In another thread, a discussion came up about how this crisis would turn out. When we look at other crises, in American history, we see situtations that look only barely plausible given what things look like today.

Some people have proposed a double saeculum. Intense Awakening, Divisive Crisis, Mild Awakening, United Crisis.

This makes sense. However, what I see is a much larger mechanism at work. A Quadruple Saeculum, or The MegaSaeculum.

My initial proposal was this:

1. Divisive Awakening (English Civil War) => Mild Crisis (Glorious Revolution)
2. Intellectual Awakening (Enlightenment) => Revolutionary Crisis (American Revolution)
3. Spiritual Awakening (Transcendentalism) => Divisive Crisis (American Civil War, War of the Roses)
4. Mild Awakening (Progressive Movement) => Triumphant Crisis (World War II, Spanish Armada)

Then, The Grey Badger proposed an addition to this:

1. Divisive Awakening => Mild Crisis (Unraveling)
2. Intellectual Awakening => Revolutionary Crisis (Crisis)
3. Spiritual Awakening => Divisive Crisis (High)
4. Mild Awakening => Triumphant Crisis (Awakening)

Now, I did notice one minor problem, which is that Britain didn't have a civil war in the middle of the 19th Century. So, I'll make one more change:

1. Spiritual Awakening => Bitter Crisis (High)
2. Mild Awakening => Triumphant Crisis (Awakening)
3. Divisive Awakening => Mild Crisis (Unraveling)
4. Intellectual Awakening => Revolutionary Crisis (Crisis)

Of course, every Awakening is, to an extent, Spiritual, Intellectual, and Divisive. However, only sometimes are one of those traits particularly emphasized, and sometimes none of them are.

All of these types will have to be looked over and researched. However, what I've been particularly interested in is the third type. The type I think we're in today.

This MegaUnraveling seems to be inspired because of the results of the past Crisis: A triumphant Hero generation that believes it can do anything. They're the most likely to show hubris of any other Civic archetypes, and they arguably have the most impact on culture.

There are two cases of these generations: Elizabethian Generation, and the GI Generation.

The Elizabethian Generation was essentially an Anglican Generation. They strongly supported the new Church, they strongly supported the Monarchy. They undoubtedly had an influence not only on political issues, but also on that primary cultural issue of the day: religion.

The GI Generation, too, had come to exert a powerful influence on culture. The perpetuation of family values in the newly created suburbs was a symbol not just of material wealth, but of a culture centered around the nuclear family.

The Puritans and the Boomers hated this, to say the least, so they rebelled with huge intensity against their elders. This type of intense generational conflict was not found in other cycles: normally, the Civics just sort of roll over once they see what's happening, and focus more on what they know rather than actively pushing back.

But in these two cycles, the Heros did push back. The Cavaliers (not to be confused with the generation) defended King Charles at all costs, to the point of violence. The GIs, fearing the wrath of the Baby Boomers, suddenly switched parties, as they had been mostly democrat, and elected Nixon to fight the Boomers.

We had an all-out generational war in both cases. In neither case was an interim generation capable of compromising these differences. In other cycles, we had a strongman who stepped in to end the conflict, but not neccessarily tilting towards either one. Andrew Jackson. Teddy Roosevelt. These were all Artists, in the past.

But in these Divisive Awakenings, these Artists are marginalized, and when they do become powerful, they are killed. There can be no compromise generation.

Instead, one side has to win. In the English Civil War, the Puritan Oliver Cromwell stepped in as the victor, finally defeating the Elizabethians and the Elizabethian ideal.

In the most recent Awakening, boomers almost won, against Nixon, but they ultimately lost as GI Ronald Reagan stepped in to solidify GI ideals.

But at the end of it all, the next generations grew tired of the Prophets and their divisive nature. With the Glorious Revolution, there was no attempt to place another Puritan in power. And with this years 4T, we don't want another Boomer.

This idea has appealed to me for a while. I only wish there was more/better documentation about the Glorious Revolution 4T, because it seems to be largely ignored by history.

If this is to be a mild, meandering 4T like that of the 1680s-90s, then it's very possible 9/11 really was the catalyst, and the Regeneracy has just been slow to come (it looks to be hitting right about now). Surely the Culture Wars and Bush/Clinton dynastic tug-of-war in the 1990s remind one of the "Reaction and Restoration" 1660s. The colonization of the early 1600s contained a technocratic euphoria unmatched by any 1T until the postwar American High.

