I wouldn't say either of those experienced large scale internal conflict, depending on what precisely is meant. I suggested the definition below as "the state violently fracturing, with the central government either ceasing to exist or losing all authority in large sections of its territory."
Those countries did experience military coups that put repressive governments in place, which I guess you could call "large-scale internal conflict" if you really wanted to. But even so, they fail by the definition of "prosperous democracy after 1945." The breakdown of Argentina happened before WW2. By 1945, Argentina was already broken, not rich, and in the midst of many decades of political instability. Meanwhile Chile has never been more than a middling economy at best.
It is pretty reasonable to describe a coup followed by a "dirty war" with as many as 30,000 citizens murdered as as "large scale internal conflict." Likewise a coup followed by a "Caravan of Death" with as many as 27,000 murdered. If he had something more narrow in mind the onus is on him to say so. Likewise, Argentina may not have been doing as well in 1945 as it had formerly, but both it and Chile were still far more "prosperous" than all but the most wealthy nations.
I'd say they were "prosperous nations" after WW2 in the sense that a Toyota Camry is a "fast car". I mean OK, we can debate exactly how fast a car needs to be to be "fast", and point out that many economy cars are slower, and that's before we even get into whether a go-kart or a golf cart counts as a car, and we could even start to bring up horses and camels, but still no one would describe a Camry as a "fast car" relative to other cars unless they're going out of their way not to get the point.
I'll allow there's more room for opinion on what a "large-scale conflict" is. But in this case, Hanania did link to an essay in which he made clear he's talking about civil war. And this is coming out of the specific context of people talking about "national divorce" and a movie called "Civil War" that's in theaters.
Not comparable at all because, as I said, Argentina and Chile were still far more "prosperous" than all but the most wealthy nations. Camrys are not faster than all but the fastest cars. And what both countries had was close enough to civil war to qualify as "large scale conflict."
On 1. There have been technological developments, mainly nukes, that make WW2 conflict impossible today. On the ideological front, fascism was destroyed and even countries that flirt with fascism go to great lengths to say they are not fascists. It's run-on-the-mill Fukuyama.
Fascism didn't come into existence until after WW1. WW1 thus happened without the help of fascism. There were lots of wars that happened during the Cold War without either party being fascist either.
Fascism is an ideology that says you need to show you're superior through war. Neither liberalism nor communism says that. That's why liberals and communists can live peacefully, like it was in the 1st world war, or now in the 2nd world war. Neither China nor the US need, because of ideology, defeat the other side through force to gain legitimacy. Indeed, liberalism vs communism create a healthy competition, because both gain or lose legitimacy through progress and economic development.
And obviously Napoleonic France (the Napoleonic Wars were a World War) and many countries during WWI had proto-fascism ideologies.
Today, Putin is invading Ukraine because he says the Ukranians are the fascists! It's totally different.
IMO, this puts too much emphasis on ideology as the primary driver of the 2nd World War.
Germany and Italy were fascist, but Japan wasn't, and the latter was every bit as expansionist as its European partners.
I'd say it's no coincidence that the major powers that lacked either continent-sized landmasses (the US and the USSR) or expansive, resource-rich colonial empires (the UK and France) were the ones that initiated wars of conquest.
Communists were opposed by liberals during the Bolshevik Revolution. The USSR became a pariah state had to rely on Germany for trade (sneaking around Versaille restrictions intended to prevent Germany from re-militarizing).
Napoleonic France had nationalism, but wasn't proto-fascist.
> Neither China nor the US need, because of ideology, defeat the other side through force to gain legitimacy.
At this point China doesn't seem to have such aspirations, but Maoism was an ideology of global communist revolution, and they supported revolutionary groups around the world. The Black Panthers and other radical groups adopted Maoist ideology and aspired to carry out such revolution in the US.
The simpler reasoning one should use is Tetlock's: usually trends (of the sort you'd call "medium run") persist longer than people expect. This applies to both "good" and "bad" things.
> This process of global communication and learning explains why the Soviet Union collapsed.
That explains too much, as lots of other Communist governments did not collapse and instead still exist.
> If you read Steven Pinker’s The Better Angels of Our Nature and look at the graphs throughout the book, you notice that something fundamentally shifted in 1945.
I don't think he argues that way. Rather, primitive societies like the Yanomamo war with each other constantly, so more settled civilizations typically have lower mortality rates from war. The World Wars were blips upward in a process that was otherwise getting more peaceful in the long-run (with the previous blip being the wars of the French Revolution & Napoleon). They were followed by the Cold War, which features lots of proxy wars even if they weren't nearly as large as WW2. It's the end of the Cold War that he refers to as marking our current era of peace.
> the much-maligned Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928, which supposedly “outlawed war,” that created new international norms, as the border changes that occurred through military force after that time tended to get reversed
Plainly wrong, as the border changes in the wake of WW2 were not reversed. There were annexations of territory afterward that nobody expected to be reversed, but overall "dirt theory" and the "Grand Illusion" idea of war meant western powers typically shied from gaining territory that way.
This kind of prediction is important in financial markets. Some people like to trace the return of stocks back until the era of free banking, or even earlier, and say that the post-WWII bull market in U.S. Stocks is just a historical abnormality. You need to acknowledge that the Federal Reserve Act of 1913, the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, while many developments on how investors think about stocks themselves (like the publication of the Securities Analysis book in 1934), are changes so big that what happened in the 19th century with stocks, inflation, and the macro landscape is just useful as a matter of historical trivia.
