The Life Span of Empires: How and Why Civilisations Evolve

The images and screen captures presented below are taken from Sir John Glubb's The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival (PDF).

Sir John Glubb was a British author and lecturer, who served in the Royal Engineers in WWI, and was commander of the Jordan Arab Legion from 1939 to 1956. His famous and succinct essay, The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival, looks at the lifespan of empires from their origins to their eventual decline.

Glubb estimates that most empires do not last longer than roughly 250 years, with many of them lasting much shorter periods of time. He describes many of the stages of empire, and many of the reasons why they break down and eventually disappear.

As seen in Glubb's image above, most of the world's great empires lasted no longer than 250 years. Glubb looks at the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire as two different empires, based upon their distinct forms of government.

One of the reasons for decline of empire described by Glubb is the influx of masses of people from outside cultures, religions, and ethnic groups, who are different from the core populations making up the founders and conquering peoples who brought about the original empire.

Glubb's summary at the end of the essay:

(a) We do not learn from history because our studies are brief and prejudiced.

(b) In a surprising manner, 250 years emerges as the average length of national greatness.

(c) This average has not varied for 3,000 years. Does it represent ten generations?

(d) The stages of the rise and fall of great nations seem to be:

The Age of Pioneers (outburst)
The Age of Conquests
The Age of Commerce
The Age of Affluence
The Age of Intellect
The Age of Decadence.

(e) Decadence is marked by:

Defensiveness
Pessimism
Materialism
Frivolity
An influx of foreigners
The Welfare State
A weakening of religion.

(f) Decadence is due to:
Too long a period of wealth and power
Selfishness
Love of money
The loss of a sense of duty.

(g) The life histories of great states are amazingly similar, and are due to internal factors.

(h) Their falls are diverse, because they are largely the result of external causes.

(i) History should be taught as the history of the human race, though of course with emphasis on the history of the student’s own country. _PDF Download of Sir John Glubb's Essay on Fate of Empires

Useful supplementary reading:

Decline of the West by Oswald Spengler

The Evolution of Civilisations by Carroll Quigley

History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Vol. 1 by Edward Gibbon

Historians often disagree over details -- both large and small. That leaves it up to each of us to learn what we can, and to make up our own minds as to the lessons that we can apply from history to more modern times.

Is Civilisation In Crisis with the Collapse of the Welfare State Model?

During the Cold War, we said there were two kinds of countries: developed countries like the western industrial democracies and Japan, and developing countries. The developed countries had reached the end of history; they had figured everything out and only had to bask in their success, growing richer and happier year by year, but not changing in any disruptive or unpleasant ways.

Developing countries were still in the process that the developed countries had completed; they just needed to catch up, and then they too could stop.

The erosion of the blue [welfare state] model throughout the west rips these illusions away. There is no such thing as a developed country. No country on earth has reached a stable end state; there is no such thing as a comfortable retirement from the stresses and storms of history and of change. France, America, Germany, Japan: we thought we had found a permanent solution to all economic and social questions.

We hadn’t.

For countries like Brazil, India, South Africa and China, this raises profound questions. What is it that they are trying to do? What are they trying to become? Is their goal to emulate the social market economies that the west enjoyed a generation ago? Are they hoping to build a stable mass middle class on the basis of big box factory work and armies of white collar middle managers that dominated American life in 1970?

And if that isn’t the goal, what is? _Walter Russell Mead

The leftist welfare state model was supposed to answer these questions in the place of traditional customs, religions, and traditions. It was thought necessary to replace tradition with ideology because in multicultural societies, no single set of tribal customs could be allowed to dominate.

But if the leftist welfare state model is in crisis, a collapse backward into warring tribal factions -- as in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, or Syria -- appears inevitable.

The “developing” countries are generally sticking with the old paradigm: that development is the process of turning blue [adopting the social democratic welfare state] and that Fordist industrialization can and will yield mass prosperity.

But they are likely to discover that this isn’t true. China will not be able to build a western style welfare state as its GDP grows. The South African labor unions won’t be able to turn the country into Detroit at its peak, with lifetime employment at high wages for a unionized work force.

Manufacturing employment in these countries will not indefinitely rise, and neither will pay. Competition from other, poorer, job-hungry countries will push wages down; automation will reduce the number of workers worldwide required to produce a given level of output and by reducing the supply of manufacturing jobs automation will also depress global wages, especially for the unskilled.

Developing countries (along with the Davoisie and most commentators and “modernization theorists”) have also assumed that because development meant the establishment of a stable middle class society, to become more economically developed was to become more politically stable.

...We, the Europeans and the Japanese can probably handle a generation of wandering. Life would be poorer and nastier than it needs to be, politics would get pretty poisonous and Europe’s problems with some of its immigrants might get deeply ugly, but this might just mean the degradation of social life and the impoverishment of democracy rather than chaos, violence and the rise of new ideologies and movements based on fanaticism and hate.

