How different is Western Europe's saecular timeline?

[FLBones]

(12-18-2016, 08:20 AM)Mikebert Wrote: I think the situation is even worse.  In generational terms 4Ts begin shortly after the aligned generational constellation.  That is, when Artists occupy elderhood, Prophets occupy mature adulthood and Nomads rising adulthood.  With 20-year generations we have elderhood from 60-79. Applying this to Silents (1925-1942) gives 2004 and 2002.  Applying 40-59 to Boomers (1943-1960) gives 2002 and 1999.  Applying 20-39 to Xers (1961-1981) gives 2000 and 2001.  Averaging these all together gives 2001.  This would be the projected final year for the Millie generation assuming 20-year generation/turning length.  S&H hedged their bets and added two years to accommodate a 22-year Millie gen and gave the date as 2003 in Generations.  Then then added a couple of years and projected the 4T start for 2005 in T4T.  These earlier dates and the once-popular view of a 4T start in 2001 all were based on the birth dates of the generations before the Millennials and the average length of the previous four that had averaged 20 years in length.

The 2001 data fell out of favor when events did not support it.  Although 911 ushered in a new era of authoritarian government featuring mass surveillance of the population and summary executions and even torture, the perception was that nothing much had changed.  In 2008 the economy nearly collapsed due to a financial crisis.  None too healthy before the crisis, the economy feels much weaker after.  And yet nothing changed policy-wise afterward.  Either outcome of the 2016 election promises more of the same. Although Trump ran as a change agent, his economic agenda appears to be the same tax cut and grow the debt policy Republicans have offered for 35 years now.  Here's a comparison of the post-1980 Republican economic plan with what they offered before:

Year     Spend     Rev     Deficit     Year     Spend      Rev     Deficit      Year     Spend     Rev     Deficit         
1921       6.8       7.5       -0.7       1981     21.1       18.7       2.5       1992      21.1       16.7      4.4
1922       4.4       5.4       -1.0       1982     22.3       18.5       3.8       1993      20.5       16.8      3.7
1923       3.6       4.5       -0.8       1983     22.2       16.5       5.7       1994      20.0       17.2      2.8
1924       3.3       4.4       -1.1       1984     21.1       16.5       4.6       1995      19.8       17.6      2.2
1925       3.2       4.0       -0.8       1985     21.8       16.9       4.9       1996      19.3       17.9      1.4
1926       3.0       3.9       -0.9       1986     21.6       16.8       4.8       1997      18.6       18.3      0.3
1927       3.0       4.2       -1.2       1987     20.6       17.5       3.1       1998      18.2       18.9    -0.7
1928       3.0       4.0       -1.0       1988     20.3       17.3       3.0       1999      17.6       18.9    -1.3
1929       3.0       3.7       -0.7       1989     20.2       17.5       2.7       2000      17.4       19.7    -2.3
All values expressed as % of GDP


Shown is the Republican fiscal policy of the 1920's under Secretary Mellon and the 1980's policy under President Reagan. Both periods featured top bracket tax cuts, from 73% to 25% in the 1920's and from 70% to 28% in the 1980's, which resulted is falling revenue.  Mellon's tax cuts were accompanied by defense spending cuts that fully offset declining revenues and can be called a fiscally conservative and small government.  Reagan's were not, although Republicans continued to describe them as such.


Funny thing was Clinton actually did what Mellon had done.  He oversaw large cuts in defense and other spending which cut spending by 3.7% of GDP and tax increases that increased revenues by 3.0% of GDP, engineering a fiscal turnaround of 6.7% of GDP.  The 1990's outcome was similar to that of the 1920's, deflationary growth that led to a speculative bubble on the stock market.

Here you see a changing of the coats.  Republicans ceased to be the party of fiscal conservatism, and after a delay, Democrats (or perhaps I should say DLC Democrats) picked up the mantle.  Over the same time the Republicans transformed from the party of the Northeastern establishment (i.e. Blue America) to the party of the South and (non-coastal) West (Red America).  The Democrats became more and more like the Republicans/Whigs of old.  Both parties still hang on to key elements.  Democrats continue to be the party of immigrants, and Republicans still are the party of the Old Right (i.e. those folks Eisenhower disparaged).  But for a long time they continued to represent themselves as what they once were, but no longer are:  Republicans *still* often describe themselves as fiscal conservatives when this has manifestly not been the case for 35 years. Democrats *still* describe themselves as the party of working people when this as clearly not been the case for 25 years.

In other words they lie, repeatedly.  Partisanship has created a situation in which both camps live in different realities as far as perceptions of the human world go. Republicans got a decade head start on Democrats and so they have traveled further on this path, so this is more apparent on the Right than the Left, but its there in both.

And so there we are.  Rigor mortis has set in, preserving the 3T status quo. Generationally the 4T clock is running out.  Gen X will fully occupy mature adulthood in 2020-21, which is when the Adaptive generation will come to an end. A few years after should come the 1T, generationally-speaking. Yet in 2020 we will still be living in the same post-2016 world, with the same rigor mortis.  Will the 3T then continue on to the 1T?