The interest in far history is just useful to learn what doesn't change among humans. Indeed, some drama that Marcus Aurelius faced is just the same to the one modern people suffer. But mostly, a lot has changed in the past 2,000 years. And it seems that there are easier ways to discover what doesn't change than reading Ancient Egypt books. (If you're interested in what doesn't change, read Morgan Houssel book What doesn't change. It's short and worth the shot).
In terms of what happens in poor countries, this is perhaps one of the main places where looking at history is useful. Certain states managed to precociously become stable democracies and some didn't. This isn't *just* genetics because even countries in Western Europe had wildly divergent trajectories. Post 1600s, Britain mostly did boring gradualism while France fought a bunch of huge wars, had several revolutions, and got taken back over by restored monarchies or dictators a few times. It's worth trying to figure out what the precocious countries did right. Some big element of it is probably luck, but I doubt it's all luck.
According to XIXth century french politician/historian Guizot, fervent patriot but also admirer of the UK, the main difference was the power in the UK always (had to) compose and compromise between lords/king, church/state, cities/rural. Even democracy/monarchy. Whereas in France there was a tendency to absolutism - full feudalism, to absolute monarchy, to absolute revolution, to absolute modern dictature, etc. But many other narratives exist.
The British went through the same process as the French, it's just that theirs lasted 50 years (1639-1689) and produced a constitutional monarchy, whereas for the latter it lasted 82 years (1789-1871) and produced a republic.
Note that, absent the 1870-1871 Franco-Prussian War, there's a good chance that France would have also ended up as a constitutional monarchy, albeit with an Emperor instead of a King.
I don't think it challenges the main narrative but France had a civil war as a liberal democracy, around 4,000 people died in mainland France and far more in Algeria in fighting over the status of Algeria.
Italy and the UK had minor civil wars in the same period.
Probably need to distinguish between a localized low-level insurgency or period of escalated terroristic attacks against the central government, and a major civil war. You could also point out the Basques in Spain as an example of the former. But when we speak of the "Spanish Civil War", we all know what event we're talking about. And I think that's the sort of event Richard is predicting won't happen to a rich country: the state violently fracturing, with the central government either ceasing to exist or losing all authority in large sections of its territory.
I don't really understand how Italy and the UK had "minor civil wars".
I'm more familiar with Italy and I disagree strongly that Red and Black terrorism during the 60s and 70s should be considered a "civil war",at no point after WWII were portions of British or Italian territory under the effective control of an insurgency
There's no particular evidence that being a democracy stops a country from being imperial especially if you adopt a somewhat softened definition of what an empire is. It doesn't stop colonial wars of independence but it does seem to stop wars within or between democratic metropoles. The one major exception to this is that the outbreak of democracy is often accompanied by brutal civil war between the old power structure and the new democrats. A good example would be the Civil War in the Vendee in France:
The American Civil War can also be framed in this way as the South was more of a quasi mercantalist oligarchy than a real democracy. Our Founding Fathers were just of such unusually high quality that they managed to successfully put off the confrontation for a couple of generations. This entrenched democracy legally and culturally and was probably why the Civil War was so "clean" by civil war standards. There was nasty sectarian violence in the South after the war (especially in Texas) but it would have been 1000X times worse without the preexisting strong democratic institutions and norms.
*Edit* I keep thinking of more things to add. Marxist revolutions are stupid, but it's notable that they were more appealing in peasant societies than they were in actual industrial societies. It seems like it's very hard to go from a moribund farming society where 3% of the population owns all the land and uses it for highly inefficient agricultural production to one where most individuals own property and are thus incentivized to work hard and improve it. Central planning and collectivization are stupid, but violent redistribution of land into the hands of individuals unfortunately seems like a consistent prerequisite for real development.
The idea that England developed without a revolution nor bloodletting is ahistorical. The Wars of the Three Kingdoms, including the English Civil War, lasted 15 years, led to the execution of the King and the formation of the Commonwealth, and killed the equivalent of about 10% of the population of the British Isles.
On a proportional basis, they were more violent than the French Revolution.
Throw in the Stuart Restoration and the Glorious Revolution and you have parallels to the Bourbon Restoration and the July Revolution in France.
In effect, Britain's historical rupture spanned the years 1639 - 1689, whereas France's historical rupture spanned the years 1789 - 1871.
I didn't say England didn't have bloodshed. I said they still have a titled nobility (they even have a monarch) because they didn't have a revolution LIKE FRANCE. France's "Decree Abolishing Hereditary Nobility and Titles" dates to 1790, shortly after the revolution began. Within the Parliamentarian faction of the English Civil War there were Levellers who wanted equality before the law, but they lost out to the moderate Grandees.
As I've said, countries which retained their monarchies tend to be better off than their republican neighbors. England retaining its nobility means it didn't experience the disruptive change that France did.
The Franco-Prussian war happened well after revolutionary France had already abolished its nobility, abolished the monarchy a couple years later, then killed not just the king but the queen, went to war with most of Europe and changed legal systems of places they conquered in ways economists are still studying today. England didn't require an international coalition to force a monarchy back on its throne; the monarchy had only been replaced by Cromwell's protectorate because he couldn't make a deal with the king after multiple civil wars, and after Cromwell died the monarchy was restored without having to fight another civil war.
You clearly didn't read my other comment where I specifically mentioned that history was worth studying to see how different states developed and mentioned the difference between England and France. England and a handful of other (mostly northern European) nations are pretty much the only ones that made that transition peacefully. For every 1 of those, there are 20 that did it violently or else failed to do it all.