So does this mean the American superpower will survive this 4T? Britain certainly lasted a full saeculum past the Glorious, and arguably two more.

I think this next saeculum will be our last as *the* major power in the world. After that, it's a question of what exactly happens during the next saeculum.

The MegaSaeculum really appeals to me because history is behaving exactly that way: first there was a high, which validated the ideals of the prior Saeculum. Then the high gives wake to an awakening, which creates a new ideal.

That new ideal is obviously the creation of "The Worker" as a new entity. It used to be that the everyman was the land-owner, the merchant, and everything was geared to favor that guy. The MegaAwakening established a new way of thinking, and it's likely that institutions will be remade to reflect that in the next saeculum, just as American democracy was made to reflect the shift from nobles to merchants.

Originally Posted by 1990

This idea has appealed to me for a while. I only wish there was more/better documentation about the Glorious Revolution 4T, because it seems to be largely ignored by history.

If this is to be a mild, meandering 4T like that of the 1680s-90s, then it's very possible 9/11 really was the catalyst, and the Regeneracy has just been slow to come (it looks to be hitting right about now). Surely the Culture Wars and Bush/Clinton dynastic tug-of-war in the 1990s remind one of the "Reaction and Restoration" 1660s. The colonization of the early 1600s contained a technocratic euphoria unmatched by any 1T until the postwar American High.

So does this mean the American superpower will survive this 4T? Britain certainly lasted a full saeculum past the Glorious, and arguably two more.

The dominant Boom coalition going into this 4T -- the Corporatist/Neocon/Fundamentalist coalition that underpinned Dubya's electoral successes in 2000 and 2004 has discredited itself, showing itself dangerously ruthless, dishonest, and irrational. Mild Crisis? Let's see how the Fraud Estate meltdown plays out. If a Crisis is entirely economic, but not so severe as to lead to starvation and radical movements, then it will be mild. Even the Great Depression did not lead to any threat to the survival of the American political system; the youth of the time, instead of falling for extremist solutions of either the Left (Commie) or Right (Nazi, KKK) worked within the system.

The high Gini coefficient suggests much distress for many Americans. Whether the political leadership that we have beginning in 2009 can relieve that distress will determine how well and perhaps how fast America gets through the consequences of the severe inequality of results in the American economy.

The solutions of the 1930s will be in vogue in the 2010s just as the follies of the 1920s were in vogue until recently. History shows that the only fault with the solutions of the 1930s didn't go far enough (that, for example, they didn't enfranchise African-Americans).

This is interesting but explain how you can tell a Mega-Unraveling from the others and why you see this as one. Is it the mild crisis or that everythings gotten so bad that no one can even agree to disagree.

But if this is true than the high will be an even worse place to be an INFP (like it ever is).

Originally Posted by The Young Rebel- '90

This is interesting but explain how you can tell a Mega-Unraveling from the others and why you see this as one. Is it the mild crisis or that everythings gotten so bad that no one can even agree to disagree.

But if this is true than the high will be an even worse place to be an INFP (like it ever is).

A mega-unraveling is distinguished by a few things:

1. A divided awakening that shows the potential for a generational war (Civic vs Idealist) that is not resolved by a strong Artist on the 2T/3T cusp. (Reagan was not a compromise between the Boom and the GI. He simply re-established the dominance of GI-ideals)
2. A discredited Prophet Generation. (Notice that every boomer in this race has lost)
3. A noticable reaction to the reform made during the Mega Awakening.

3 is the important one. The Mega Awakening established a new mode of thinking that is markedly different from Englightenment ideals. During this entire Saeculum, we've seen a very noticable conflict between a restablishment of the Enlightenment Ideal, and a new Ideal that was invented during the New Deal.

I respect one's own interpretation, but the four-part cycle is itself is far from absolute. I find that the beauty of each turning lies not in its regularity or alteration, but the defining personalities and course of events that shape them, which is why each has own distinct character. To attach and isolate traits from separate traits that can be said to describe all Awakenings/Crises ("Revolutionary", "Divisive", "Triumphant", "Bitter") and attribute them to some unique pattern, would only obscure what is an, otherwise, flexible theory.