We are not still in the 3T. You can't go from 3T to 1T without a 4T.

[Remy Renault]

But with most of his cabinet picks, Trump is proving himself to be just as "establishment" as anyone else in Washington. Please explain to me how we can expect the likes of Rick I-was-a-C-student-in-undergrad Perry and Rex Tillerson to "clean up the muck".

[Mikebert]

(12-18-2016, 10:02 PM)FLBones Wrote: We are not still in the 3T. You can't go from 3T to 1T without a 4T.

Correct, if the generational theory is valid.  But the proof of the pudding is in application. Either it works or it doesn't.  Back in Generations S&H wrote than not much can be told in a decade. but by 3 or 4 decades from now it will become clear. By the next presidential election it will be about 30 years since Generations, time enough to tell if it works.  It is not hard to recognize that the Revolution, Civil War and New Deal/WWII as major turning points in the development of the American state, dividing it into three "republics". And folks have been anticipating the appearance of the "fourth republic" for some time. 

So, has the fourth republic appeared?  I think not, what I see is the same old see-saw, Democrats get a shot under Clinton, then its the Republicans turn under Bush, then Democrats come back under Obama and now Republican are coming back.  Each time they do the same thing, Democrats try to pass national health care (a goal they have had since the Truman administration) and Republicans cut taxes and run deficits (an option made possible by the 1979 "October Revolution" in Federal Reserve policy). in both cases they cause a lot of unpopularity with their policies and get replaced by the other side as neither party addresses the obvious problem (the middle/working class has been losing ground for forty years).

The same pattern continues on as it has for decades.  We used to call this lack of movement a 3T.  We now call it a 4T, but it isn't materially any different from the 3T before it, which is why it feels wrong.  Now there are all sorts of things that have been suggested here than would be pretty clear-cut indicators of a 4T.  A constitutional convention or even a slew of amendments would be a clean indicator of an emerging "new republic" and definitive proof of a 4T.  The outbreak of mass violence, such as a civil war or insurrection, would also be clear evidence of a 4T.  If the economy collapsed like it did in 1931, this too would serve.  Finally, if through some combination of economic policies (maybe Turchin's right and immigration restriction and tariffs would do the trick) the economic inequality measures peaked and began a long-term decline, why, then we'd be 4T too, although it may take a decade or two to be sure about that.

There are lots of things that could happen (and have in the past) that would be clear-cut "we be 4T" signposts.  Problem is, none of them have happened so far and generationally-speaking we are running out of time (the 1T constellation is due to arrive around 2020). This constellation is determined by the Boomer/GenX split.  The only way to move it back would be if Xers born in the 1960's start to see themselves as Boomers. Any takers here?  I didn't think so

So the 2020 deadline is pretty much baked into the cake.  One of the things above or something like it has to happen like now, or during Trump's first term, at the latest. If it doesn't, the theory will be invalidated.  One can continue on with it, of course, but it would become a crank theory at that point.

[Odin]

(12-20-2016, 07:30 AM)Mikebert Wrote:

(12-18-2016, 10:02 PM)FLBones Wrote: We are not still in the 3T. You can't go from 3T to 1T without a 4T.

Correct, if the generational theory is valid.  But the proof of the pudding is in application. Either it works or it doesn't.  Back in Generations S&H wrote than not much can be told in a decade. but by 3 or 4 decades from now it will become clear. By the next presidential election it will be about 30 years, time enough to tell if it works.  It is not hard to recognize that the Revolution, Civil War and New Deal/WWII as major turning points in the development of the American state, dividing it into three "republics". And folks have been anticipating the appearance of the "fourth republic" for some time. 

So, has the fourth republic appeared?  I think not, what I see is the same old see-saw, Democrats get a shot under Clinton, then its the Republicans turn under Bush, then Democrats come back under Obama and now Republican are coming back.  Each time they do the same thing, Democrats try to pass national health care (a goal they have had since the Truman administration) and Republicans cut taxes and run deficits (an option made possible by the 1979 "October Revolution" in Federal Reserve policy). in both cases they cause a lot of unpopularity with their policies and get replaced by the other side as neither party addresses the obvious problem (the middle/working class has been losing ground for forty years).

The same pattern continues on as it has for decades.  We used to call this lack of movement a 3T.  We now call it a 4T, but it isn't materially any different from the 3T before it, which is why it feels wrong.  Now there are all sorts of things that have been suggested here than would be pretty clear-cut indicators of a 4T.  A constitutional convention or even a slew of amendments would be a clean indicator of an emerging "new republic" and definitive proof of a 4T.  The outbreak of mass violence, such as a civil war or insurrection, would also be clear evidence of a 4T.  If the economy collapsed like it did in 1931, this too would serve.  Finally, if through some combination of economic policies (maybe Trump's right and immigration restriction and tariffs would do the trick) the economic inequality measures peaked and began a long-term decline, why, then we'd be 4T too, although it may take a decade or two to be sure about that.