As to the other point...seriously? The south was a society with a much narrower functional franchise through much of its history and massive numbers of men who were either literal slaves or disenfranchised tenant farmers to gigantic landlords. The North (especially New England) had precocious self government that incorporated many of the middling classes, lots of people who owned their own land, and a pretty much constantly and dramatically expanding franchise post 1830s.
Plenty of countries tried violence and still developed worse. Surviving monarchies today tend to be better off than their republican cousins, and that includes the Middle East.
I will grant that slaves couldn't vote (just as they didn't in ancient Athens), not being considered citizens at all. But tenant farmers are another story.
"Not a single state that entered the Union after the thirteen colonies had a property requirement for the franchise, and although a few adopted tax-based qualifications, it was only in Louisiana that the restriction was a serious constraint and endured very long. Most of the original thirteen states (all but Rhode Island, Virginia, and North Carolina) eliminated property qualifications by the middle of the 1820s [...]
The use of wealth as a basis for distinguishing who should vote was clearly becoming less When there were wealth-based restrictions, there had been no real need for provisions that dealt specifically with these classes, but as states eliminated or weakened the economic-based qualifications, there was increasing emphasis on introducing or tightening qualifications that would keep undesirable groups out of the electorate. At the same time that Delaware, Maryland, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania eased their economic qualifications, each altered its constitution to exclude blacks. On the eve of the Civil War, the only states that extended the franchise to blacks were five in New England (where those of African descent were exceptionally rare) and New York (where a property requirement of $250 was applied to blacks, as compared to no requirement for whites). [...]
[B]y 1820 more than half of adult white males were casting votes, except in those states that still retained property requirements or substantial tax requirements for the franchise – Virginia, Rhode Island (the two states that maintained property restrictions through 1840), and New York as well as Louisiana. The clear implication is that the adoption of laws that extended suffrage contributed to the attainment of such broad participation in elections. Some may consider the estimates puzzling in that the voting rates are higher in early non-
presidential elections than in the presidential elections, but that is probably a testament to
citizens caring most about local issues during this era and presidential races not generally
being contested seriously at the state level. [...]
By 1840, only three states retained a property qualification, North Carolina (for some state-wide offices only), Rhode Island, and Virginia. In 1856 North Carolina was the last state to end the practice. Tax-paying qualifications were also gone in all but a few states by the Civil War, but they survived into the 20th century in Pennsylvania and Rhode Island."
The world becoming more black African and Muslim is what the EU and the globalists are planning for. Laws and institutions,corporations, culture etc are changing to accommodate that. The fact is that the US spends the most on military and continues to have a materiel superiority over Russia which is why every symmetrical conflict since WW2 has gone the way of the side supplied with US weapons and or US support. Let's put to the test the concept of the US being a high net positive for the world since the end of the Cold war. Take the first Gulf War where they adhered to the UN resolution and degraded the Iraqi armed forces before launching the ground war. A complete military and political success was the verdict. But because Saddam Hussein remained in power US troops remained in Saudi Arabia in large numbers which offended Osama Bin Laden who had been part of the Mujahedeen forces in Afghanistan who forced the Soviet Union out of the country. Cue the first attack on the Twin Towers in 1993 which is conveniently forgotten. But of course this was at the start of the Clinton administration which won largely as the result of Bush having to renege on his promise of no new taxes mostly due to spending on the Gulf War, and a third candidate Ross Perot being on the ballot too. That Democrat administration was more concerned with European affairs-Ireland and the former Yugoslavia, neglecting the Islamic threat. This meant that 9 11 was allowed to be plotted and the event occurred at the start of the Bush administration and its disastrous response has created a fall out affecting Europe much more than the US. But turning to the present and the 2 wars that are interlinked really as Israel was supplying armaments to the Ukraine and was focused on a potential attack by the Iran backed Hezbollah from the North neglecting the Southern border completely. But those 2 conflicts were always going to break out again. But the Russian invasion was desired by the US as Trump's present for the incoming Biden administration of exit from Afghanistan left them with no worries about casualties there and they knew about the deep flaws in the Russian military and the resistance to it that would follow.And to link that conflict to China we can see that they've never recognised Russias annexation of the Crimea back in 2014.Abstaining in the UN is precisely sitting on the fence on the issue. If they had how many countries would have recognised it by now too?40?50?It might have changed the course of recent history and avoided the conflict. And switching again to another topic in the essay the crime levels in Latin America, they are chiefly drug related and to the Mexican Cartels which have only come about since the NATFTA so US liberal capitalism should take credit for that.
Correct. Most instead of every would have given my reply the accuracy I intended. But come to think of it the Korean War did effectively have the two communist states on the same side with a high risk of ww3 breaking out with an A Bomb involvement had the communist forces been facing a total defeat. so a stalemate allowed both sides save face.
Believe he's referring either to the Algerian War (1954-1962) or the 1958 coup (can't be this, actually, because it didn't have so many people die, but arguably a better example of instability within a liberal democracy as opposed to at its outskirts.)
"[...] or alternatively heralding the creation of machine-Gods. I don’t think that the world will be that exciting in the future [...]"
Ever? In the entire future? Unless I'm misunderstanding something, this is a pretty strong claim. Present understanding of the laws of physics rules out superluminal travel, but not superintelligent machines.
I wouldn't that be that worried about the rise of the Muslim share in the world. Most Muslims actually live in India and Southeast Asia. Both of these regions are seeing a falling birth rate. Plus now a majority of Africans are actually Christian. So the Christian portion of the world population is probably increasing.