Originally Posted by Millennial_90'

I respect one's own interpretation, but the four-part cycle is itself is far from absolute. I find that the beauty of each turning lies not in its regularity or alteration, but the defining personalities and course of events that shape them, which is why each has own distinct character. To attach and isolate traits from separate traits that can be said to describe all Awakenings/Crises ("Revolutionary", "Divisive", "Triumphant", "Bitter") and attribute them to some unique pattern, would only obscure what is an, otherwise, flexible theory.

There are different traits that are emphasized in each one. And there is a pattern to when they are emphasized. It makes *sense* to start expanding the theory. You can identify megacycles and microcycles through using this technique.

Sorry, but it just plain old doesn't make sense to not pursue something that makes sense. I could just as easily say that we shouldn't do any research on generational dynamics because we just like the way "random" history has characters and dynamics and are far more flexible.

But that's stupid. If you can identify a trend, you should investigate it and make a prediction. That's the point of science.

Originally Posted by Silifi

There are different traits that are emphasized in each one. And there is a pattern to when they are emphasized. It makes *sense* to start expanding the theory. You can identify megacycles and microcycles through using this technique.

Sorry, but it just plain old doesn't make sense to not pursue something that makes sense. I could just as easily say that we shouldn't do any research on generational dynamics because we just like the way "random" history has characters and dynamics and are far more flexible.

But that's stupid. If you can identify a trend, you should investigate it and make a prediction. That's the point of science.

Understood and well appreciated. Of course all theories should be pursued. S&H pursued their own, and made an amazing discovery, one that is the subject of books and debates. But if these theories are to continue to grow, then they should be met with just as much skepticism and restraint as they with zeal and drive.

It would seem to me that the theory you speak of, is one that works best when applied to specific conflicts of a wider turning, which can differ dramatically depending on country and geographic region. Also, one must consider the variety of first-hand accounts. For some individuals, an awakening could be "spiritual", and for others, "divisive". Or for that matter, a crisis could be equally "revolutionary" as it is "triumphant."

The point is that a turning can encompass all of these traits, but should not be defined by any single one of them. I agree insofar that turnings are similar and can be categorized with an arrangement of some sort (depending on the generational constellation), but I would not go as far to assign a pattern to 80-100 year saecula themselves, especially when you consider that there have only been a few in the 500-year history of our country.

Doesn't work for Russia.

Divisive 1870s-1880s Awakening; 1910s-1920s Crisis is bitter or revolutionary.

Originally Posted by MichaelEaston

Doesn't work for Russia.

Divisive 1870s-1880s Awakening; 1910s-1920s Crisis is bitter or revolutionary.

Was it a divisive awakening, or was it just an Awakening with division?

Originally Posted by Millennial_90'

Understood and well appreciated. Of course all theories should be pursued. S&H pursued their own, and made an amazing discovery, one that is the subject of books and debates. But if these theories are to continue to grow, then they should be met with just as much skepticism and restraint as they with zeal and drive.

It would seem to me that the theory you speak of, is one that works best when applied to specific conflicts of a wider turning, which can differ dramatically depending on country and geographic region. Also, one must consider the variety of first-hand accounts. For some individuals, an awakening could be "spiritual", and for others, "divisive". Or for that matter, a crisis could be equally "revolutionary" as it is "triumphant."

The point is that a turning can encompass all of these traits, but should not be defined by any single one of them. I agree insofar that turnings are similar and can be categorized with an arrangement of some sort (depending on the generational constellation), but I would not go as far to assign a pattern to 80-100 year saecula themselves, especially when you consider that there have only been a few in the 500-year history of our country.

If anything, I see a far simpler explanation of why Crises go well or badly for a country: how well (or badly) the country solves problems that could create extreme dangers in the event of a Crisis. National pride is a tawdry substitute for conscience, and a society that gets sociopathic leaders going into or during a 4T seem to take too many, and excessive risks. Societies that fail to address rifts along lines of ethnicity, class, and religion tend to implode easily under a challenge. 4Ts are opportunities for major reforms -- for granting opportunities to extend justice and rectify social issues long deferred for questionable reasons. They can also be times of the most despicable behavior toward humanity.

