Thanks to @Kerbrech for sharing this excellent illustration of the status-drives-societies idea. The work…
Thanks to @Kerbrech for sharing this excellent illustration of the status-drives-societies idea. The work Peter Turchin has done on ‘elite overproduction’.
The bit in green is where I would offer a different view. 1/8
https://t.co/D5SnkjjkQ0 https://t.co/aC9dJLWdCk
You can see here Turchin recognises that it’s catastrophes, ‘violent end times’, that shift societies. The exception he gives in green isn’t an exception, I think. It’s just that the world had 4 mega-catastrophes in quick succession. 2/8 https://t.co/C46p61a501
As he says elsewhere in the interview, those golden 30 years post-WW2 started to fray in the 1970s. Exactly the time I often say when status-driven societies returned.
What I find particularly interesting about Turchin’s work is the elite overproduction idea. 3/8
Namely, that when societies get too many people vying for the top rung of the status ladder, such as the US with its proliferation of billionaires, the team sports between these top aspirants drives a society into chaos.
It’s the same team sports as the rest of society. 4/8
But focused at the top level of status. I’ve Tweeted before, peaceful and prosperous societies are ones with stable status hierarchies. Kings and Queens and Popes used to provide that.
Billionaires never will. 5/8
Kings, Queens and Popes had cascading, nested sub-hierarchies, their royal courts and the various levels of status/authority within churches.
That allowed the status hierarchy to operate effectively throughout society. 6/8
Billionaires have none of that. No noblesse oblige. Just big vacuums, sucking up wealth and status for themselves. The ‘wealth pumps’, as Turchin calls it.
Our current social collapse and chaos is that status war between billionaires, playing out. 7/8
None of them will win. Wealth pumps can’t run societies. I don’t agree with Turchin that we could choose another golden post-WW2 period. That was the result of mega-catastrophes, in quick succession.
Catastrophe(s) incoming.
/end