chaos Theory. It doesn't mean that
every political event brings the Mideast closer to war; it means that
political events float around in all directions, at random, but most
of them, not necessarily all of them, are attracted to Mideast war.

So now, another way of looking at this whole phenomenon is with
Polya's Urn. After many years, the Urn is filled with "red balls"
(political events that move the Mideast toward war), with few "green
balls" (political events that move the Mideast away from war, such as
the 1994 Oslo treaty, or the 2003 Mideast Roadmap to Peace). Today
there are so many red balls in the Urn that almost everything turns
out badly, and the region moves closely to war.

I began this essay with the question of destiny or "kismet," and the
question of inevitability of crisis wars. The answer appears to be
that if a new crisis war is to be avoided, then it requires a
tremendous effort immediately after the end of the old crisis war,
because the first few political events can determine what happens
decades later. Once the time of the new crisis war approaches, then
it's way too late.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

• Awakening phase - the beginning of low-level violence, possibly a
  non-crisis civil war. This can last several decades.
  
  Examples: Palestine/Israel: 1989 intifada.

• Unraveling phase - Desperate attempts to avoid war - "peace
  process" - peace treaties.
  
  Examples: Palestine/Israel: 1994 Oslo peace treaty.
• Shock events - these are sprinkled throughout all phases, but
  they don't cause panic until the Artists have disappeared.
  
  Examples: Palestine/Israel: 2006 capture of Israeli soldier. .
• Regeneracy -- A shock event that transitions the war from
  unraveling to full-scale crisis.
  
  Example: Sudan: The Feb 26, 2003, attack caused the regeneracy for
  the Darfur war.
• Crisis - Genocidal phase - value of a human life is close to
  zero, as survival of the nation becomes controlling factor in all
  decision.
• Climax - The crisis war reaches an explosive climax at
  some point. When the dust clears, the new cycle begins.
  
  

I take it that these events don't need to happen full turnings apart. In the case of Israel/Palestine, the 1989 Intifada was only five years before the 1994 Oslo Peace process, and only 17 years from the 2006 Israel/Hezbollah war.

By the way, I love your essay on the urn.

Interesting post, John. What struck me most about it was how similar Pólya's Urn is to the bottleneck effect occurring in random genetic drift.

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

The answer appears to be that if a new crisis war is to be avoided, then it requires a tremendous effort immediately after the end of the old crisis war, because the first few political events can determine what happens decades later. Once the time of the new crisis war approaches, then it's way too late.

So, obvious next question: what do you think are the "red balls" and "green balls" placed at the end of the last crisis war for the US?

John,

Execellent article. One of the dangers in trying to explain the saeculium to others is to explain that history has not made us automatons doomed to repeat the same crises every 80-100 years. To oversimplify things, it's sort of like how Forrest Gump discribes life as being both fate and free will happening at the same time. Yes, every generational allignment is inclined to behaive in a way that is more or less true to its turnings' historical archtype, but within the collective experence of its individuals treagedies can be avoided if we are willing to learn from the past.

Dear Nathaniel,

Originally Posted by 1990

> I have put up a slightly different map, in both bitmap and GIF
> format (the GIF format looks checkered, for some reason)

The reason for the checkered appearance is because of dithering.

There are 256 "browser-safe" colors that you can use, and these are
the same 256 colors generally used in GIF files. When you create a
bitmap, there are 16 million colors you can choose from. When you
convert to a GIF, the conversion software has to resolve the "wrong"
colors by choosing "nearby" browser-safe colors. In this case, the
conversion software uses a processing called "dithering." Each group
of pixels of the wrong color is replaced with a group of pixels of
"nearby" browser-safe colors, so that when you look at the graphic,
the human eye automatically merges the "nearby" colors so that it
appears to be the "wrong" color that you originally chose.

You performed two separate operations on your 2.8 megabyte bitmap
file, and those two operations together caused the checkered
appearancy. First, the software replaced the each of your 1427x628
pixels with pixels in the browser-safe pallette, using dithering.
Then when it resized the image to a smaller image, the dithered pixels
got rearranged, and sometimes the dark pixels were accidentally
grouped together and the light pixels were accidentally grouped
together. This can give the "checkered" appearance that you saw.

One way to avoid this problem is to do compression only by exactly 50%
or 25%. Usually these compressions will correctly compress the
dithered pixels. There are other percentages too, and it's worthwhile
to spend some time experimenting with this.