Lest we Americans get smug, imagine that we have done things badly. The landmarks will be different, but they will be more familiar because they will be in Washington, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Miami, Cleveland, Chicago, St. Louis, Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Minneapolis... or perhaps Wausau:

Berlin, 1945

Hint: we have had no major reforms of the social order for the last quarter-century unless you want to call "tax cuts" reform.

Originally Posted by Silifi

Was it a divisive awakening, or was it just an Awakening with division?

It's divisive as they come. It began with a burst of idealism (nihilistic idealism!) that deeply disturbed the older generations. They wanted to reform the government, and when that failed, they wanted the peasants to lead Russia. This failed and terrorism took hold in Russia in the 1870s with the ultimate goal of a revolution leading to Anarchism. In 1881, an Anarchist assassinated the Tsar, and in the 1880s, Revolutionaries were hunted down.

It could have been an intellectual awakening (nihilist movement), but by the mid 1870s, it ran a different course.

Read up on it.

Originally Posted by MichaelEaston

It's divisive as they come. It began with a burst of idealism (nihilistic idealism!) that deeply disturbed the older generations. They wanted to reform the government, and when that failed, they wanted the peasants to lead Russia. This failed and terrorism took hold in Russia in the 1870s with the ultimate goal of a revolution leading to Anarchism. In 1881, an Anarchist assassinated the Tsar, and in the 1880s, Revolutionaries were hunted down.

It could have been an intellectual awakening (nihilist movement), but by the mid 1870s, it ran a different course.

Read up on it.

This looks a lot more to me like an intellectual awakening that just happened to result in some violence, probably because of Russia's deeply authoritarian tradition.

Different countries will handle things differently. And it appears that this is an intellectual awakening because it involves revolutionaries who have arrived at a new philosophical paradigm, and then tried to advance it, failing. The fact that the Russian Prophets of that day created a complete philosophy on which to base their revolutions seems to indicate an intellectual movement, not a divisive movement.

The divisive awakening seems to be less focused on a particular consistent philosophy and more around just simply removing the old tradition.

Parliament didn't have a particular vision in mind when they removed Charles II. Boomers didn't have a particular vision in mind when they removed Nixon.

Originally Posted by Silifi

...

Parliament didn't have a particular vision in mind when they removed Charles II. Boomers didn't have a particular vision in mind when they removed Nixon.

HM Charles II was removed by Providence and not Parliament. Mr. Nixon was removed by the elders of the GOP.

Originally Posted by Virgil K. Saari

HM Charles II was removed by Providence and not Parliament. Mr. Nixon was removed by the elders of the GOP.

Charles I, I misspoke. Mr. Nixon wasn't removed by the GOP, he simply was pressured to leave after the boomers went after him.

Originally Posted by Silifi

Charles I, I misspoke. Mr. Nixon wasn't removed by the GOP, he simply was pressured to leave after the boomers went after him.

FYI, the boomers didn't "get" Nixon anymore than they "stopped" the Vietnam war. Nixon "got" himself with his own actions. People from all of the adult generations of the time decided that the bum had to go. This came about because a lost generation senator named Sam Ervin headed the Senate Watergate Commitiee and set a no nonsense tone in questioning witnesses that led to the truth. I know, I saw it unfold.

The baby boomers were the primary force that pushed Nixon into the position. His "actions" were likely a common occurence in politics up to that point. It was boomers who opposed him since 1968 who went after him and did everything they could to take him down.

I highly doubt that Nixon was especially corrupt. It was simply that the boomers hated him because he had declared a war against them, and they used everything in their power to destroy him.

I’m not sold on the mega saeculum idea. It is true that each saeculum seems to be larger and/or more intense than the previous one, and thus I can see the desire to look for a higher cycle that’s playing out. You are suggesting that it is fractal.

I suggest it is exponential. Each new saeculum seems to include a larger population and thus a larger critical mass that pushes events to a breaking point. Somewhere there is a quantitative change that triggers the qualitative change. If a town grows by 100% it may be able to continue its prior social structure; if it grows by 200% it may have to change social structure. (If you give me $10,000 I say thanks and continue working; give me $1,000,000 and I retire). Our current 4T may seem like a mega 4T because it will include many nations beyond the US when the climax comes. I see this as a compounding effect not a multi-scalar one.

