The quotes about the mid-2020's refer to the 4T/1T transition. Think mid-1940's, or mid-1870's, or mid-1790's. The crisis is over, the major structural change typical of the 4T is largely complete.
But here is the stopping point. All of the things identified as problems in the 1990's are still here. For example, political polarization, there was the Contract on America in 1994, and the new political hostility introduced under Gingrich, the impeachment (a startling new thing back then), and the 2000 election, again something that hadn't happened in more than a century. It's all still here, just more intense, folks are talking about civil war now, and Senators are threatening violence. Feels like the 1850's. The story of the 3T is problems are deferred by the Artist generation (Silents) in power who cannot act decisively. This is supposed to change with the Prophets (Boom) coming in. And yet it has been the same kicking the can down the road for more than twenty years. Right now we have a presidential candidate who is sounding like a fascist. Trump is mostly talk, but there could be more serious people in his movement who seek to make dramatic change. This sort of change is the stuff of the 4T, but its twenty years late. You have just come to this, but The Fourth Turning (T4T) was published in 1997. We discussed all this for years at the T4T site, which was shut down some years ago.
The final nail in the coffin is GenZ. As far as I can tell, there is just as much evidence for the existence of GenZ as a generation in its own right. They are supposed to be the Homelanders (ca 2003-2023), but no there are given as ca.1996-2020.
And not just that, but this generation are classical Prophets, not Artists. It feels like an Awakening with a youth generation all fired up in moralistic crusades. The whole cancel culture thing, is about not saying (morally) bad things. Isn't the War on Terror, sort of a repeat of the 1095-1122 Crusade Awakening (yeah, we extended the original cycle back to the 9th century). And we have a list of Roman turnings too. Actually, I have three sets, and they are different, which does not fill me with confidence, if there was something to this, you would think different folks would come up with the same set of turnings.
It feels like the 1850's because the final resolution of the 4T has not arrived yet. From my perspective, your conclusion that S&W cycles can't be observed empirically is a little too premature considering turnings tend to last a few years longer especially in the current seculum. If we agree the 3T started in the early 80's and lasted until the GFC of '08, how can the 4T be 20 years late ?
The US still has a silent gen president in office with many high offices still held by the same generation. No wonder turnings are dragging.
As for Homelanders, I have 3 at home and been around this generation since they were born. These kids are no "prophets" from my point of view. Communitarian, yes. Moralistic, not even close.
Remember, the values regime we are still facing is the one stemming from the Boomer awakening, but on steroids. Let's wait a decade or so before we discredity the generational theory altogether.
The 1850's were from *before* the 4T. Being like 1850's implies the 4T hasn't started yet.
Have you read Generations? If so you know about the constellation model. Back in 2000 we (at the T4T discussion site) were trying to ger a handle on when the 4T would start. None of us bought the civil war anomaly. It seems to us every turning has to have its generation. The average turning length since the super-long Transcendentals was 18, so we applied the constellation model with gen length of 18 to estimate the start of the next gen after the millennials would start being born in the late nineties. And when 911 happened we thought that was the start if the 4T. I had noted a correlation between my Stockmarket Cycle, Kondratiev seasons and the turnings.
So we thought 911 looked promising as a 4T start. Later, when the K-fall to K-winter transition happened in 2008, we had another indicator that perhaps 2008 was the start iof the 4T. Confirmation would come in 2016 with a Democratic victory.
At that time most of us were now in the 2008 start camp (as was Howe who has posted shortly after 2008 that this looked right to him).
Later most of us came back to 2001, and now the consensus is that a 1T is coming. Most people are simply calling the last 20 years a "failed 4T".
The problem is, it's not just generations. Structural changes in the "outer world" are supposed to happen in the 4T just as changes in the "inner world" happen in the 2T. And these are clearcut for all the 4Ts except for the Armada 4T. The last three are particularly clear cut. Nathan Coleman wrote a nice account of the "three republics" the US has lived under each resulting from one of these 4Ts. (Unfortunately, it is gone, this is one thing that sucks about the net. My go to links keep dying :(
But this is not hard to see. There simply hasn't been any change. The stuff we are dealing with today was mostly there in the 1990's. It is what we thought would get resolved in the 4T. Like there was obviously a problem with financial bubbles in the late 1990's, just like in the decades before 1929. And then we HAD and honest to God old-style financial panic. And what happened? They papered over the whole thing. And when it happens again they will paper over it again I suppose. Can they do this forever. I don't know, nothing like this has ever happened before. We have gotten to a point where seemingly the authorities can just ignore problems forever. Look at polarization. Polarization was already a big issue in the 1990's with Gingrich and crew. It has just gotten worse, and now many people think civil war is in the future. A civil war would be the START of a 4T. Nobody things a civil war would be like the last one. More likely would be something like the troubles in Ireland or the Lebanese civil war that began in 1975. The former lasted more than 30 years and the later 25 years. The start of 25 year civil wat here would clearly be a 4T event, and that would put the beginning of the 4T sometime in the future.