Bullish Latin America? Really? I can maybe see Mexico and maybe some of the Mexican supply chains will spill over to Central America but that's doubtful. Although Latin America might have changed in a way that would prevent a long lasting upsurge in crime. Since 90s, almost all of them have been more educated and also less unequal. The rise of this urban middle class might more strongly reward politicians to be pro law and order than before.
I actually think it's probably harder for Mexico to unfuck itself than most of Latin America. Controlling the trade routes into the USA is just too valuable and you would need years of loyal, non corrupt, massed state violence to get rid of the cartels. Good luck with that. There are certain changes in *US* policy that might defang the cartels, but that is largely out of Mexico's control.
So, I'm a huge fan of your writing, so I paid for a separate account to read your paid stuff, but I'm also a coward, so I'm not commenting from an account linked to my credit card number. I saw what they did to you, and unlike you I doubt I write well enough to make a living on it after cancellation. ;) As I've said below, I could survive, but...why blow things up before absolutely necessary? There may be something useful I could still do by waiting another few years and accumulating another million or so.
I really enjoyed your bit about the female comedian who talks about saying she doesn't want to sleep with you when she really does. So you can get an idea of how this affects people with bad social skills and low risk tolerance, here was my reasoning. Perhaps it will serve as a cautionary (or comical) tale.
In my teens (90s): I have bad social skills. I know some of this 'no means no' stuff is BS and sometimes they say no when they mean yes, but I'm not smart enough to figure out when. Furthermore, if something goes wrong and she gets pregnant, I'll have to drop out of high school to get a job and my life will be ruined. If she really hates me and decides to launch a false rape accusation, I can wind up in jail where I'll be raped regularly and probably die young of HIV (this was before protease drugs). I'll wait until after college.
In my 20s (2000s): I have bad social skills. I'm not good at reading people. If I make the wrong move on a girl, at the very least my college and academic career (because that's what people with bad social skills are supposed to do, right?) will be over and I'll have to join the working class, where my academic skills are useless and my poor social skills will rapidly become a liability. (And I don't fight well, so I'll get beat up all the time.) Momentary pleasure from sex is not worth this risk. I know feminists are probably lying about this stuff because they lie about everything, but they've made the rules where I am and I don't have the charisma or public support to change anything. I'll keep my mouth shut and my nose clean and hoard enough cash to retire early. I'll slake my thirst for rebellion by reading weird right-wing stuff...you know, Sailer's really smart, Moldbug's interesting if lengthy, and this Hoste guy writes really well.
In my early 30s (early 2010s): OK, I've read Roissy and then Heartiste. The whole thing was a stupid shit-test. However, I'm not smart enough to know when to get past it, and the consequences are still not worth it. I have a good job, which means they'll want me for my money as the 'beta bux' part of the equation, but that also means they'll divorce my ass and collect half my dough and I'll be working to feed my ex-wife for the rest of my life. Screw it. Well, these apps leave a record that can be subpoenaed in a court case, so maybe I'll try there. This OKCupid thing is kind of fun.
In my late 30s (late 2010s): OK, I've read Heartiste, who was pretty enlightening before he turned into a Nazi. How do you go from getting laid to goose-stepping? Wow, everyone's crazy these days. The only thing I have to offer is 'beta bux', and now with this woke crap blowing up they can wreck my career any time they want. "Believe women!" Given that I'm accumulating nicely it doesn't seem worth it to blow up everything for love. I'll stick to the apps where I have records of everything, though I never seem to meet anyone I'd actually want to start a family with. What happened to OKCupid?
In my 40s (now): Too late now. Sure, I could try to marry a substantially younger woman, but that's something only the top five percent of men can carry off. But I now have over 25x annual expenses saved. Theoretically if terminated over a scandal I could survive indefinitely. I still have an estimated three to four decades to live, and theoretically could survive cancellation. I've failed in the Darwinian sense and my sperm are probably bad, but have yet to actually *die*, and have no intention to do so. So, what to do with the remainder of my existence?
Recommended reading on this topic: The Beginning of Infinity, by David Deutch. The Industrial Revolution was made possible by the Enlightenment, which was made possible by the ability of people to seek good explanations, with dissenting opinions allowed, which create dynamic societies with hypothetically limitless growth. This book was written in 2012. One is perhaps less optimistic after seeing the past decade unfold, but as long as Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, and their ilk are allowed to solve problems that advance civilization, we'll be ok.
As a counterpoint, I was very persuaded by Beej's counterintuitive argument that, when only looking at the history of the US, a random American born today has a 37% chance of experiencing a revolution/civil war/mass uprising in their lifetime (https://hwfo.substack.com/p/the-surprisingly-solid-mathematical).
This doesn't require you to make historical predictions based on inferences drawn from Bronze Age meteorological patterns or whatever: all of the relevant events took place in the last quarter-millennium, which I think could reasonably be characterised as "medium-term past".
"there have been many prosperous democracies since 1945, and not a single one has experienced large scale internal conflict."
Huh? Argentina was a very prosperous democracy. Chile too. That's just off the top of my head.
I wouldn't say either of those experienced large scale internal conflict, depending on what precisely is meant. I suggested the definition below as "the state violently fracturing, with the central government either ceasing to exist or losing all authority in large sections of its territory."
Those countries did experience military coups that put repressive governments in place, which I guess you could call "large-scale internal conflict" if you really wanted to. But even so, they fail by the definition of "prosperous democracy after 1945." The breakdown of Argentina happened before WW2. By 1945, Argentina was already broken, not rich, and in the midst of many decades of political instability. Meanwhile Chile has never been more than a middling economy at best.