I’m not nearly as sure that the rest of the world would be as calm or as stable if the blue model continues to rot but we don’t make the move to the next step.

The fight for the reforms and changes in the United States that can facilitate and speed up the birth of a prosperous post-industrial society here is deeply connected to the fight for a peaceful and prosperous world in the 21st century. It is not just that these changes will keep the US rich and strong enough to play a role in supporting world peace. It is that the example of a successful transformation here will do more to promote democracy, peace and human rights worldwide than all the foreign aid, all the diplomats and even all the ships and tanks and drones in the world could ever do.

And it is raving lunacy to expect that there is some master plan that can reveal the shape of the new society and show us how to achieve it. That isn’t what life at the cutting edge of history is ever like. The challenge of our time is invention, not implementation. The future doesn’t exist yet; we have to make it up. _WRM in The American Interest

The problem is that modern civilised nations continue to shoot themselves in the foot, by electing destructively inept clowns such as Barack Obama, and carbon hysterics such as the current leaders of Australia and the greens in the governments of several European countries.

The problems are hard enough already, without making things 10 times harder by creating faux catastrophes such as carbon hysteria to waste precious resources on.

Walter Russell Mead talks about the potential for an abundant future facilitated by advanced technologies. Such a future is possible for some parts of some countries around the world. But there are many problems of human nature and politics which will have to be overcome. Most of the world is unlikely to see its way clear to an abundant future without a great deal of violent turmoil on the way.

A Measure of a Society's Resilience

The US is a dynamic mixture of large and small. While in most nations it is the large central cities which feed knowledge and culture to the rest of the society, in the US knowledge and culture flows in both directions.

In ancient times, power tended to flow from one city-state to another, as conditions suitable for prosperity naturally shifted over time. With the coming of the nation-state, it was thought by many analysts that the city-state concept had become obsolete -- particularly in regard to smaller cities. But it is the health of cities -- including small cities -- that contributes to the resilience and robustness of the nation.

Images from Wired

Livable cities draw creative people, and creative people spawn jobs. Some places you’d never expect—small cities not dominated by a university—are learning how to lure knowledge workers, entrepreneurs, and other imaginative types at levels that track or even exceed the US average (30 percent of workers). Here are some surprising destinations from the data of the Martin Prosperity Institute, directed by Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class. _Wired

Most conventional analysts of societal growth and knowledge dynamics will assume that knowledge flows out of large universities and university towns into society at large. But in a free society with a market economy, knowledge is apt to originate most anywhere the market operates. And that knowledge is apt to flow anywhere the market can reach.

Above: How Omaha Nebraska was transformed into one of the US Midwest's most vibrant cultural hubs, starting in the 1990s and proceeding into the 2000s (see case study).

Adapted from an earlier article published originally in Al Fin Potpourri

Finding Nazis in Norway's Closet?

The only conclusion that makes sense to me is that human beings are stuck in a condition of radical uncertainty. Something big and earth shaking is going on around us, but the information we have does not allow us to predict where it all goes. _WRM

Walter Russell Mead takes a look at the Norwegian tragedy and finds Nazis in Norway's closet. Even more profoundly, Mead finds that human nature has always retained the capacity for committing vile and unspeakable deeds, and suggests that the concept of "social progress" is a myth.

When a whole society is stressed by more change than it knows what to do with, the Dark Side gets crowded. People flip out in sects and groups rather than one by one. We see that in many Muslim countries today where the appeal of terrorists is strengthened by a pervasive sense of social frustration. Sometimes whole countries and whole nationalities flip. We saw it in the Bolshevik madness in Russia, the Fascist epidemic that swept Europe in the 1920s and 1930s; we saw it in Iran in 1979. The Serbs and the Hutus went over the edge in the 1990s. _AmericanInterest

Unfortunately, much of the stress that Norway has been feeling, was designed stress inserted by its own governing leaders and cultural overseers. In fact, the social engineers of Norway were trying to accomplish far too many disparate and conflicting goals at the same time, never understanding the underlying stresses that their policies were causing to build.

But Mead looks even more deeply to try to find meaning in the tragedy:

The same technological progress that helps create violent alienation and rage also empowers individuals and groups. 200 years ago a Breivik could not have done so much damage. 100 years ago Al-Qaeda could not have hijacked a plane. Modern society is more vulnerable than ever before to acts of terror, and developments in weaponry place ever greater power in the hands of ever smaller numbers of people.

This is still in early stages. Fortunately Breivik was a traditionalist and relatively low tech mass murderer; he did not hack vital computer systems to wreak murderous havoc with a rail or air traffic control system. He did not poison the reservoirs with weaponized biologicals. He did not even pump poison gas into a subway system.