I do see three cycles all working together: the four generations, the four turnings, and the flip-flop between rationalism and romanticism with awakenings being the transition..

Originally Posted by Silifi

This looks a lot more to me like an intellectual awakening that just happened to result in some violence, probably because of Russia's deeply authoritarian tradition.

It just so happened to be the first saeculum I decided to test it on.

Originally Posted by Silifi

Of course, every Awakening is, to an extent, Spiritual, Intellectual, and Divisive. However, only sometimes are one of those traits particularly emphasized, and sometimes none of them are.

It's legacy was violence and bitter divisions, not nihilism. Also, the Crimean War doesn't come across as "Mild."

I think there can potentially be something to this, but only as a guide, not a rule-set.

Originally Posted by Silifi

The baby boomers were the primary force that pushed Nixon into the position.

How?

His "actions" were likely a common occurence in politics up to that point...

...I highly doubt that Nixon was especially corrupt.

Conjecture.

It was simply that the boomers hated him because he had declared a war against them, and they used everything in their power to destroy him.

That's a fine sentiment. But, in 1974 the oldest boomers were only 31 and the youngest 14. A generation with its last cohorts still in high school doesn't really run anything yet.

Originally Posted by moorele

I’m not sold on the mega saeculum idea. It is true that each saeculum seems to be larger and/or more intense than the previous one, and thus I can see the desire to look for a higher cycle that’s playing out. You are suggesting that it is fractal.

I suggest it is exponential. Each new saeculum seems to include a larger population and thus a larger critical mass that pushes events to a breaking point. Somewhere there is a quantitative change that triggers the qualitative change. If a town grows by 100% it may be able to continue its prior social structure; if it grows by 200% it may have to change social structure. (If you give me $10,000 I say thanks and continue working; give me $1,000,000 and I retire). Our current 4T may seem like a mega 4T because it will include many nations beyond the US when the climax comes. I see this as a compounding effect not a multi-scalar one.

I do see three cycles all working together: the four generations, the four turnings, and the flip-flop between rationalism and romanticism with awakenings being the transition..

The last 4T was the nastiest that the world ever has ever known because of the totalitarian states that had the power to command anything and murder anyone. I see Stalin's forced collectivization and purges and the Katyn massacre, one of Mussolini's sons expressing delight at the destruction of 'primitive' people in Ethiopia through air raids, the Holocaust, the Bataan Death March, and Camp T-731 (human experimentation); all reflect the purest depravity that "swinedom" could ever create. Not since the Middle Ages was life so expendable... because mechanistic ideologies like Bolshevism and fascism had abolished individuality and sociopaths had command of empires.

Out of desperation, even the good guys (Britain and America) resorted to the most savage aerial attacks ever known, culminating in nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

In much of the world, populations have been rising very slowly. Japan, China and many European countries have birth rates below long-term sustenance; even the United States would be in the same position were it not for immigration from Latin America. Pressure upon the land, a usual portent of demographic disaster and of the success of militaristic demagogues who start aggressive wars, is less a menace now than it was in the 1930s.

One difference between this 4T and the last one is that we have the lessons of the past one. Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, Benito Mussolini, and Hideki Tojo remain objects of contempt. If anything, Stalin is becoming even more an example of unabated evil, and imagery of him becomes as much a horror as that of Hitler.

Racism and religious bigotry have become far less acceptable. Anyone who speaks of 'eliminating' ethnic or religious groups is quickly linked to the images of smoke from recently-living people going up chimneys at Auschwitz or to mass-shootings as at Babi Yar. The Holocaust imagery is likely to survive the last survivors -- children of the 1930s who are now old. Images of the last 4T remain as powerful as they were when they were new even though the persons who brought back those images are largely gone.

Apartheid is dead. Communism is all but dead as an ideology; the one Great Power (China) that has any Red icons isn't Marxist in its economic system. Thug military regimes that once dominated southern and eastern South America are no more. China and Russia are both undemocratic -- but they have no ideologies to push onto other countries. Few demagogues now promote military expansion as a solution for the economic distress of the masses; there are no frontiers of the 19th-century type.