The idea than the 4T is ending soon contains the prediction that the near future will be a turning called a "High". Perhaps you are thinking of the 4T ending with a bang like last time, but how about the Revolutionary 4T? It began with a bang (the war) and ended with a whimper (the Whiskey Rebellion in which very few, if anyone was killed). Or the Glorious Revoltion before it. Exactly what happened in 1704 (in America) to end the 4T. The big action has been in the 1670's. And then there is the Wars of the Roses 4T. The big bang was early on in the Battle of Tauton.
The Depression and WW II was the exception. Generally, there is no big climax before the resolution.
I ended up writing a book on stock cycles in 2000. These cycles are closely related to economic long cycles (Kondratieffs). Harry Dent developed a synthesis of K-cycles and the Strauss and Howe generational cycles that I read in 1997, which led me to Strauss and Howe's book Generations, which introduced their cycle ideas. I came up with a synthesis of their ideas, K-cycles and stockmarket cycles. The generation cycle articles in this link are the oldest still extant examples of my thinking ca. 2001.
I joined the Fourth Turning discussion site in 2000, and participated in it until it got shut down. It continues on in a number of Facegroup groups, where I still post. We concluded that based on their mechanism, the Fourth Turning it should have started around 20 years ago and be nearing its end now.
I spent considerable time coming up with empirical tests of the theory, making explicit predictions of future events that would either come true or not to test the cycle's validity. Some came true, like the 2008 financial crisis. Others like either a Republican victory in 2008 or a Democratic one in 2016 (depending on when you start the fourth turning) did not happen. There was also the associated stock market cycle, that failed spectacularly in 2014:
I concluded the Strauss and Howe cycle was invalidated after 2014, and discovered Professor Turchin's work. He had done all the empirical tests and had math models (stuff I labored unsuccessfully to do for the generational cycle). I was able to get up to speed and write my first application of it in just two years.
Thanks for your interest and taking the time to comment on my Substack. There is a lot to be digested here and I will take the time to go over what you've shared.
You are most welcome. I still love S&H stuff and have lots of opinions, been discussing it for 23 years. But if you want real insight, Turchin's stuff works better. I've been doing this as a hobby for 25 years. I invite you to read some of my stuff at my substack.
I know a person that use to say « plus ça change plus c’est pareil » it might look sad, but it also means human history always come back to good time with peace and love. Your text bring me back hope in our society and its futur. Thank you.
Some podcasters like Tim Pool, Joe Rogan have discussed this theory. Interestingly, the Bible explains that it usually takes 3 generations for a people to forget or leave the faith of their fathers and grandparents. Depending on which generation span you use - 25 or 40 years - the approximate time line works out similarly.
In Strauss & Howe’s framework, the span of a generation is roughly 22 years corresponding to the length of every phase of life (childhood, young adulthood, midlife and elderhood).
As for the Bible reference, there is also the following passage:
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
Love the piece! I was just reading about the Strauss-Howe theory and generational turnings! I was trying to think if the French-Canadian world - with the Quiet Revolution and all - was on the same cycle as the anglo-amercian world, or on an offset cycle. Interesting.
Interestingly enough, I noticed that French Canadian attempts historically to reshape the political order in their favour was often in a Anglo-American third turning.
The 1995 referendum on independence or the rebellions of 1837-38 for example.
This might partially explain the failures, from the viewpoint of French Canadians, in both instances.
In any case, it is an interesting angle to look into down the road.
The quotes about the mid-2020's refer to the 4T/1T transition. Think mid-1940's, or mid-1870's, or mid-1790's. The crisis is over, the major structural change typical of the 4T is largely complete.