There are lots of things that could happen (and have in the past) that would be clear-cut "we be 4T" signposts.  Problem is, none of them have happened so far and generationally-speaking we are running out of time (the 1T constellation is due to arrive around 2020). This constellation is determined by the Boomer/GenX split.  The only way to move it back would be if Xers born in the 1960's start to see themselves as Boomers. Any takers here?  I don't think so

So the 2020 deadline is pretty much baked into the cake.  One of the things above or something like it has to happen like now, or during Trump's first term, at the latest. If it doesn't, the theory will be invalidated.  One can continue on with it, of course, but it would become a crank theory at that point.

To me there was a big change in how many candidates were perceived starting in 2008. With Obama, Sanders, and Trump you have had people projecting messianic dreams of world-historical change on them. Look at Obama's campaign rallies in 2008, and Sanders' and Trump's rallies in this election cycle, they all had that same messianic enthusiasm. I don't remember that with previous elections in my lifetime. To me that's a good indicator that something shifted in the collective psyche and that we are 4T.

[Remy Renault]

There was definitely a mood change at the tail end of the 2000's, despite the lack of a cataclysmic event. Frankly, Brexit and Trump happening in the same year is more than "we be 4T" enough for me.

[FLBones]

TBH, I've been following the theory myself since about 2010. I was starting to question the theory myself, but then 2016 hit. We are definetely in the 4T!! 2016 proved it to us all. Even those who aren't aware of the theory can sense the change going on. It's crazy out there. This is definetely a new and different era than it was compared to 10-20 years ago. I never would have imagined anything going on now back then. Everything feels a weird Onion story or something. The 4T book also was very accurate in predicting in what would happen now too, almost down to the zeninth, I'm suprised they were so accurate. I can see now why things are going on the way they are and it's pretty cool.

As of so far, Trump has been a totally different man for president. Whether he sticks through with his anti trade and anti China politics, tarrifs on imports, deporting the illegals, and continues battling against the globalists is to be seen. He is a Boomer, Boomers like to say one thing but do another. So far, everything the last 6 months or so has been a total reaction against the 3T ways.


Edit: another thing to add... Silents are starting to die out in large numbers now, their calm ways are being replaced with the preachy and loud Boomers. Boomers will too start to die out in about 5 years, they're going to want to leave their mark on society before they go. 13ers are replacing the Boomers as the pragmatic midlife leaders. Millennials are taking over. In two weeks, the oldest are turning 36, getting later and later in their rising adulthood years, while the youngest will be going to 13. Fast forward 3 years from 2017, the oldest Millies will be nearing midlife and things will really start to shift. There will be a liberation in economic policies like minimum wage and we'll probably see implementation of maternity leave and what not. The next few years and on going to be some really crazy times, 2016 was just the start. 2021 sticks out to me as a very important year for some reason. I think a major war is going to break out that year. The 2020s will be hectic but energizing times. The outer world will appear to be changing at a pace we've never seen before. There's also going to be great advancements in medicine. We'll see what happens.

[Remy Renault]

Isn't it a bit oxymoronic for a corporate billionaire to be anti-globalist?

[Remy Renault]

What will happen come the 1T though? Will the globalists finally achieve their goal of a NWO or will Little Englanders and the likes of Viktor Orban ultimately have their way?

[Mikebert]

(12-20-2016, 07:56 AM)Odin Wrote: To me there was a big change in how many candidates were perceived starting in 2008. With Obama, Sanders, and Trump you have had people projecting messianic dreams of world-historical change on them. Look at Obama's campaign rallies in 2008, and Sanders' and Trump's rallies in this election cycle, they all had that same messianic enthusiasm. I don't remember that with previous elections in my lifetime. To me that's a good indicator that something shifted in the collective psyche and that we are 4T.

This strikes me as reaching.  In the absence of something more definitive we can talk about subjective things like perceptions and mood that cannot be ascertained.   Past 4T were period identified from a future perspective, sometimes very far in the future.  What people actually felt is unknowable to such observers. They had to make use of the events that actually happened.  That America faced crises in 1776, 1861 and 1932 was obvious to large numbers of observers long before S&H.

At 8 years in, we are like 1971, 1937, 1867, and 1780.  In all four of these years it was crystal clear that the country had been through and was still in a momentous period of history (i.e. a social moment). I lived through the 2T.  It was obvious shit was going down. FOr decades after people talked about The Sixties as a special period. There was no need to talk about perceptions and moods, it was plain as a pikestaff.  It has NOT been plain as a pikestaff that America has been in a social moment since 2001, or 2005 or 2008, or any of the dates people have floated. This is my point.  No interpretation should be necessary. Momentous change should be underway now.  We have had big scale events: largest foreign attack on American soil since the War of 1812; second largest stock market crash in history; the first financial panic in 75 years.  There have been triggers aplenty, but they haven't ignited anything. 

This is the problem.  According to the theory triggers DO ignite things when the generational constellation is right.  Well its been right for years, with sparks aplenty and we have had bupkis.  How do you explain this?