Can a 4T be nasty today? Certainly. Look at Yugoslavia, which seems to have gotten out of one. Look at Sudan. Look at Rwanda. Lots of countries can get through one with little harm done. They can also be times of major restructuring of institutions with minimal violence -- and reorganizations of society so that it rewards toil and thrift instead of scamming, speculation, political huckstering, and bureaucratic toadying.

Our world cannot afford a 4T "exponentially" more severe than the last one. There will likely be some ugly civil wars in some countries of great resources and huge chasms of ethnicity and power. Someone might do something incredibly stupid that cause the military forces of Russia or China to resolve the matter. Should Pakistan or Burma blow up, I can imagine some factions preferring to join India than to remain with the other side and give the Indian government an offer that it can't refuse.

pbrower2a,
Well, I generally agree with you. Yes, we cannot afford a 4T that blows off the Fujita scale. I hope I’m wrong about the exponential impact. But is it possible? I think it is. We live in a new romantic age (much to the disgust of Susan Jacoby, The Age of Unreason, 2008) which means that events will be more volatile, more unpredictable and nonlinear (hard to connect the dots). Previous romantic 4Ts were the Glorious Revolution and the Slave debates-Civil War (1854-1865, my version). Each had some exceptionally volatile moments. RE Lee tried twice to have a symbolic victory on northern soil that would “end” the war (Antietam, Gettysburg). That was romantic idealism at work. Our rational 4Ts were the Am Revolution and the Depression-WWII; in each, battles and campaigns were generally more methodical. I see Iraq as similar to the William Walker expeditions into Latin America of the mid-late 1850s, which means our climax has yet to come.

Originally Posted by moorele

pbrower2a,
Well, I generally agree with you. Yes, we cannot afford a 4T that blows off the Fujita scale. I hope I’m wrong about the exponential impact. But is it possible? I think it is. We live in a new romantic age (much to the disgust of Susan Jacoby, The Age of Unreason, 2008) which means that events will be more volatile, more unpredictable and nonlinear (hard to connect the dots). Previous romantic 4Ts were the Glorious Revolution and the Slave debates-Civil War (1854-1865, my version). Each had some exceptionally volatile moments. RE Lee tried twice to have a symbolic victory on northern soil that would “end” the war (Antietam, Gettysburg). That was romantic idealism at work. Our rational 4Ts were the Am Revolution and the Depression-WWII; in each, battles and campaigns were generally more methodical. I see Iraq as similar to the William Walker expeditions into Latin America of the mid-late 1850s, which means our climax has yet to come.

Of course the climax of this 4T is far from nigh. Some of us can't agree that we are in a 4T; those who think that we are in one consider either the election of Dubya (2000), the 9/11 attack (2001), the invasion of Iraq (2003), or the bungled response to Katrina (2005) the starts. The last two are the unqualified results of the personality of the President -- ugly episodes in American history. Some see it in the financial meltdown that began in 2007.

Dubya has tried to be a 3T President, a weak leader who asks little of people other than to let Big Business get whatever it wants and get out of the way while indulging as if there is no future. Such is his personality, and he can't change. After 9/11 he told Americans to "go shopping", the definitive 3T activity. During the Gulf War, he advocated tax cuts targeted at enriching the rich -- a measure contrary to usual canons of a Crisis finance. His response to the meltdown of a real estate bubble that has become the sole measure of prosperity is to issue a $300 tax rebate... and tell people to "spend it".

That flawed vision leads to a 4T that results from the intellectual vacuity and moral depravity associated with such conduct. It leads to economic polarization between rich and poor, revelers and prudes, and Right and Left. Dubya's popularity may seem to be in the toilet with one recent poll giving him a 19% approval rating... but some people have never been so happy in their lives. Any change in things -- higher real wages or higher taxes -- will tear at their privileged lives. Such people, the ones who have the economic and bureaucratic power, aren't going to like any change. They have the money, and they want to keep it.

I’m no defender of Bushie. His vocabulary is too small: cut taxes, cut rates, go shopping.

The Generations model explains very well the narrowing and widening gap between the Haves and Have-nots. At its widest most of the adult reactives get hit the hardest. At the narrowest, adaptives become gentility.

3T behaviors and values continue into the 4T. The 4T compounds them by adding another layer of heightened fear, depression, and anxiety.

For example, a rancher from Texas:
http://agonist.org/don/20080301/the_wind_whispers_all_is_not_well