Fourth Turnings

What do you think of the theory?

As the theory goes, there is a cycle of generations. Every 80 years the country reaches a major crisis and sorts itself out: the American Revolution, Civil War and the Great Depression/World War II. Historical cycles play out like seasons: Spring (High), Summer (Awakening), Fall (Unraveling) and Winter (Crisis).

Wikipedia:

“According to the authors, the Fourth Turning is a Crisis. This is an era of destruction, often involving war or revolution, in which institutional life is destroyed and rebuilt in response to a perceived threat to the nation’s survival. After the crisis, civic authority revives, cultural expression redirects towards community purpose, and people begin to locate themselves as members of a larger group.[

The authors say the previous Fourth Turning in the US began with the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and climaxed with the end of World War II. The G.I. Generation (which they call a Hero archetype, born 1901 to 1924) came of age during this era. They say their confidence, optimism, and collective outlook epitomized the mood of that era. The authors assert the Millennial Generation (which they also describe as a Hero archetype, born 1982 to 2004) show many similar traits to those of the G.I. youth, which they describe as including: rising civic engagement, improving behavior, and collective confidence …”

Anyway, recent events have got me thinking about the theory. 80 years from the beginning of World War II is around 2020. I’ve never read the book, but I am familiar with the basic outline of the argument. The author was recently on the Peak Prosperity podcast to talk about it.

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20 Comments

  1. Sounds like a rehashing of the Kondratieff wave theory. It was popular 4 decades ago.

    It had a 60 year economic cycle with connected social and military consequences.

    Seems that someone took out a 45 yr old newsletter and just restyled what it said.

  2. Yes I agree with that. I remember reading about it in Merlin Miller’s book. I believe he mentioned in every 100 years and it became every 50 years. Now the events in terms of race riots and violence have been happening very frequently. I can see this going for a long while. The elections play a big role but I can see these things keep going until the National Guard stops it with armed force. Deo Vindice !

  3. We have unprecedented generational disunity. There always was some generational friction but the way boomers and millennials hate each other is unprecedented and not totally explained by diversity because whites millennials feel the friction.

    That I think is going to be the “big thing.” It’s going to be when the younger generation finally fights back, but that will include a lot of non-whites.

  4. This goofy pseudo-historical Meyer-Briggs style astrology has neo-conservatism written all over it. “The Fourth Turning.” Are you a Fifth Monarchy man?

    The thing about “conservatives” and history is this: for the vast majority of “conservatives” – their heritage has no influence on their thinking, no influence on their identity, no influence on their values. Neo-conservative references to “history” are invariably self-aggrandizing superstitions. It is just a variation on Adam Weishaupt having claimed to have received the true religion of Christ.

  5. Any way the Right can stop the stupid infighting and babyish squabbling? We have a much greater enemy looming. Hunter, Spencer, Ramz, Fuentes – you need to support each other and present a united front.

    • Jannie,

      A lot of these guys (not all) would rather be a big fish in a (very) small pond.

      Ego et al, that’s why so much of the alt-blight “leadership” (lol) is essentially worthless

    • Ramz and Fuentes are not on our side at all, so there is no “infighting.” They are both liberals.

    • “Hunter, Spencer, Ramz, Fuentes – you need to support each other and present a united front.”

      What a spectacularly useless move that would be.

      The alt-right talking to the alt-right gets nowhere. We’ve seen that. A united front was what was present in C’ville in 2017; we saw the results of that. Preaching to the choir is pointless.

      What is NOT pointless is understanding how the people in your locality think, interacting with them on a regular basis, understanding their values, and being able to demonstrate that certain specific political positions you advocate would improve their situations – and also let them be “good people”. Or building an organization that has local chapters throughout your region while not being a clear target for government infiltration or leftist suppression.

      The infighting and squabbling happens because verbal sniping on the internet is a lot easier than real-world work like that.

    • Agreed…this is where we all put our petty differences to the side and side with our people blindly and tribally.
      Just like the negroes and jews and brown people do.
      These riots may be our actual last shot at waking large sects of the white populous up which may thwart the catastrophic violence that will happen if our current trajectory isn’t stopped.

  6. Years ago I watched a documentary on Nostradamus, that was on network TV. I can’t remember the year I saw it or its name, but it must have been made a few years after 9/11, because they tried to interpret one of his quatrains to say he predicted NY city would be attacked, and he warned people to leave the city.

    Anyway getting to the point, they also thought he predicted a second and very nasty civil war would occur in America, where Americans would decide once and for all what the country should be. Watching the USA rapidly degenerate over the last 15 years keeps reminding me of that prediction.

  7. Re: a “turning”:

    There is one essential turning: No political system lasts forever, and some are worse than others, but none is ever good, because people are not good. The “heart” of man (and woman) is naturally “desperately wicked.” Only the “Light” of God can “TURN” men from pride and selfishness to be humble and unselfish, share with and care for one another – doing “unto” others instead of doing TO others – creating peace on earth in spite of the carnal sword (any political system).