But here is the stopping point. All of the things identified as problems in the 1990's are still here. For example, political polarization, there was the Contract on America in 1994, and the new political hostility introduced under Gingrich, the impeachment (a startling new thing back then), and the 2000 election, again something that hadn't happened in more than a century. It's all still here, just more intense, folks are talking about civil war now, and Senators are threatening violence. Feels like the 1850's. The story of the 3T is problems are deferred by the Artist generation (Silents) in power who cannot act decisively. This is supposed to change with the Prophets (Boom) coming in. And yet it has been the same kicking the can down the road for more than twenty years. Right now we have a presidential candidate who is sounding like a fascist. Trump is mostly talk, but there could be more serious people in his movement who seek to make dramatic change. This sort of change is the stuff of the 4T, but its twenty years late. You have just come to this, but The Fourth Turning (T4T) was published in 1997. We discussed all this for years at the T4T site, which was shut down some years ago.
The final nail in the coffin is GenZ. As far as I can tell, there is just as much evidence for the existence of GenZ as a generation in its own right. They are supposed to be the Homelanders (ca 2003-2023), but no there are given as ca.1996-2020.
And not just that, but this generation are classical Prophets, not Artists. It feels like an Awakening with a youth generation all fired up in moralistic crusades. The whole cancel culture thing, is about not saying (morally) bad things. Isn't the War on Terror, sort of a repeat of the 1095-1122 Crusade Awakening (yeah, we extended the original cycle back to the 9th century). And we have a list of Roman turnings too. Actually, I have three sets, and they are different, which does not fill me with confidence, if there was something to this, you would think different folks would come up with the same set of turnings.
It feels like the 1850's because the final resolution of the 4T has not arrived yet. From my perspective, your conclusion that S&W cycles can't be observed empirically is a little too premature considering turnings tend to last a few years longer especially in the current seculum. If we agree the 3T started in the early 80's and lasted until the GFC of '08, how can the 4T be 20 years late ?
The US still has a silent gen president in office with many high offices still held by the same generation. No wonder turnings are dragging.
As for Homelanders, I have 3 at home and been around this generation since they were born. These kids are no "prophets" from my point of view. Communitarian, yes. Moralistic, not even close.
Remember, the values regime we are still facing is the one stemming from the Boomer awakening, but on steroids. Let's wait a decade or so before we discredity the generational theory altogether.
The 1850's were from *before* the 4T. Being like 1850's implies the 4T hasn't started yet.
Have you read Generations? If so you know about the constellation model. Back in 2000 we (at the T4T discussion site) were trying to ger a handle on when the 4T would start. None of us bought the civil war anomaly. It seems to us every turning has to have its generation. The average turning length since the super-long Transcendentals was 18, so we applied the constellation model with gen length of 18 to estimate the start of the next gen after the millennials would start being born in the late nineties. And when 911 happened we thought that was the start if the 4T. I had noted a correlation between my Stockmarket Cycle, Kondratiev seasons and the turnings.
Stockmarket cycle: 1929-1949, 1949-1966, 1966-1982, 1982-2000.,
K-seasons: 1929-1946, 1946-1966, 1966-1981, 1981-????
Turnings: 1929-1946, 1946-1964, 1964-1984, 1984-????
So we thought 911 looked promising as a 4T start. Later, when the K-fall to K-winter transition happened in 2008, we had another indicator that perhaps 2008 was the start iof the 4T. Confirmation would come in 2016 with a Democratic victory.
At that time most of us were now in the 2008 start camp (as was Howe who has posted shortly after 2008 that this looked right to him).
Later most of us came back to 2001, and now the consensus is that a 1T is coming. Most people are simply calling the last 20 years a "failed 4T".
The problem is, it's not just generations. Structural changes in the "outer world" are supposed to happen in the 4T just as changes in the "inner world" happen in the 2T. And these are clearcut for all the 4Ts except for the Armada 4T. The last three are particularly clear cut. Nathan Coleman wrote a nice account of the "three republics" the US has lived under each resulting from one of these 4Ts. (Unfortunately, it is gone, this is one thing that sucks about the net. My go to links keep dying :(
But this is not hard to see. There simply hasn't been any change. The stuff we are dealing with today was mostly there in the 1990's. It is what we thought would get resolved in the 4T. Like there was obviously a problem with financial bubbles in the late 1990's, just like in the decades before 1929. And then we HAD and honest to God old-style financial panic. And what happened? They papered over the whole thing. And when it happens again they will paper over it again I suppose. Can they do this forever. I don't know, nothing like this has ever happened before. We have gotten to a point where seemingly the authorities can just ignore problems forever. Look at polarization. Polarization was already a big issue in the 1990's with Gingrich and crew. It has just gotten worse, and now many people think civil war is in the future. A civil war would be the START of a 4T. Nobody things a civil war would be like the last one. More likely would be something like the troubles in Ireland or the Lebanese civil war that began in 1975. The former lasted more than 30 years and the later 25 years. The start of 25 year civil wat here would clearly be a 4T event, and that would put the beginning of the 4T sometime in the future.