We can be reasonably confident that an increasingly chaotic and stressful 21st century will generate more bitter nutjobs and place more destructive power in their hands. Democracy and affluence won’t cure it; the same forces that raise those golden arches build bombs to knock them down. _WRM

Europe is at the center of this chaotic cauldron of change, with a shrinking core population deeply in debt and hounded by increasing numbers of violence-prone immigrants being forced upon them by their own governments. Norway's government and culture is in the advance guard of the politically correct leftist multicultural drive to displace western culture and populations with more dysfunctional cultures and populations of the third world. Norway's cultural and political leaders had thought it was safe to move ahead quickly with that agenda, given the relative sedateness of 21st century Norwegian society generally.

But human nature does not change as quickly as political whim would like it to do. Within Norway's core population are many reactive personalities, who will reach a breaking point and strike out against the perceived oppressors. If such a person is reasonably intelligent and competent in the use of weapons, a significant number of this person's perceived enemies may die. But if the person happens to be a world class scientist or technologist who is competent in the ways of profound actuation, far worse things can happen.

The "masters of the universe" -- the clowns in control of western governments -- are intent on pushing their blind ambition of social engineering agenda to the bitter end, no matter what. They are underwritten by special interests with similarly amoral ambition and intent, including the legions of Green dieoff.orgiasts, faux environmentalists, energy starvationists, and other "well-meaning" persons whose agendas could easily and inadvertently result in mass starvation and other forms of mass death.

Individuals who strike out in the manner of the perpetrator of the Norwegian tragedy only make things worse for everyone, just as the well-intended faux environmentalists and leftist multiculturalists are bound to do. There are abundant ways to make things worse, and our leaders intend to explore as many of those ways as possible.


Walter Russell Mead does not think that these forces of chaos -- combined with the technological empowering of individuals to do large-scale harm -- will lead to an apocalypse or doom. But we need to accept that something of the sort may occur, at some level of probability.

Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.

Norwegian Tragedy: Violent Outbreak of Simmering Culture War?

Explanatory Note: As a population gets progressively squeezed and harried by destructive political policies and top-down cultural dictates, it is inevitable that some weak links will break. Some unstable minds will come completely undone and commit unforgiveable acts such as what was done in Norway last week. The cause and the blame rest on multiple shoulders, indluding those of the authors of the dysfunctional and counter-productive policies and cultural dictates which helps push the unstable ones over the brink.

The growing polarisation of societies sometimes referred to as "The Culture War" is becoming more difficult to deny, in the wake of the tragic outbreak of violence and mayhem in Norway last week.

Norway has long prided herself on her tolerance to Islamic immigration and global jihad, and has gone out of her way to protect Muslim terrorists such as mullah Krekar. Despite the fact that all the rapes in Oslo over the past 5 years have been committed by outsiders -- non-westerners -- the leaders of Norway have papered over any problems that violence-prone outsiders may have been causing. The leaders of Norway considered themselves safe from Islamic violence, for that reason. But these same national leaders -- appeasers of violent men -- had failed to calculate the potential for a violent blowback from more traditional Norwegians, members of the core Norwegian population who prefer the country to go back to the way it was before the influx of non-assimilable outsiders.

Rank	Country of origin[14]	Population (2001)[15]	Population (2011)[16]
1.	Poland	6,432	60,610
2.	Sweden	23,010	34,108
3.	Pakistan	23,581	31,884
4.	Iraq	12,357	27,827
5.	Somalia	10,107	27,523
6.	Germany	9,448	24,394
7.	Vietnam	15,880	20,452
8.	Denmark	19,049	19,522
9.	Iran	11,016	16,957
10.	Turkey	10,990	16,430
11.	Lithuania	378	16,309
12.	Bosnia-Herzegovina	12,944	16,125
13.	Russia	3,749	15,879
14.	Philippines	5,885	14,797
15.	Sri Lanka	10,335	14,017
16.	United Kingdom	10,925	13,395
17.	Kosovo	0 [17]	13,303
18.	Thailand	3,738	13,293
19.	Afghanistan	1,346	12,043
20.	India	6,140	10,096
21.	Morocco	5,719	8,305
22.	China, People's Republic of	3,654	7,895
23.	United States	7,253	7,853
24.	Eritrea	813	7,728
25.	Chile	6,491	7,708
26.	Netherlands	3,848	7,251
27.	Finland	6,776	6,626
28.	Iceland	3,756	6,022
29.	Ethiopia	2,803	5,805
30.	Romania	1,054	5,670
31.	Latvia	385	4,979
32.	France	2,350	4,289
33.	Burma	63	3,350
34.	Palestinian Territory	64	3,340
35.	Croatia	1,863	3,327
36.	Macedonia, Republic of	789	3,244
37.	Brazil	824	3,017
38.	Serbia	0 [17]	2,987
39.	Ukraine	399	2,918
40.	Estonia	342	2,871
41.	Bulgaria	842	2,693
42.	Hungary	1,666	2,599
43.	Spain	1,382	2,577
44.	Slovakia	207	2,498
45.	Lebanon	1,613	2,476
46.	Italy	1,265	2,230
47.	Congo, Democratic Republic of	276	2,183
48.	Syria	860	2,163
49.	Ghana	1,355	2,116
50.	Canada	1,120	1,680
-1		-1	-1