    • “The “heart” of man (and woman) is naturally “desperately wicked.”

      WHAT TOTAL BS.

      there are some exceptionally virtuous ppl.
      Ppl of noble character and dedication to good.

  8. LOSING PERSPECTIVE…

    Many will get too caught up in the hullaballoo of the moment and see far-reaching changes right around the corner.

    I doubt it.

    Why?

    Because those for whom this society has been designed are not really being damaged by any of this. No, they are in gated communities, or watching things unfold via their smart phone at the edge of a pool in St. Thomas or Dubai.

    In order for the period we entered into, perhaps in 2010 with the advent of The Tea Party or 2015 with the Trump Candidacy, those for whom this country is running would have to concede something, and I see not the vaguest signs from them on that.

    No, in order for any kind of a change to occur, things are going to have to get, and remain, extremely dysfunctional, in an anarchic way, for a long time, if for no other reason than a war cannot be won until the sides have fully formed, identified each other, and slugged it out until one side grows too tired to go on.

    Or maybe there is a 3rd way?

    HOW IT WILL ARISE…

    Right now there are two governing status quos – the first being the dysfunctionally corrupt technocracy of Bureaucratic Washington and the second the chaos and mayhem of the Left-controlled urban areas.

    To evolve a new paradigm that will gradually outcompete these two status quos, Smalltown and Rural Whites will have to suffer their disgust level to be driven up to the point where they become sufficiently politicized to proffer a 3rd way that will succeed as the other two status quos exhaust their appeal to the broader public.

    Though Smalltown and Rural Whites have suffered enormously, and largely in silence, during recent decades, they remain the only ones left in this nation with enough of the original sensibility, and common sense, to forge something that will make it through these chaotic years.

    In the midst of incredible corruption and unreasoning agendae, Common Sense, based on traditional laws and customs, will slowly win out.

    But, yes, it will be a long slow process that goes through numerous stages.

    There can be no other way, if only for the fact that the United States’ Government has degenerated past the point of being able to offer something genuinely remedial and the cities will not be able to offer a view beyond destruction of what think think is or was.

    People in smalltowns and rural places, on the other hand, are still actively engaged in the construction of life – from the mending of fences and the administration of farms to the restoration of historic places and the attending of churches.

    These things must win out, because they are the building blocks of well-being and life, whilst the other two competing status quos are the building blocks of disease and death.

    Yes, in the end, the great creative spark that is Anglo-Saxon blood, and their friends who are in alignment with them, will reign – because the impulses to create, mend, thrive, and build are still there, in abundance.

    If it is that The Anglo-Saxe Blood has seem wilted in recent decades, it has only been because those in charge of this society made it their task to thwart and redirect that vital drive to impotence and indifference, and thus a languishing on the vine.

    The resulting chaos, however, that has been brought about by the relegation of this blood, will bring this long hibernating vitality out once again.

    In the beginning, this country was built by small White Communities, and, in the end, it will be rebuilt by them, because the spirit of construction still lies within them.

    The Blood may be stifled for a time, but, not forever. It will win out, because it cannot be made to lay permanently against it’s nature – dormant.

    This era, unlike the one we are leaving, is built for Anglo-Saxon Blood to shine; a new wilderness from which a new civilization will have to be carved out.

    There is no other race so well equipped in the world to deal with this kind of challenge, and it will win out.

    That, as of the early morning hours of June 1 2020, is what I see ahead of us.

  9. As a Gen Xer I like Strauss & Howes theory and have no problem identifying with my age cohort. Heck I am wearing a Nirvana T-shirt right now.

    When it comes to the fouth turning there id alot of debate about what that event is/ was.

    9/11? Seemed to usher in an age of endless war and a surveillance state to track dangerous muzzies. (In 2004 I did not vote for Shrub due to my opposition to the Patriot Act nor in 2008 for McInsane due to his war-mongering rhetoric.)

    The Great Recession? (circa 2007) The job losses were scary & I seem to recall reading one of Strauss & Howes blog posts speculating this was ‘The Big One’

    What about the misery of current times?

    Anyhow one thing I do know is this Pandemic has not been the Boomer-caust some pkanned & I was kind of hoping it would take out my my boss who is a Boomer and I would finally be free from the shackles of the Boomer-hegemon.

  10. “From bondage to spiritual faith; (1700s)
    From spiritual faith to great courage; (1750s)
    From courage to liberty; (1770s)
    From liberty to abundance; (1800s-1940s)
    From abundance to complacency; (1940s-1960s)
    From complacency to apathy; (1960s-1980s)
    From apathy to dependence; (1980s-2000s)
    From dependence back into bondage.” (2000s-2020s)

    White Americans are somewhere in between apathy and dependence, headed back into bondage. Southern Whites are in complacency and apathy.

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