The easiest way to avoid all this is to stick to browser-safe colors.
Since I'm often faced with the same problem, I've put a "secret" page
on my web site that displays all the browser-safe colors that I can
refer to when I need it.
http://www.generationaldynamics.com/...=ww2010.colors

In your map, you've used grey and orange colors that are not browser
safe. For example, your grey color is (185, 185, 185), using an RGB
representation. If you replace it with a browser-safe grey, such as
(204, 204, 204), you'll get almost the same grey, but it won't be
dithered in a GIF file, and you won't get checkers when you compress
it.

Another thing to watch for is "anti-aliasing." Microsoft Paint
doesn't support anti-aliasing, but more advanced graphics programs
do. When you save your file, the software smooths the edges between
regions of different colors by inserting pixels of in-between colors.
Depending on the software you're using, this can once again introduce
dithering. That's why I almost always have the "anti-alias" option
turned off, unless I specifically want it for some reason. Other
people leave it on, since it gives the graphic a more pleasing
appearance.

If you're going to be doing a lot of graphics and you're in the mood
to splurge, amazon.com is selling the CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X3
Student & Teacher Edition for $80, which is the same software as the
non-student edition, but a lot cheaper.
http://www.amazon.com/CorelDRAW-Grap...0DT7ONE/sr=8-4

This package has a great deal of functionality, and it'll get you
through college. Some people complain that the user interface could
be easier, and those people can use Adobe Creative Suite for $1,200.
But most people will find the far less expensive Corel package works
fine.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Dear Jenny,

Originally Posted by The Wonkette

> I take it that these events don't need to happen full turnings
> apart. In the case of Israel/Palestine, the 1989 Intifada was only
> five years before the 1994 Oslo Peace process, and only 17 years
> from the 2006 Israel/Hezbollah war.

Yeah, you're right. I thought using the same names would be helpful,
but now I see that it's just confusing. So I need to think up new
names. If you have any ideas, let me know.

Originally Posted by The Wonkette

> By the way, I love your essay on the urn.

Yes, George Polya was an interesting person. He said, "Wishful
thinking is imagining good things you don't have...[It] may be bad as
too much salt is bad in the soup and even a little garlic is bad in
the chocolate pudding. I mean, wishful thinking may be bad if there is
too much of it or in the wrong place, but it is good in itself and may
be a great help in life and in problem solving."

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Dear Richard,

Originally Posted by Croakmore

> Interesting post, John. What struck me most about it was how
> similar Pólya's Urn is to the bottleneck effect occurring in
> random genetic drift.
> http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/art...?artid=1460318

That appears to be right. I believe that the Polya's Urn idea can be
used to model anything where there's talk of a "tipping point," since
once you reach a "tipping point" of too many red balls or green
balls, then it's almost impossible to move back.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Dear Rick,

Originally Posted by herbal tee

> Execellent article. One of the dangers in trying to explain the
> saeculium to others is to explain that history has not made us
> automatons doomed to repeat the same crises every 80-100 years. To
> oversimplify things, it's sort of like how Forrest Gump discribes
> life as being both fate and free will happening at the same time.
> Yes, every generational allignment is inclined to behaive in a way
> that is more or less true to its turnings' historical archtype,
> but within the collective experence of its individuals treagedies
> can be avoided if we are willing to learn from the past.

Yes, I understand what you're saying, but after WW II we WERE willing
to learn from the past. After two world wars, we were desperate to
learn from the past. That's why we did the Marshall Plan, that's why
we put the United Nations in New York City, that's why we decided to
stop Communism in Korea and Vietnam, that's why we built up our armed
forces and became policemen of the world.

Long before I got into this stuff, I used to make that joke that we
all make the same mistakes that our grandparents made -- the joke
being that we do so by trying to avoid the mistakes that our parents
made.

I'm afraid that the problem is that red balls lead to an unwelcome
outcome, but green balls lead to a different unwelcome outcome. If
it weren't war with China, it might be war with Russia. So we aren't
"doomed to repeat the same crises every 80-100 years." Instead,
we're doomed to choose different crises every 80-100 years.

Sorry. I wish I could be more cheerful, but it's not in me.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Australia is most definitely in an Unraveling phase right now.

Have you taken into account the increasing xenophobia following the
Bali bombings?

Those happened in? 2002?. So yeah, I've been there quite a bit since 2002. And I'd hardly say that the 'xenophobia' has increased. Aussies (by in large) have a dose of race-consciousness, and a still-living memory of having been much more directly-involved in a war with Orientals than does the US. But 'increasing xenophobia'? You've obviously been walking different streets than I, my friend.