The idea than the 4T is ending soon contains the prediction that the near future will be a turning called a "High". Perhaps you are thinking of the 4T ending with a bang like last time, but how about the Revolutionary 4T? It began with a bang (the war) and ended with a whimper (the Whiskey Rebellion in which very few, if anyone was killed). Or the Glorious Revoltion before it. Exactly what happened in 1704 (in America) to end the 4T. The big action has been in the 1670's. And then there is the Wars of the Roses 4T. The big bang was early on in the Battle of Tauton.
The Depression and WW II was the exception. Generally, there is no big climax before the resolution.
I know a great deal about this. I first got into cycles through my observations on stock market cycles, he's my first take on it (from 1997).
http://web.archive.org/web/20040203015044/http://csf.colorado.edu/authors/Alexander.Mike/stock.htm
I ended up writing a book on stock cycles in 2000. These cycles are closely related to economic long cycles (Kondratieffs). Harry Dent developed a synthesis of K-cycles and the Strauss and Howe generational cycles that I read in 1997, which led me to Strauss and Howe's book Generations, which introduced their cycle ideas. I came up with a synthesis of their ideas, K-cycles and stockmarket cycles. The generation cycle articles in this link are the oldest still extant examples of my thinking ca. 2001.
http://web.archive.org/web/20040203000240/csf.colorado.edu/authors/Alexander.Mike/
My most recent take on this cycle is here (about a decade ago).
https://mikebert.neocities.org/
I joined the Fourth Turning discussion site in 2000, and participated in it until it got shut down. It continues on in a number of Facegroup groups, where I still post. We concluded that based on their mechanism, the Fourth Turning it should have started around 20 years ago and be nearing its end now.
I spent considerable time coming up with empirical tests of the theory, making explicit predictions of future events that would either come true or not to test the cycle's validity. Some came true, like the 2008 financial crisis. Others like either a Republican victory in 2008 or a Democratic one in 2016 (depending on when you start the fourth turning) did not happen. There was also the associated stock market cycle, that failed spectacularly in 2014:
https://mikealexander.substack.com/p/how-anomalies-drove-my-social-science
I concluded the Strauss and Howe cycle was invalidated after 2014, and discovered Professor Turchin's work. He had done all the empirical tests and had math models (stuff I labored unsuccessfully to do for the generational cycle). I was able to get up to speed and write my first application of it in just two years.
https://escholarship.org/uc/item/230872k1
My substack is my current effort along these lines.
Thanks for your interest and taking the time to comment on my Substack. There is a lot to be digested here and I will take the time to go over what you've shared.
You are most welcome. I still love S&H stuff and have lots of opinions, been discussing it for 23 years. But if you want real insight, Turchin's stuff works better. I've been doing this as a hobby for 25 years. I invite you to read some of my stuff at my substack.
I know a person that use to say « plus ça change plus c’est pareil » it might look sad, but it also means human history always come back to good time with peace and love. Your text bring me back hope in our society and its futur. Thank you.
“The little apocalypse repeats...”
Some podcasters like Tim Pool, Joe Rogan have discussed this theory. Interestingly, the Bible explains that it usually takes 3 generations for a people to forget or leave the faith of their fathers and grandparents. Depending on which generation span you use - 25 or 40 years - the approximate time line works out similarly.
In Strauss & Howe’s framework, the span of a generation is roughly 22 years corresponding to the length of every phase of life (childhood, young adulthood, midlife and elderhood).
As for the Bible reference, there is also the following passage:
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
Love the piece! I was just reading about the Strauss-Howe theory and generational turnings! I was trying to think if the French-Canadian world - with the Quiet Revolution and all - was on the same cycle as the anglo-amercian world, or on an offset cycle. Interesting.
Interestingly enough, I noticed that French Canadian attempts historically to reshape the political order in their favour was often in a Anglo-American third turning.
The 1995 referendum on independence or the rebellions of 1837-38 for example.
This might partially explain the failures, from the viewpoint of French Canadians, in both instances.
In any case, it is an interesting angle to look into down the road.