[Mikebert]

(12-20-2016, 10:54 AM)FLBones Wrote: TBH, I've been following the theory myself since about 2010. I was starting to question the theory myself, but then 2016 hit. We are definetely in the 4T!! 2016 proved it to us all. Even those who aren't aware of the theory can sense the change going on. It's crazy out there. This is definetely a new and different era than it was compared to 10-20 years ago. I never would have imagined anything going on now back then. Everything feels a weird Onion story or something. The 4T book also was very accurate in predicting in what would happen now too, almost down to the zeninth, I'm suprised they were so accurate. I can see now why things are going on the way they are and it's pretty cool.

As of so far, Trump has been a totally different man for president. Whether he sticks through with his anti trade and anti China politics, tarrifs on imports, deporting the illegals, and continues battling against the globalists is to  be seen. He is a Boomer, Boomers like to say one thing but do another. So far, everything the last 6 months or so has been a total reaction against the 3T ways.


Edit: another thing to add... Silents are starting to die out in large numbers now, their calm ways are being replaced with the preachy and loud Boomers. Boomers will too start to die out in about 5 years, they're going to want to leave their mark on society before they go. 13ers are replacing the Boomers as the pragmatic midlife leaders. Millennials are taking over. In two weeks, the oldest are turning 36, getting later and later in their rising adulthood years, while the youngest will be going to 13. Fast forward 3 years from 2017, the oldest Millies will be nearing midlife and things will really start to shift. There will be a liberation in economic policies like minimum wage and we'll probably see implementation of maternity leave and what not. The next few years and on going to be some really crazy times, 2016 was just the start. 2021 sticks out to me as a very important year for some reason. I think a major war is going to break out that year. The 2020s will be hectic but energizing times. The outer world will appear to be changing at a pace we've never seen before. There's also going to be great advancements in medicine. We'll see what happens.

See my response to Odin. But I ask the same question of you.  How do you explain the absence of change when there have been sparks and the right constellation?

[Remy Renault]

If you don't think stuff's been triggered you're not paying attention. This current 4T is basically the most recent 3T on steroids.

[Eric the Green]

(12-20-2016, 12:40 PM)Mikebert Wrote:

(12-20-2016, 07:56 AM)Odin Wrote: To me there was a big change in how many candidates were perceived starting in 2008. With Obama, Sanders, and Trump you have had people projecting messianic dreams of world-historical change on them. Look at Obama's campaign rallies in 2008, and Sanders' and Trump's rallies in this election cycle, they all had that same messianic enthusiasm. I don't remember that with previous elections in my lifetime. To me that's a good indicator that something shifted in the collective psyche and that we are 4T.

This strikes me as reaching.  In the absence of something more definitive we can talk about subjective things like perceptions and mood that cannot be ascertained.   Past 4T were period identified from a future perspective, sometimes very far in the future.  What people actually felt is unknowable to such observers. They had to make use of the events that actually happened.  That America faced crises in 1776, 1861 and 1932 was obvious to large numbers of observers long before S&H.

At 8 years in, we are like 1971, 1937, 1867, and 1780.  In all four of these years it was crystal clear that the country had been through and was still in a momentous period of history (i.e. a social moment). I lived through the 2T.  It was obvious shit was going down. FOr decades after people talked about The Sixties as a special period. There was no need to talk about perceptions and moods, it was plain as a pikestaff.  It has NOT been plain as a pikestaff that America has been in a social moment since 2001, or 2005 or 2008, or any of the dates people have floated. This is my point.  No interpretation should be necessary. Momentous change should be underway now.  We have had big scale events: largest foreign attack on American soil since the War of 1812; second largest stock market crash in history; the first financial panic in 75 years.  There have been triggers aplenty, but they haven't ignited anything. 

This is the problem.  According to the theory triggers DO ignite things when the generational constellation is right.  Well its been right for years, with sparks aplenty and we have had bupkis.  How do you explain this?

It's a good question. I explain it, you may remember, by claiming that the 2010s are the 1850s redux. The constellation was in place then too (The Gilded had many civic qualities, according to accounts such as The Civil War series). Nothing but fruitless attempts at compromise and continuing oppression occurred, despite many triggers. The double rhythm happens, and the anomaly is not so anomalous. And the cosmic rhythms confirm timing of events. The 2020s will see the sparks explode. I have predicted the trends of both this decade and the next, decades in advance. Things have unfolded as I expected. I expect this will continue.

Describing past moods in history is very-much possible; we have the poets, artists, essayists and personal accounts of how they felt. It is not just the record of events that we have available to us. The subjective is more real than the objective; it's what we actually experience.

I agree with you that a real 4T will have actual results. These will come only in the 2020s. However, Odin's point is well-taken that with Obama, Sanders and Trump we have had not only candidates, but "movements" and "phenomena." So something is stirring, and it will lead somewhere.

I don't know if it will turn out well. So far, not so good. But my prediction remains that it will turn out pretty good. We'll see.

