Pendulum theory of history?

[Charlemagne_III]

The pendulum theory of history argues that history is cyclical. Socrates, for example, argued that democracy leads to anarchy and anarchy induces tyranny and tyranny engenders the move back to democracy.

If Socrates is right, where are we located at the swing of the pendulum, and what do you project to be the next link in the cyclical chain?

If Socrates is wrong, why do you think he is wrong?

Your thoughts?

 

[Wesrock]

Well, I’m not sure it’s always a march of progress. I look at our present day and age and I think G.K. Chesterton had it right when he suggested that tyranny follows a tired democracy, and that perhaps becoming more civilized requires being more despotic.

Some excerpts from The Everlasting Man:

If there is one fact we really can prove, from the history that we really do know, it is that despotism can be a development, often a late development and very often indeed the end of societies that have been highly democratic. A despotism may almost be defined as a tired democracy. As fatigue falls on a community, the citizens are less inclined for that eternal vigilance which has truly been called the price of liberty; and they prefer to arm only one single sentinel to watch the city while they sleep. It is also true that they sometimes needed him for some sudden and militant act of reform; it is equally true that he often took advantage of being the strong man armed to be a tyrant like some of the Sultans of the East. But I cannot see why the Sultan should have appeared any earlier in history than many other human figures. On the contrary, the strong man armed obviously depends upon the superiority of his armor; and armament of that sort comes with more complex civilization. One man may kill twenty with a machine gun; it is obviously less likely that he could do it with a piece of flint. As for the current cant about the strongest man ruling by force and fear, it is simply a nursery fairytale about a giant with a hundred hands. Twenty men could hold down the strongest strong man in any society, ancient or modern. Undoubtedly they might admire, in a romantic and poetical sense, the man who was really the strongest; but that is quite a different thing, and is as purely moral and even mystical as the admiration for the purest or the wisest. But the spirit that endures the mere cruelties and caprices of an established despot is the spirit of an ancient and settled and probably stiffened society, not the spirit of a new one. As his name implies, the Old Man is the ruler of an old humanity . It is far more probable that a primitive society was something like a pure democracy. To this day the comparatively simple agricultural communities are by far the purest democracies. Democracy is a thing which is always breaking down through the complexity of civilization. Anyone who likes may state it by saying that democracy is the foe of civilization.

Now Egypt and Babylon, those two primeval monsters, might in this matter have been specially provided as models. They might almost be called working models to show how these modern theories do not work. The two great truths we know about these two great cultures happen to contradict flatly the two current fallacies which have just been considered. The story of Egypt might have been invented to point the moral that man does not necessarily begin with despotism because he is barbarous, but very often finds his way to despotism because be is civilized. He finds it because he is experienced; or, what is often much the same thing, because he is exhausted.

The point is here, however, that the Egyptian government, whether pontifical or royal, found it more and more necessary to establish communication; and there always went with communication a certain element of coercion. It is not necessarily an indefensible thing that the state grew more despotic as it grew more civilized; it is arguable that it had to grow more despotic in order to grow more civilized. That is the argument for autocracy in every age; and the interest lies in seeing it illustrated in the earliest age. But it is emphatically not true that it was most despotic in the earliest age and grew more liberal in a later age; the practical process of history is exactly the reverse. It is not true that the tribe began in the extreme of terror of the Old Man and his seat and spear; it is probable, at least in Egypt, that the Old Man was rather a New Man armed to attack new conditions. His spear grew longer and longer and his throne rose higher and higher, as Egypt rose into a complex and complete civilization. That is what I mean by saying that the history of the Egyptian territory is in this the history of the earth; and directly denies the vulgar assumption that terrorism can only come at the beginning and cannot come at the end.

 

[Della]

The pendulum theory of history argues that history is cyclical. Socrates, for example, argued that democracy leads to anarchy and anarchy induces tyranny and tyranny engenders the move back to democracy.

If Socrates is right, where are we located at the swing of the pendulum, and what do you project to be the next link in the cyclical chain?

If Socrates is wrong, why do you think he is wrong?

Your thoughts?

It certainly can happen that way. Benjamin Franklin stated: “When the people find that they can vote themselves money that will herald the end of the republic.” That’s where Western societies are now with entitlements galore. And when they’re reduced/eliminated we’ll see anarchy, which is already trying to start a revolution (witness the riots over the recent election), they may just have their chance. The USA’s constitution was meant to break that cycle, but if people keep reinterpreting it to fit the latest agenda, it might be swept aside. It’s a real possibility. I hope I don’t live to see–or better, that it doesn’t happen. My prayers have been earnestly directed that way. As I’ve stated before, not because we deserve it, but because we so very badly need it.

 

[7_Sorrows]

I think Glenn beck has spoke about this. He had an author on who wrote a book about
this.

 

[STT]

The pendulum theory of history argues that history is cyclical. Socrates, for example, argued that democracy leads to anarchy and anarchy induces tyranny and tyranny engenders the move back to democracy.

History is not deterministic but I like his idea. People sometimes don’t respect democracy and that can initiate anarchy. Anarchy is not desirable in long term so people seek stability. The democracy has specific structure and cannot be reached from anarchy so the next step would be tyranny. Tyranny also is not a desirable state for a long term so people gradually reach for democracy.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

What’s interesting about the pendulum theory of history is that it cautions us to believe that one system or world view will forever dominate.

Another interesting thing about the theory is that it has predictive qualities. When you are at one point of the pendulum swing, a person with foresight can prepare himself for the next point in the swing.

Study the stock markets, for example,