I’m undertaking a 1000-day reinvention project, blogging here daily to track my progress. In Thursday Thinker, I share a smart idea or theory.
The theory of the four turnings, developed by Neil Howe and William Strauss and outlined in their book The Fourth Turning: An American Prophecy – What the Cycles of History Tell Us About America’s Next Rendezvous with Destiny, argues that history unfolds in long-term cycles they term saeculums. A saeculum is a period of eighty to one hundred years in length (the duration of a long human life) divided into four basic moods or seasons — four turnings.
The seasons are:
- A High — society is confident and affluent.
- An Awakening — society demands cultural and spiritual renewal.
- An Unraveling — institutions weaken.
- A Crisis — Societal destruction paving the way for rebuilding and a new High.
The turnings are driven by the birth and rise to power of generations of people, each of a particular archetype depending on when in the cycle they were born. In our present saeculum the four generations are, as described by Howe:
- The Boomers, still in power – the Nomads. Having grown up as indulged children, they lead cultural revolutions in middle age and become moralistic, hardened elders.
- Gen X, rising to power – the Prophets – Raised under-protected amidst social change, they become pragmatic, cynical leaders during crises, such as the one unfolding now.
- The Milliennials, required to sacrifice and work for the aims that the Boomers lay out (e.g., going to war in Iran) – the Heroes. Raised with high protection and believing in the power of the collective, they emerge as adults driven to fix social disoder during crisis.
- Gen Z, the Artists. Born during a crisis, they are cautious and emotional. They grow up to be flexible, conforming adults.
In The Fourth Turning is Here, Howe suggests we are in a fourth turning period right now, a crisis where institutions will be torn down. This era is marked by institutional decay, severe political polarization, financial volatility, and threats of global conflict.
The last fourth turning ran from the 1929 stock market crash through World War II. It was a crisis on a worldwide basis, and it laid the foundation for the so-called Pax Americana, a time of relative international stability and worldwide economic prosperity, overseen by the American hegemon. With the dollar as the reserve currency and the U.S. military more powerful than any other,
Because many people think in linear time — that we are always progressing and improving — they look at the United States of today and think that it can only become more economically, culturally, and militari;y powerful. In cyclical time, however, empires come and go. Before the American century, the British empire was the most powerful. What country or culture will take over after the crisis we are living through? The baton shall be passed.