[Mikebert]

(12-20-2016, 03:25 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: It's a good question. I explain it, you may remember, by claiming that the 2010s are the 1850s redux. The constellation was in place then too (The Gilded had many civic qualities, according to accounts such as The Civil War series). Nothing but fruitless attempts at compromise and continuing oppression occurred, despite many triggers. The double rhythm happens, and the anomaly is not so anomalous. And the cosmic rhythms confirm timing of events. The 2020s will see the sparks explode. I have predicted the trends of both this decade and the next, decades in advance. Things have unfolded as I expected. I expect this will continue.

Describing past moods in history is very-much possible; we have the poets, artists, essayists and personal accounts of how they felt. It is not just the record of events that we have available to us. The subjective is more real than the objective; it's what we actually experience.

I agree with you that a real 4T will have actual results. These will come only in the 2020s. However, Odin's point is well-taken that with Obama, Sanders and Trump we have had not only candidates, but "movements" and "phenomena." So something is stirring, and it will lead somewhere.

I don't know if it will turn out well. So far, not so good. But my prediction remains that it will turn out pretty good. We'll see.

In the 1850's the constellation was NOT in place. Recall S&H claim the crisis came early, before the constellation was in place, which is why there was no civic generation.

[Odin]

(12-20-2016, 12:40 PM)Mikebert Wrote:

(12-20-2016, 07:56 AM)Odin Wrote: To me there was a big change in how many candidates were perceived starting in 2008. With Obama, Sanders, and Trump you have had people projecting messianic dreams of world-historical change on them. Look at Obama's campaign rallies in 2008, and Sanders' and Trump's rallies in this election cycle, they all had that same messianic enthusiasm. I don't remember that with previous elections in my lifetime. To me that's a good indicator that something shifted in the collective psyche and that we are 4T.

This strikes me as reaching.  In the absence of something more definitive we can talk about subjective things like perceptions and mood that cannot be ascertained.   Past 4T were period identified from a future perspective, sometimes very far in the future.  What people actually felt is unknowable to such observers. They had to make use of the events that actually happened.  That America faced crises in 1776, 1861 and 1932 was obvious to large numbers of observers long before S&H.

At 8 years in, we are like 1971, 1937, 1867, and 1780.  In all four of these years it was crystal clear that the country had been through and was still in a momentous period of history (i.e. a social moment). I lived through the 2T.  It was obvious shit was going down. FOr decades after people talked about The Sixties as a special period. There was no need to talk about perceptions and moods, it was plain as a pikestaff.  It has NOT been plain as a pikestaff that America has been in a social moment since 2001, or 2005 or 2008, or any of the dates people have floated. This is my point.  No interpretation should be necessary. Momentous change should be underway now.  We have had big scale events: largest foreign attack on American soil since the War of 1812; second largest stock market crash in history; the first financial panic in 75 years.  There have been triggers aplenty, but they haven't ignited anything. 

This is the problem.  According to the theory triggers DO ignite things when the generational constellation is right.  Well its been right for years, with sparks aplenty and we have had bupkis.  How do you explain this?

The extreme political polarization which began in 2008 is the current manifestation of the Crisis. One of the mistakes the authors make is that they thought that 4Ts were times of unity and common purpose, which speaks more to how they learned about the Great Depression and WW2 as kids than to historical reality. What historical 4Ts have in common is the lack of Artist restraint and compromise, any problem and any issue gets blown up to huge proportions and if there is disagreement there is increasing anger and uncompromising rage, which is exactly what we are seeing right now.

[Odin]

(12-20-2016, 04:43 PM)Mikebert Wrote:

(12-20-2016, 03:25 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: It's a good question. I explain it, you may remember, by claiming that the 2010s are the 1850s redux. The constellation was in place then too (The Gilded had many civic qualities, according to accounts such as The Civil War series). Nothing but fruitless attempts at compromise and continuing oppression occurred, despite many triggers. The double rhythm happens, and the anomaly is not so anomalous. And the cosmic rhythms confirm timing of events. The 2020s will see the sparks explode. I have predicted the trends of both this decade and the next, decades in advance. Things have unfolded as I expected. I expect this will continue.

Describing past moods in history is very-much possible; we have the poets, artists, essayists and personal accounts of how they felt. It is not just the record of events that we have available to us. The subjective is more real than the objective; it's what we actually experience.

I agree with you that a real 4T will have actual results. These will come only in the 2020s. However, Odin's point is well-taken that with Obama, Sanders and Trump we have had not only candidates, but "movements" and "phenomena." So something is stirring, and it will lead somewhere.

I don't know if it will turn out well. So far, not so good. But my prediction remains that it will turn out pretty good. We'll see.

In the 1850's the constellation was NOT in place. Recall S&H claim the crisis came early, before the constellation was in place, which is why there was no civic generation.

Many of us think S&H got the Civil War Saeculum completely wrong, there was no anomaly (most of the cohorts of S&H's "Gilded Generation" are in fact Civics) and that the 4T was from 1850-1868.

[SomeGuy]

Gah, I may regret this...