It is pretty reasonable to describe a coup followed by a "dirty war" with as many as 30,000 citizens murdered as as "large scale internal conflict." Likewise a coup followed by a "Caravan of Death" with as many as 27,000 murdered. If he had something more narrow in mind the onus is on him to say so. Likewise, Argentina may not have been doing as well in 1945 as it had formerly, but both it and Chile were still far more "prosperous" than all but the most wealthy nations.
I'd say they were "prosperous nations" after WW2 in the sense that a Toyota Camry is a "fast car". I mean OK, we can debate exactly how fast a car needs to be to be "fast", and point out that many economy cars are slower, and that's before we even get into whether a go-kart or a golf cart counts as a car, and we could even start to bring up horses and camels, but still no one would describe a Camry as a "fast car" relative to other cars unless they're going out of their way not to get the point.
I'll allow there's more room for opinion on what a "large-scale conflict" is. But in this case, Hanania did link to an essay in which he made clear he's talking about civil war. And this is coming out of the specific context of people talking about "national divorce" and a movie called "Civil War" that's in theaters.
Not comparable at all because, as I said, Argentina and Chile were still far more "prosperous" than all but the most wealthy nations. Camrys are not faster than all but the fastest cars. And what both countries had was close enough to civil war to qualify as "large scale conflict."
It's odd to take the world since the industrial revolution and since WW2 as your baseline but not to think that events like them could happen again.
The industrial revolution raised the global growth rate from 0.1% to 2%, why couldn't AI rise it from 2% to 40%?
If WW2 can happen, why not WW3?
On 1. There have been technological developments, mainly nukes, that make WW2 conflict impossible today. On the ideological front, fascism was destroyed and even countries that flirt with fascism go to great lengths to say they are not fascists. It's run-on-the-mill Fukuyama.
Fascism didn't come into existence until after WW1. WW1 thus happened without the help of fascism. There were lots of wars that happened during the Cold War without either party being fascist either.
Fascism is an ideology that says you need to show you're superior through war. Neither liberalism nor communism says that. That's why liberals and communists can live peacefully, like it was in the 1st world war, or now in the 2nd world war. Neither China nor the US need, because of ideology, defeat the other side through force to gain legitimacy. Indeed, liberalism vs communism create a healthy competition, because both gain or lose legitimacy through progress and economic development.
And obviously Napoleonic France (the Napoleonic Wars were a World War) and many countries during WWI had proto-fascism ideologies.
Today, Putin is invading Ukraine because he says the Ukranians are the fascists! It's totally different.
IMO, this puts too much emphasis on ideology as the primary driver of the 2nd World War.
Germany and Italy were fascist, but Japan wasn't, and the latter was every bit as expansionist as its European partners.
I'd say it's no coincidence that the major powers that lacked either continent-sized landmasses (the US and the USSR) or expansive, resource-rich colonial empires (the UK and France) were the ones that initiated wars of conquest.
Communists were opposed by liberals during the Bolshevik Revolution. The USSR became a pariah state had to rely on Germany for trade (sneaking around Versaille restrictions intended to prevent Germany from re-militarizing).
Napoleonic France had nationalism, but wasn't proto-fascist.
> Neither China nor the US need, because of ideology, defeat the other side through force to gain legitimacy.
At this point China doesn't seem to have such aspirations, but Maoism was an ideology of global communist revolution, and they supported revolutionary groups around the world. The Black Panthers and other radical groups adopted Maoist ideology and aspired to carry out such revolution in the US.
The simpler reasoning one should use is Tetlock's: usually trends (of the sort you'd call "medium run") persist longer than people expect. This applies to both "good" and "bad" things.
> This process of global communication and learning explains why the Soviet Union collapsed.
That explains too much, as lots of other Communist governments did not collapse and instead still exist.
> If you read Steven Pinker’s The Better Angels of Our Nature and look at the graphs throughout the book, you notice that something fundamentally shifted in 1945.
I don't think he argues that way. Rather, primitive societies like the Yanomamo war with each other constantly, so more settled civilizations typically have lower mortality rates from war. The World Wars were blips upward in a process that was otherwise getting more peaceful in the long-run (with the previous blip being the wars of the French Revolution & Napoleon). They were followed by the Cold War, which features lots of proxy wars even if they weren't nearly as large as WW2. It's the end of the Cold War that he refers to as marking our current era of peace.
> the much-maligned Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928, which supposedly “outlawed war,” that created new international norms, as the border changes that occurred through military force after that time tended to get reversed
Plainly wrong, as the border changes in the wake of WW2 were not reversed. There were annexations of territory afterward that nobody expected to be reversed, but overall "dirt theory" and the "Grand Illusion" idea of war meant western powers typically shied from gaining territory that way.
This kind of prediction is important in financial markets. Some people like to trace the return of stocks back until the era of free banking, or even earlier, and say that the post-WWII bull market in U.S. Stocks is just a historical abnormality. You need to acknowledge that the Federal Reserve Act of 1913, the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, while many developments on how investors think about stocks themselves (like the publication of the Securities Analysis book in 1934), are changes so big that what happened in the 19th century with stocks, inflation, and the macro landscape is just useful as a matter of historical trivia.
The interest in far history is just useful to learn what doesn't change among humans. Indeed, some drama that Marcus Aurelius faced is just the same to the one modern people suffer. But mostly, a lot has changed in the past 2,000 years. And it seems that there are easier ways to discover what doesn't change than reading Ancient Egypt books. (If you're interested in what doesn't change, read Morgan Houssel book What doesn't change. It's short and worth the shot).