Wikipedia Immigration to Norway
Norway is a very small country, and relatively homogeneous when compared to the US. Outsiders have a large impact, particularly when unassimilable culturally, and when present in large numbers. Norway's politicians and media can sweep outsider rape of Norwegians and other violence and crime under the rug for so long before blowback occurs.

Politicians such as the leaders of Norway and Sweden often believe that their own people have become too civilised to lash out violently against what their leaders are doing to their societies. Such politicians feel that the power of the laws, the courts, and a general culture of obedience to authority and political correctness will be enough to keep their people submissive to whatever societal changes the leaders may choose to inflict upon them.

The recent bloody tragedy in Norway suggests that there may be a bit of the berserker Viking left in Scandinavian populations, despite the long effort of regressive progressives to tame the spirit of individualism and independence among their core peoples. Regressive progressives of the western left have been generally successful over the past few decades, in using the weapons at their command -- including general control over popular media and news media -- to control their populations in the face of a wide range of provocations. But just as the female domestic partner may use her mastery of language to dominate her male partner for a long period of time, in some cases the other party may resort to his particular skills and competencies to fight back. That is just one example of when domestic violence can occur -- sometimes in a decisive way -- at the end of a long and somewhat lop-sided exchange.

Norway's sad example of bloody domestic violence appears to fit into the above mold. Norwegian citizens who object to a large scale re-arrangement of their country, have been brow-beaten and forced into submission by laws, courts, and politically correct society. They have had essentially no recourse to the course their leaders have set for their nation. But historically, humans have used violence to settle disputes far more frequently than they have used laws, courts, and the use of societal disapproval.

Governments which forget the lessons of history -- that they govern at the consent of their citizens or they do not govern for long -- will be reminded of those harsh lessons sooner or later.

Inside the continental United States, the borders of the "culture war" can be seen by looking at a national election map at county-level resolution.  The red counties lean away from the regressive progressive agenda.  The blue counties lean toward the agenda of government dependency, and shifting the balance of power away from citizens and toward central government.

Civilisations rise and fall based upon the ability of its citizens and organsations to work together toward a common stability, lingua franca, culture, security, and markets.  If the forces of dissolution and neo-tribalisation become stronger than the forces of cohesion, the civilisation will tear itself apart.

What happened in Norway is the sign of a society in the process of tearing itself apart.  The government of Norway, and other leftist European governments, will attempt to double down on the use of laws, courts, media, and popular culture and political correctness, to take advantage of the rare violent episode from the Norwegian nationalist side.   Taking that path will drive their country even deeper into the maelstrom of polarisation, and closer to large scale bloody confrontations.

Marginalising Norwegian traditionalists will result in a hardening of both sides of the culture war.  It will push the crimes of non-western immigrants even further under the media carpet.  It will make it easier for violent jihadists to plan and execute acts of intimidation and murder.  But it is what the dysfunctional Norwegian government -- and the governments of other dysfunctional European nations -- are likely to do.

Despite all the denials, the culture war is very active.  But until now, it had not been particularly violent, except on the part of government agencies enforcing political correctness.

In the US, after the violent Oklahoma City reaction to the government's Ruby Ridge and Waco adventures, came 9/11. After the US Clinton administration had declared "right wing terrorism" as the true enemy, and let down their guard against dangers from global jihadist supremacism, the jihad stepped into the breech and took advantage of the regressive progressive self-blinding. Let us hope that a similar catastrophe does not befall Europe, in its headlong rush to blame its own traditionalists for all of Europe's growing problems of immigration-spawned violence.

More: The perpetrator of the bloody Norwegian massacre also intended to attack oil and gas platforms and a BP oil company base. The man has written a 1500 page manifesto detailing his grievances and his terror plans of vengeance. Fortunately there are not many persons at this extreme in Norway or any other modern nation.

Some persons who have committed mass murders in the past were later found to be suffering from brain tumours or other serious diseases affecting their mental states.

Despite the outlier nature of this event and this perpetrator, the tragedy should be seen as a warning call to the Norwegian government and other European governments who are pressing the politically correct multicultural agenda against the best interests of their native populations. It is often the outliers -- the canaries in the coal mines -- that tell us that something is going wrong. If European governments cannot interpret the meaning of this event appropriately, they are in for a world of pain.