And Russia is also nowhere near a Crisis. My best guess is High verging on Awakening, though Awakening verging on Unraveling is also possible (the business environment might better support that one). 2008 should make it pretty clear which one Russia is in.

What are you claiming is the last crisis war? The Afghan war?
That's a hard sell.

It's possibly that the failure of that was the kick-off, but the bad part of crisis time was almost certainly the period immediately before and just following the fall of the Soviet Union. Not all crises run their course militarily, you know. And the country most certainly came out of that one with a renewed (and renewing) sense of purpose and ever-increasing cultural self-esteem. This is the one I am absolutely the most certain of. I've been through Unraveling and Crisis (early phase) in the US; I know what they look -- and more important, feel -- like. This place isn't there.
And as for the 'increasing level of xenophobia' internally here, isn't some degree of racism a characteristic of a High? If I remember my T4T, it is..
And regarding their foreign relations, it's worth keeping in mind that, during their Crisis period, continuing into the right now, their next-door neighbors have been one by one pulled away from them into the lap of an increasingly unfriendly power. Remind me again how relations between the US and Korea went during our high?

China is going to be at war with India. Russia is India's defender.
Therefore, China will be at war with Russia.

Russia is India's defender? Didn't the USA just give India a whole pile of nuclear weapons technology? And Russia trades way, way more with China than with India; particularly weapons tech. And India is not inherently friendly with another of Russia and China's important mutual friends, Iran. Were things to truly split between the three -- and the SCO does offer a strong argument otherwise -- it is absolutely inconceivable that Russia would side with India against China. Most likely, they'd do their damndest to stay neutral or even try to help broker some sort of cessation-of-hostilities (the better to boost their standing as an important world player).

Originally Posted by Justin '77

It's possibly that the failure of that was the kick-off, but the bad part of crisis time was almost certainly the period immediately before and just following the fall of the Soviet Union. Not all crises run their course militarily, you know. And the country most certainly came out of that one with a renewed (and renewing) sense of purpose and ever-increasing cultural self-esteem. This is the one I am absolutely the most certain of. I've been through Unraveling and Crisis (early phase) in the US; I know what they look -- and more important, feel -- like. This place isn't there.

So if the Soviet Union collapse was part of a Crisis, then are all the former Warsaw Pact countries in a High? That is, not just Russia, but the rest of the former Soviet Union, and other countries like Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, etc?

Originally Posted by Justin '77

And as for the 'increasing level of xenophobia' internally here, isn't some degree of racism a characteristic of a High? If I remember my T4T, it is..
And regarding their foreign relations, it's worth keeping in mind that, during their Crisis period, continuing into the right now, their next-door neighbors have been one by one pulled away from them into the lap of an increasingly unfriendly power. Remind me again how relations between the US and Korea went during our high?

I thought that the trend was that xenophobia rises during a Crisis and gets strongest during a High when national hubris is at its peak. Then it starts to go out of fashion in an Awakening when people start to explore new ideas, and during an Unraveling it becomes very taboo indeed - any hints of xenophobia or racism get you a media whipping. So the fact that xenophobia is rising out of nowhere indicates a Crisis. Yes? No?

Originally Posted by Justin '77

Russia is India's defender? Didn't the USA just give India a whole pile of nuclear weapons technology? And Russia trades way, way more with China than with India; particularly weapons tech. And India is not inherently friendly with another of Russia and China's important mutual friends, Iran. Were things to truly split between the three -- and the SCO does offer a strong argument otherwise -- it is absolutely inconceivable that Russia would side with India against China. Most likely, they'd do their damndest to stay neutral or even try to help broker some sort of cessation-of-hostilities (the better to boost their standing as an important world player).

I thought Russia was India's closest ally. During the Soviet days India was quite dependent on the USSR. Even today I thought they maintained a close friendship. And since when is Iran Russia's ally?

I would love to see a write-up on Hugo Chavez and Venezuela.
From what I can tell, their revolutionary war was right after the Napoleonic Wars, the rest of the nineteenth century was pretty uneventful, there was a dictatorship from 1908-1935, a democracy movement from 1945-1958 (when Chavez was born), stable 2-party rule until 1989, when the Bolivarian Revolution started.
Was the Bolivarian Revolution the crisis, or are they seriously looking for a fight?

chrono117

Originally Posted by 1990

So if the Soviet Union collapse was part of a Crisis, then are all the former Warsaw Pact countries in a High? That is, not just Russia, but the rest of the former Soviet Union, and other countries like Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, etc?