In terms of what happens in poor countries, this is perhaps one of the main places where looking at history is useful. Certain states managed to precociously become stable democracies and some didn't. This isn't *just* genetics because even countries in Western Europe had wildly divergent trajectories. Post 1600s, Britain mostly did boring gradualism while France fought a bunch of huge wars, had several revolutions, and got taken back over by restored monarchies or dictators a few times. It's worth trying to figure out what the precocious countries did right. Some big element of it is probably luck, but I doubt it's all luck.
According to XIXth century french politician/historian Guizot, fervent patriot but also admirer of the UK, the main difference was the power in the UK always (had to) compose and compromise between lords/king, church/state, cities/rural. Even democracy/monarchy. Whereas in France there was a tendency to absolutism - full feudalism, to absolute monarchy, to absolute revolution, to absolute modern dictature, etc. But many other narratives exist.
I disagree.
The British went through the same process as the French, it's just that theirs lasted 50 years (1639-1689) and produced a constitutional monarchy, whereas for the latter it lasted 82 years (1789-1871) and produced a republic.
Note that, absent the 1870-1871 Franco-Prussian War, there's a good chance that France would have also ended up as a constitutional monarchy, albeit with an Emperor instead of a King.
I don't think it challenges the main narrative but France had a civil war as a liberal democracy, around 4,000 people died in mainland France and far more in Algeria in fighting over the status of Algeria.
Italy and the UK had minor civil wars in the same period.
Probably need to distinguish between a localized low-level insurgency or period of escalated terroristic attacks against the central government, and a major civil war. You could also point out the Basques in Spain as an example of the former. But when we speak of the "Spanish Civil War", we all know what event we're talking about. And I think that's the sort of event Richard is predicting won't happen to a rich country: the state violently fracturing, with the central government either ceasing to exist or losing all authority in large sections of its territory.
I don't really understand how Italy and the UK had "minor civil wars".
I'm more familiar with Italy and I disagree strongly that Red and Black terrorism during the 60s and 70s should be considered a "civil war",at no point after WWII were portions of British or Italian territory under the effective control of an insurgency
There's no particular evidence that being a democracy stops a country from being imperial especially if you adopt a somewhat softened definition of what an empire is. It doesn't stop colonial wars of independence but it does seem to stop wars within or between democratic metropoles. The one major exception to this is that the outbreak of democracy is often accompanied by brutal civil war between the old power structure and the new democrats. A good example would be the Civil War in the Vendee in France:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_the_Vend%C3%A9e
The American Civil War can also be framed in this way as the South was more of a quasi mercantalist oligarchy than a real democracy. Our Founding Fathers were just of such unusually high quality that they managed to successfully put off the confrontation for a couple of generations. This entrenched democracy legally and culturally and was probably why the Civil War was so "clean" by civil war standards. There was nasty sectarian violence in the South after the war (especially in Texas) but it would have been 1000X times worse without the preexisting strong democratic institutions and norms.
*Edit* I keep thinking of more things to add. Marxist revolutions are stupid, but it's notable that they were more appealing in peasant societies than they were in actual industrial societies. It seems like it's very hard to go from a moribund farming society where 3% of the population owns all the land and uses it for highly inefficient agricultural production to one where most individuals own property and are thus incentivized to work hard and improve it. Central planning and collectivization are stupid, but violent redistribution of land into the hands of individuals unfortunately seems like a consistent prerequisite for real development.
How was the south less of a democracy than the north?
England developed without a revolution like France's. They even still have titled nobility with hereditary land.
The idea that England developed without a revolution nor bloodletting is ahistorical. The Wars of the Three Kingdoms, including the English Civil War, lasted 15 years, led to the execution of the King and the formation of the Commonwealth, and killed the equivalent of about 10% of the population of the British Isles.
On a proportional basis, they were more violent than the French Revolution.
Throw in the Stuart Restoration and the Glorious Revolution and you have parallels to the Bourbon Restoration and the July Revolution in France.
In effect, Britain's historical rupture spanned the years 1639 - 1689, whereas France's historical rupture spanned the years 1789 - 1871.
I didn't say England didn't have bloodshed. I said they still have a titled nobility (they even have a monarch) because they didn't have a revolution LIKE FRANCE. France's "Decree Abolishing Hereditary Nobility and Titles" dates to 1790, shortly after the revolution began. Within the Parliamentarian faction of the English Civil War there were Levellers who wanted equality before the law, but they lost out to the moderate Grandees.
What does it matter, though, that England still has a monarchy/nobility titles?
Had Napoleon III dodged the Franco-Prussian War, France today would likely be similar.
As I've said, countries which retained their monarchies tend to be better off than their republican neighbors. England retaining its nobility means it didn't experience the disruptive change that France did.
The Franco-Prussian war happened well after revolutionary France had already abolished its nobility, abolished the monarchy a couple years later, then killed not just the king but the queen, went to war with most of Europe and changed legal systems of places they conquered in ways economists are still studying today. England didn't require an international coalition to force a monarchy back on its throne; the monarchy had only been replaced by Cromwell's protectorate because he couldn't make a deal with the king after multiple civil wars, and after Cromwell died the monarchy was restored without having to fight another civil war.