I dunno, Mike, sounds like you're saying Britain didn't have a 4T in the mid-late 19th century.  I mean, they had plenty of fuel (Franco-Prussian War, US Civil War, Indian Mutiny, etc.) but what really happened IN BRITAIN?

Not much.

Or look at the previous "4T".  The American and French Revolutions were very dramatic, to be sure, but they were happening OVER THERE.  Nothing even close came about in Britain.  Likewise with the Napoleonic Wars, which really dragged on well into what ought to have been a 1T.  Was that a skipped Crisis as well?



Look at who just got elected, under a platform of tariffs and isolationism but also torture(?).  Look at the response.  Look at the absolute moral panic over Russia by the Democrats, much less the Neocons.  The president-elect just spoke to Taiwan directly, for the first time since 1979.  Dow pushing 20,000 while earnings stagnate.  The EU looking shaky.  Pundits bemoaning the collapse of the post-war order.  Looks plenty fourth turning to me.

Stop geeking out over the latest indicator de jour ("OMG! TAX CUTS!  Well, if the president is proposing tax cuts then nothing will change EVER AGAIN because SCIENCE!).  Everybody understands that we are on the cusp of something different, and by that I don't just mean everyone who read S & H.  It's just that nobody knows what it is yet.  I have continued to be impressed/disappointed in the ability of Obama, Merkel, et al. to keep all of the dishes in the air, and I am fully confident in Trump's inability/lack of interest in doing the same.

Relax, it'll be all right, and by that I mean it will first get worse.

[Odin]

Also, the US just elected a god-damned hyper-nationalist demagogue who ran on bigotry against brown people, likely had help from Russia to get election, and is seen as practically the Antichrist by half the country, if that doesn't count as anything I don't know what will. Civil war is a serious possibility.

[David Horn]

(12-20-2016, 07:30 AM)Mikebert Wrote:

(12-18-2016, 10:02 PM)FLBones Wrote: We are not still in the 3T. You can't go from 3T to 1T without a 4T.

Correct, if the generational theory is valid.  But the proof of the pudding is in application. Either it works or it doesn't.  Back in Generations S&H wrote than not much can be told in a decade. but by 3 or 4 decades from now it will become clear. By the next presidential election it will be about 30 years since Generations, time enough to tell if it works.  It is not hard to recognize that the Revolution, Civil War and New Deal/WWII as major turning points in the development of the American state, dividing it into three "republics". And folks have been anticipating the appearance of the "fourth republic" for some time. 

So, has the fourth republic appeared?  I think not, what I see is the same old see-saw, Democrats get a shot under Clinton, then its the Republicans turn under Bush, then Democrats come back under Obama and now Republican are coming back.  Each time they do the same thing, Democrats try to pass national health care (a goal they have had since the Truman administration) and Republicans cut taxes and run deficits (an option made possible by the 1979 "October Revolution" in Federal Reserve policy). in both cases they cause a lot of unpopularity with their policies and get replaced by the other side as neither party addresses the obvious problem (the middle/working class has been losing ground for forty years).

The same pattern continues on as it has for decades.  We used to call this lack of movement a 3T.  We now call it a 4T, but it isn't materially any different from the 3T before it, which is why it feels wrong.  Now there are all sorts of things that have been suggested here than would be pretty clear-cut indicators of a 4T.  A constitutional convention or even a slew of amendments would be a clean indicator of an emerging "new republic" and definitive proof of a 4T.  The outbreak of mass violence, such as a civil war or insurrection, would also be clear evidence of a 4T.  If the economy collapsed like it did in 1931, this too would serve.  Finally, if through some combination of economic policies (maybe Turchin's right and immigration restriction and tariffs would do the trick) the economic inequality measures peaked and began a long-term decline, why, then we'd be 4T too, although it may take a decade or two to be sure about that.

There are lots of things that could happen (and have in the past) that would be clear-cut "we be 4T" signposts.  Problem is, none of them have happened so far and generationally-speaking we are running out of time (the 1T constellation is due to arrive around 2020). This constellation is determined by the Boomer/GenX split.  The only way to move it back would be if Xers born in the 1960's start to see themselves as Boomers. Any takers here?  I didn't think so

So the 2020 deadline is pretty much baked into the cake.  One of the things above or something like it has to happen like now, or during Trump's first term, at the latest. If it doesn't, the theory will be invalidated.  One can continue on with it, of course, but it would become a crank theory at that point.

I agree on all points but one: events don't have to provide a clear and distinct 4T for the theory to be valid.  Though I'm not a great fan of the mega-saeculum, the idea that 2Ts and 4Ts wax and wane is not at all outrageous.  We've had mild 4Ts in the past.  The Glorious Revolution was more an amalgam of critical events than a singular crisis, yet we have no problem citing it as a 4T.  The last three have been unusually dramatic.  I don't think that's a necessity, and certainly appears to not the case this time.  If, on the other hand, the next 2T will have to spotlight the unresolved 4T issues from this saeculum, or the cycle is essentially dead.