Possibly; but they would be fairly early in the 1T. The accession to NATO (in 1999/2004) and the accession to the EU (2004/2007) would seem to be Crisis end-markers.

I wouldn't mark the end of Russia's crisis until probably 1999, with the election of Putin. (Don't you remember the succession of failed Presidents (5 in 18 months)? And Putin was the candidate of the United Russia party -- you can hardly get more emblematic than that.)

Originally Posted by 1990

And since when is Iran Russia's ally?

Since at least 1980, when Iraq/Iran became the last of the US/Russia proxy wars.

Originally Posted by chrono117

> I would love to see a write-up on Hugo Chavez and Venezuela. From
> what I can tell, their revolutionary war was right after the
> Napoleonic Wars, the rest of the nineteenth century was pretty
> uneventful, there was a dictatorship from 1908-1935, a democracy
> movement from 1945-1958 (when Chavez was born), stable 2-party
> rule until 1989, when the Bolivarian Revolution started. Was the
> Bolivarian Revolution the crisis, or are they seriously looking
> for a fight?

I did a very brief study of Venezuela in 2004.
http://www.fourthturning.com/forum/s...&postcount=406

I came to the conclusion that there are Venezuela's crisis wars:

1811-22 War of Independence
1899-1902 War of a Thousand Days - prolonged civil war
1948-60 La Violencia - civil war

This would appear to indicate that Venezuela is currently in the
early part of an Unraveling era, and that Hugo Chávez is an early
Prophet.

It's possible that "MichaelEaston" has also done some work on
Venezuela.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Originally Posted by 1990

So if the Soviet Union collapse was part of a Crisis, then are all the former Warsaw Pact countries in a High? That is, not just Russia, but the rest of the former Soviet Union, and other countries like Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, etc?

All of them? No idea. I tend towards skepticism on what I get from the TeeVee and related media on matters foreign, and I've never actually spent any time in or had any kind of dealings with people in the Warsaw Pact countries outside of Russia. I'd be guessing without any meaningful data.

I thought that the trend was that xenophobia rises during a Crisis and gets strongest during a High when national hubris is at its peak. Then it starts to go out of fashion in an Awakening when people start to explore new ideas, and during an Unraveling it becomes very taboo indeed - any hints of xenophobia or racism get you a media whipping. So the fact that xenophobia is rising out of nowhere indicates a Crisis. Yes? No?

Were it <i>rising</i>, that might be the case. However, none of what's been happening in the past five years is anything new. The rise began almost subsequently with the fall of the Iron Curtain (and the end of the forced integration as 'Soviet Citizens'). Right now, the level is not really moving anywhere in particular -- high, but stable, just like in a High.

I thought Russia was India's closest ally. During the Soviet days...

You mean, like twenty years ago? Maybe. But particularly in the past seven years, China and Russia have been moving closer together, while India has been moving into the sphere of the US (such as it is...).

And since when is Iran Russia's ally?

In addition to Finch's point, it might be worth pointing out just exactly who is helping the Iranians build Bushehr and who helped them with Isfahan (hint: Xenakis knows these guys are both on the verge of a major war with each other). Russia is very tight with Iran. May I direct you to (for one simple example) the following flight schedule:
Sheremetyevo (Moscow) to Teheran
Note they have flights every day but Thursday and Saturday.
Compare to Sheremtyevo-to-Toronto.

And Teheran is not nearly the major hub airport that Toronto is...

Originally Posted by Justin '77

If I remember my T4T, it is..
And regarding their foreign relations, it's worth keeping in mind that, during their Crisis period, continuing into the right now, their next-door neighbors have been one by one pulled away from them into the lap of an increasingly unfriendly power. Remind me again how relations between the US and Korea went during our high?

Russia is it's own worst enemy though. Take the spying row with Georgia. Russia turned up the heat, and in response, Georgia has an even greater reason to bind its future to pursuing relations with the EU and NATO.

Though Putin's managed democracy has given the country some quotient of stability, I think most investors see Russia as a land of great opportunity that is closed to their investment in big capital (energy) projects and wholly unpredictable.

That's why countries like Ukraine and Georgia toy with the idea of NATO membership. Because Russia isn't making them any safer or richer, they think being a member of a club that involves what basically constitutes the "West" these days - the EU, the US, and Canada - will tell foreign investors that it's safe to pour money into T'bilisi and Kiev.

From all accounts I've read, Georgia and Ukraine are still considerably poor countries. It's not hard to see why they would want to attract foreign investment. NATO membership is a way to do that. It says, "relax investors, your capital is safe."