You clearly didn't read my other comment where I specifically mentioned that history was worth studying to see how different states developed and mentioned the difference between England and France. England and a handful of other (mostly northern European) nations are pretty much the only ones that made that transition peacefully. For every 1 of those, there are 20 that did it violently or else failed to do it all.
As to the other point...seriously? The south was a society with a much narrower functional franchise through much of its history and massive numbers of men who were either literal slaves or disenfranchised tenant farmers to gigantic landlords. The North (especially New England) had precocious self government that incorporated many of the middling classes, lots of people who owned their own land, and a pretty much constantly and dramatically expanding franchise post 1830s.
Plenty of countries tried violence and still developed worse. Surviving monarchies today tend to be better off than their republican cousins, and that includes the Middle East.
I will grant that slaves couldn't vote (just as they didn't in ancient Athens), not being considered citizens at all. But tenant farmers are another story.
"Not a single state that entered the Union after the thirteen colonies had a property requirement for the franchise, and although a few adopted tax-based qualifications, it was only in Louisiana that the restriction was a serious constraint and endured very long. Most of the original thirteen states (all but Rhode Island, Virginia, and North Carolina) eliminated property qualifications by the middle of the 1820s [...]
The use of wealth as a basis for distinguishing who should vote was clearly becoming less When there were wealth-based restrictions, there had been no real need for provisions that dealt specifically with these classes, but as states eliminated or weakened the economic-based qualifications, there was increasing emphasis on introducing or tightening qualifications that would keep undesirable groups out of the electorate. At the same time that Delaware, Maryland, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania eased their economic qualifications, each altered its constitution to exclude blacks. On the eve of the Civil War, the only states that extended the franchise to blacks were five in New England (where those of African descent were exceptionally rare) and New York (where a property requirement of $250 was applied to blacks, as compared to no requirement for whites). [...]
[B]y 1820 more than half of adult white males were casting votes, except in those states that still retained property requirements or substantial tax requirements for the franchise – Virginia, Rhode Island (the two states that maintained property restrictions through 1840), and New York as well as Louisiana. The clear implication is that the adoption of laws that extended suffrage contributed to the attainment of such broad participation in elections. Some may consider the estimates puzzling in that the voting rates are higher in early non-
presidential elections than in the presidential elections, but that is probably a testament to
citizens caring most about local issues during this era and presidential races not generally
being contested seriously at the state level. [...]
By 1840, only three states retained a property qualification, North Carolina (for some state-wide offices only), Rhode Island, and Virginia. In 1856 North Carolina was the last state to end the practice. Tax-paying qualifications were also gone in all but a few states by the Civil War, but they survived into the 20th century in Pennsylvania and Rhode Island."
https://web.archive.org/web/20201111211244/http://economics.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/Workshops-Seminars/Economic-History/sokoloff-050406.pdf
I don't think they really count as wars except perhaps Algeria.
What was the per capita income of France back then? 1,200? 2,500? Both of those would be lower than Philippines is today.
World Bank figures say $13,600
The world becoming more black African and Muslim is what the EU and the globalists are planning for. Laws and institutions,corporations, culture etc are changing to accommodate that. The fact is that the US spends the most on military and continues to have a materiel superiority over Russia which is why every symmetrical conflict since WW2 has gone the way of the side supplied with US weapons and or US support. Let's put to the test the concept of the US being a high net positive for the world since the end of the Cold war. Take the first Gulf War where they adhered to the UN resolution and degraded the Iraqi armed forces before launching the ground war. A complete military and political success was the verdict. But because Saddam Hussein remained in power US troops remained in Saudi Arabia in large numbers which offended Osama Bin Laden who had been part of the Mujahedeen forces in Afghanistan who forced the Soviet Union out of the country. Cue the first attack on the Twin Towers in 1993 which is conveniently forgotten. But of course this was at the start of the Clinton administration which won largely as the result of Bush having to renege on his promise of no new taxes mostly due to spending on the Gulf War, and a third candidate Ross Perot being on the ballot too. That Democrat administration was more concerned with European affairs-Ireland and the former Yugoslavia, neglecting the Islamic threat. This meant that 9 11 was allowed to be plotted and the event occurred at the start of the Bush administration and its disastrous response has created a fall out affecting Europe much more than the US. But turning to the present and the 2 wars that are interlinked really as Israel was supplying armaments to the Ukraine and was focused on a potential attack by the Iran backed Hezbollah from the North neglecting the Southern border completely. But those 2 conflicts were always going to break out again. But the Russian invasion was desired by the US as Trump's present for the incoming Biden administration of exit from Afghanistan left them with no worries about casualties there and they knew about the deep flaws in the Russian military and the resistance to it that would follow.And to link that conflict to China we can see that they've never recognised Russias annexation of the Crimea back in 2014.Abstaining in the UN is precisely sitting on the fence on the issue. If they had how many countries would have recognised it by now too?40?50?It might have changed the course of recent history and avoided the conflict. And switching again to another topic in the essay the crime levels in Latin America, they are chiefly drug related and to the Mexican Cartels which have only come about since the NATFTA so US liberal capitalism should take credit for that.
> every symmetrical conflict since WW2 has gone the way of the side supplied with US weapons and or US support
The Korean war was fairly symmetrical, and ended with a stalemate.
Correct. Most instead of every would have given my reply the accuracy I intended. But come to think of it the Korean War did effectively have the two communist states on the same side with a high risk of ww3 breaking out with an A Bomb involvement had the communist forces been facing a total defeat. so a stalemate allowed both sides save face.
Wait. What year was this civil war?