[Eric the Green]

(12-20-2016, 07:30 AM)Mikebert Wrote:

(12-18-2016, 10:02 PM)FLBones Wrote: We are not still in the 3T. You can't go from 3T to 1T without a 4T.

Correct, if the generational theory is valid.  But the proof of the pudding is in application. Either it works or it doesn't.  Back in Generations S&H wrote than not much can be told in a decade. but by 3 or 4 decades from now it will become clear. By the next presidential election it will be about 30 years since Generations, time enough to tell if it works.  It is not hard to recognize that the Revolution, Civil War and New Deal/WWII as major turning points in the development of the American state, dividing it into three "republics". And folks have been anticipating the appearance of the "fourth republic" for some time. 

So, has the fourth republic appeared?  I think not, what I see is the same old see-saw, Democrats get a shot under Clinton, then its the Republicans turn under Bush, then Democrats come back under Obama and now Republican are coming back.  Each time they do the same thing, Democrats try to pass national health care (a goal they have had since the Truman administration) and Republicans cut taxes and run deficits (an option made possible by the 1979 "October Revolution" in Federal Reserve policy). in both cases they cause a lot of unpopularity with their policies and get replaced by the other side as neither party addresses the obvious problem (the middle/working class has been losing ground for forty years).

The same pattern continues on as it has for decades.  We used to call this lack of movement a 3T.  We now call it a 4T, but it isn't materially any different from the 3T before it, which is why it feels wrong.  Now there are all sorts of things that have been suggested here than would be pretty clear-cut indicators of a 4T.  A constitutional convention or even a slew of amendments would be a clean indicator of an emerging "new republic" and definitive proof of a 4T.  The outbreak of mass violence, such as a civil war or insurrection, would also be clear evidence of a 4T.  If the economy collapsed like it did in 1931, this too would serve.  Finally, if through some combination of economic policies (maybe Turchin's right and immigration restriction and tariffs would do the trick) the economic inequality measures peaked and began a long-term decline, why, then we'd be 4T too, although it may take a decade or two to be sure about that.

There are lots of things that could happen (and have in the past) that would be clear-cut "we be 4T" signposts.  Problem is, none of them have happened so far and generationally-speaking we are running out of time (the 1T constellation is due to arrive around 2020). This constellation is determined by the Boomer/GenX split.  The only way to move it back would be if Xers born in the 1960's start to see themselves as Boomers. Any takers here?  I didn't think so

So the 2020 deadline is pretty much baked into the cake.  One of the things above or something like it has to happen like now, or during Trump's first term, at the latest. If it doesn't, the theory will be invalidated.  One can continue on with it, of course, but it would become a crank theory at that point.

The 1T constellation will not be fully in place by 2020. The year you apparently see as a start date for a would-be 1T is 8 years too early. The crisis climax will only rev up to full speed AFTER 2020. Mr. Howe agrees with me too. Wait; you'll see!

There's no reason to assume everything is determined by the Boom/Gen X split, which probably has been assigned too early by the authors. But that's also because the early turnings in this saeculum went by faster than the 3T did. And that, I believe, is due to cosmic timing. "The sixties" had to come when they did. Even so, some 1T conditions remained through our accelerated 2T, because the people were still prosperous and happy overall in "the sixties," despite their awakening and their protests. Also, I think the authors say that nomads enter elderhood when their oldest members become 65, not 60.

Trump is baking in the 4T mood of anger, and ramping it up to a later version of civil war. That's where we're heading, as I've said we would for decades now. It doesn't have to be the same or as bloody as then; it's also going to be the Return of the Revolution. The decline of the middle and working class has to be addressed, along with related problems like climate change. The Republican block has to be removed. We choose that option, or else our 4T is a failure. The question is whether we have reached our peak as a nation and empire, and are about to decline, as some here say; or whether this 4T will be a victory for progress as all the others have been. And yes, progress was real, not just "defined by the winners." It will be our choice, and it may come down to another 70,000 voters in the Rust Belt in 2020 or even 2024.

Success is not guaranteed for the USA. Our 4T may be a dying whimper instead of a glorious fight and victory. That's up to the people. But certainly I think the 2008 crash was enough of a catalyst to define the start of our 4T. This happened exactly how and when I predicted.

One thing I notice is, that the American High was a great climax of prosperity and power for the USA. No nation has experienced anything like it. Things may seem calmer than during the earlier 4Ts whose decisions and achievements prepared the way for this "American Century" and "American High." That's because we are still basking to some degree in that success. And we may be spoiled by it. But people don't feel as desperate as they did in previous Crises, because we are still the number 1 economy and military in the world. We have less to fret about, so our Crisis may be milder-- like the British Crises which the new poster talked about above. We are now in the position Britain was then, and so we could suffer less during this 4T.

