The Fourth Turning Is Here: What the Seasons of History Tell Us about How and When This Crisis Will End

An American civil war, accompanied by a sudden implosion of global U.S. power, might usher in such ghastly scenarios as a multi-sided world war in which America itself is not a major participant.

Former Fed chairman Ben Bernanke may be correct that these measures averted an economic collapse worse than the Great Depression. But they worked largely by further exacerbating income and wealth inequality, something that did not happen in the years following 1929. And they rendered the economy dependent on ever-higher doses of stimulus—leaving it

The Millennial Crisis is therefore very likely to become a Crisis era not just for America but also for much of the world—perhaps even more than the Great Depression−World War II Crisis that preceded it.

Ordinarily, Americans prefer day-to-day competence rather than partisanship in the people they elect. Yet whenever they are reminded that the other side is pushing their country toward catastrophe, they are apt to forget about day-to-day competence.

The experience would likely remind Americans of the Great Recession—only this time trigger much louder zero-sum arguments over how income gets divvied up through taxes, benefits, subsidies, and trade. Partisan tribal factions will gravitate to more radical goals and confrontational tactics. The red zone vanguard will grow more aggressively authorit

The worst outcomes would be dismal indeed. Imagine, perhaps, a war which, after extensive violence, leaves the world in chaos—and leaves America riven into two or more fragments, one or more of which is directed by foreign powers.

If, as now seems likely, we are moving back to phases of life that are at least twenty-two years in length, 2034 would be a reasonable forecast.

The notion that an American civil war would primarily result in chronic disorganized terrorism—the so-called “Irish troubles” scenario—is likewise unrealistic. This typically happens when one faction is overwhelmingly more powerful than the other (so terror networks are the weaker faction’s only option). Or when the society has no history of legiti

Nor is the typical civil war triggered by a single urgent or “forcing” question of law or policy. Rather, it happens after one faction comes to fear that power wielded by the other will lead to the inevitable demise of its identity, its status, and its way of life—at which point the trigger could be almost anything.

Xi likes to compare “China’s order” with “chaos in the West.” As well he might, for it’s a playbook the world has seen before. Leaders of the Axis powers, after several successful invasions in the late 1930s, were themselves astonished by the disunity of their vanquished opponents.