[Mikebert]

(12-21-2016, 11:54 AM)David Horn Wrote: I agree on all points but one: events don't have to provide a clear and distinct 4T for the theory to be valid.  Though I'm not a great fan of the mega-saeculum, the idea that 2Ts and 4Ts wax and wane is not at all outrageous.  We've had mild 4Ts in the past.  The Glorious Revolution was more an amalgam of critical events than a singular crisis, yet we have no problem citing it as a 4T.  The last three have been unusually dramatic.  I don't think that's a necessity, and certainly appears to not the case this time.  If, on the other hand, the next 2T will have to spotlight the unresolved 4T issues from this saeculum, or the cycle is essentially dead.

I think people are misunderstanding my point.  I am not saying crises don't happen.  They just don't have to be generational in nature.  I have studied a variety of cycles.  They all have all four periods one of which is a crisis. Their timing is different reflecting their different mechanisms. A generational cycle is constrained by the generations that take part in it. In the S&H system it’s the adult generations that matter and the timing of the 4T start is heavily dependent on the three adult gens, Silent, Boomer and Xers occupying the adult phase of life.  This happened in 2001.  If you buy the idea that the cycle is generational, then the 4T has to start shortly after this aligned constellation.
Folks are no saying the meat of the crisis doesn’t have to happen now, it has happen later in the 2020’s.  Sure it can, and probably will.  It will be a crisis, but NOT a 4T.
I am familiar with multiple cycles.  Right now we are in the K-cycle crisis period. But the K-cycle was useless for predicting this event because it is supposed to be a fifty year cycle, and it now looks like it might be 75 or 80 years long this time.  The fact that it has been stretched way longer than its normal length shows that the forces that were responsible for its past timing are not dominant here, something else is driving the K-cycle.
I believed that what was doing this was the saeculum and wrote a book in 2002 about a generational interpretation of the K-cycle using the S&H cycle as driver.  But now we are running into the same problem with the saeculum.  Something is stretching out the saeculum, we had a 24 year 3T and it looks like the 4T may be long as well. This suggests that generations are not the primary driver of these cycles either.
Recently I have become familiar with Turchin’s secular cycle.  This one is the best documented of all the cycles I have seen and it comes with detailed mechanisms and can even be modeled with some success. Like the K-cycle it has empirical markers that tell you where you are so I can measure the cycle length. It’s about 100 years.  We are also in a crisis phase of that cycle. Last cycle the crisis phase ran from 1907-1929.  This was followed by the depression phase (which serves the function the 4T does in S&H) which ran over 1929-1941.  The crisis phase of this cycle began in 2006 and if the 100 year timing holds, the resolution of this cycle (that is the 4T-like part) will happen in the 2030’s.  The key measure of this cycle is inequality and that is the thing that is resolved. When it is resolved the cycle ends and a new one begins.  Here’s the deal, inequality is the fact that wages haven’t risen and the middle class and is crumbling. Trump is directly caused by inequality.  Stock market bubbles and the 2008 also caused by inequality.  The inequality problem has in the past been solved by civil war, revolution, invasion and economic collapse.  In other words it is solved by period that performs the function of a 4T. It is not generationally driven and so technically is not a 4T.  Based on pure secular cycle timing this “4T-like period” will happen in the 2030’s, one hundred years after the last time.
Turchin also has a second shorter cycle he calls fathers and sons cycles that he doesn’t talk much about. This cycle is explicitly generation.  I was toying with the idea that this cycle is the saeculum and that the actual cycle timing is determined by the interaction between the two cycles.
 
For example the period around 1920 was filled with violence that was caused by inequality, according the secular cycle theory.  So why didn’t the inequality get resolved then?  Turchin claims it was resolved by immigration restriction in 1924. He downplays the New Deal, putting it in the next cycle.  I think the the 4T then was key to the inequality turnaround. In fact I believe that to end a secular you need a 4T-type period.  The concept I am working with now is that a S&H 4T is simply a period when psi is high (as it is now and was in 1920) and we have the right generational constellation (like we do now but did not in 1920).  Thus, this secular cycle should end early because it does not have to wait for the 4T to come along for the inequality problem to be solved (which is why it didn’t get solved around 1920). 

What this means is when we head into recession and inequality puts in a short-term peak, events will happen so that inequality continues to decline and it becomes a long term peak. This would be caused by a set of policies that will be put into place in year X.  X will then be the end of the secular cycle AND close to the end of the 4T.  Once the solution is in place, implementing it will produce results that will create consensus on this is the way to go and we will be 1T.  I can think of a number of scenarios where this can happen in just a few years and we could well see real action taken around 2020, right where S&H forecasted it 30 years ago; inequality starts to come down and it becomes crystal clear that we now are in a 1T.  If X falls, say in 2021, then I suppose we will draw the 4T as 2001-2021 (with the 20-20 vision that comes from hindsight). If it is 2024, we might stick with 2008 as a 4T start as this will give a 16-year 4T or maybe we choose 2005, S&H’s original forecast.
If on the other hand nothing happens and we continue to see rising inequality all through the 2020’s then this wipes out that idea.  We can still date the 4T later, stretching out the saeculum, just like the K-cycle is stretched out, but the saeculum won’t be mechanistically responsible for events. The secular cycle will be in the driver’s seat.
If generations really matter, then this shift has to happen earlier rather than later.