Believe he's referring either to the Algerian War (1954-1962) or the 1958 coup (can't be this, actually, because it didn't have so many people die, but arguably a better example of instability within a liberal democracy as opposed to at its outskirts.)
I don't get why the Algerian thing is included. They're not part of France. Arabs are unworthy of being citizens anyways.
The French claimed that Algeria was part of France at the time.
"[...] or alternatively heralding the creation of machine-Gods. I don’t think that the world will be that exciting in the future [...]"
Ever? In the entire future? Unless I'm misunderstanding something, this is a pretty strong claim. Present understanding of the laws of physics rules out superluminal travel, but not superintelligent machines.
The fall in African fertility appears to be almost certain, even if some countries are doing all they can to avoid it by staying poor: https://www.gapminder.org/answers/the-rapid-growth-of-the-world-population-when-will-it-slow-down/
I wouldn't that be that worried about the rise of the Muslim share in the world. Most Muslims actually live in India and Southeast Asia. Both of these regions are seeing a falling birth rate. Plus now a majority of Africans are actually Christian. So the Christian portion of the world population is probably increasing.
Bullish Latin America? Really? I can maybe see Mexico and maybe some of the Mexican supply chains will spill over to Central America but that's doubtful. Although Latin America might have changed in a way that would prevent a long lasting upsurge in crime. Since 90s, almost all of them have been more educated and also less unequal. The rise of this urban middle class might more strongly reward politicians to be pro law and order than before.
I actually think it's probably harder for Mexico to unfuck itself than most of Latin America. Controlling the trade routes into the USA is just too valuable and you would need years of loyal, non corrupt, massed state violence to get rid of the cartels. Good luck with that. There are certain changes in *US* policy that might defang the cartels, but that is largely out of Mexico's control.
It sounds like you start by expressing disagreement only to convince yourself to agree with him!
I'm not agreeing with him even by the end. I'm just hedging.
So, I'm a huge fan of your writing, so I paid for a separate account to read your paid stuff, but I'm also a coward, so I'm not commenting from an account linked to my credit card number. I saw what they did to you, and unlike you I doubt I write well enough to make a living on it after cancellation. ;) As I've said below, I could survive, but...why blow things up before absolutely necessary? There may be something useful I could still do by waiting another few years and accumulating another million or so.
I really enjoyed your bit about the female comedian who talks about saying she doesn't want to sleep with you when she really does. So you can get an idea of how this affects people with bad social skills and low risk tolerance, here was my reasoning. Perhaps it will serve as a cautionary (or comical) tale.
In my teens (90s): I have bad social skills. I know some of this 'no means no' stuff is BS and sometimes they say no when they mean yes, but I'm not smart enough to figure out when. Furthermore, if something goes wrong and she gets pregnant, I'll have to drop out of high school to get a job and my life will be ruined. If she really hates me and decides to launch a false rape accusation, I can wind up in jail where I'll be raped regularly and probably die young of HIV (this was before protease drugs). I'll wait until after college.
In my 20s (2000s): I have bad social skills. I'm not good at reading people. If I make the wrong move on a girl, at the very least my college and academic career (because that's what people with bad social skills are supposed to do, right?) will be over and I'll have to join the working class, where my academic skills are useless and my poor social skills will rapidly become a liability. (And I don't fight well, so I'll get beat up all the time.) Momentary pleasure from sex is not worth this risk. I know feminists are probably lying about this stuff because they lie about everything, but they've made the rules where I am and I don't have the charisma or public support to change anything. I'll keep my mouth shut and my nose clean and hoard enough cash to retire early. I'll slake my thirst for rebellion by reading weird right-wing stuff...you know, Sailer's really smart, Moldbug's interesting if lengthy, and this Hoste guy writes really well.
In my early 30s (early 2010s): OK, I've read Roissy and then Heartiste. The whole thing was a stupid shit-test. However, I'm not smart enough to know when to get past it, and the consequences are still not worth it. I have a good job, which means they'll want me for my money as the 'beta bux' part of the equation, but that also means they'll divorce my ass and collect half my dough and I'll be working to feed my ex-wife for the rest of my life. Screw it. Well, these apps leave a record that can be subpoenaed in a court case, so maybe I'll try there. This OKCupid thing is kind of fun.
In my late 30s (late 2010s): OK, I've read Heartiste, who was pretty enlightening before he turned into a Nazi. How do you go from getting laid to goose-stepping? Wow, everyone's crazy these days. The only thing I have to offer is 'beta bux', and now with this woke crap blowing up they can wreck my career any time they want. "Believe women!" Given that I'm accumulating nicely it doesn't seem worth it to blow up everything for love. I'll stick to the apps where I have records of everything, though I never seem to meet anyone I'd actually want to start a family with. What happened to OKCupid?
In my 40s (now): Too late now. Sure, I could try to marry a substantially younger woman, but that's something only the top five percent of men can carry off. But I now have over 25x annual expenses saved. Theoretically if terminated over a scandal I could survive indefinitely. I still have an estimated three to four decades to live, and theoretically could survive cancellation. I've failed in the Darwinian sense and my sperm are probably bad, but have yet to actually *die*, and have no intention to do so. So, what to do with the remainder of my existence?
Other disorienting, novel changes:
- The end of non-violent death (biology gets solved)
- Robots do all the work and all the warring
- Final separation of sex and reproduction with accompanying leveling up of health/IQ/talents
- "Death" of Europe/rise of Asia
- Ubiquitous cheap, clean energy
Recommended reading on this topic: The Beginning of Infinity, by David Deutch. The Industrial Revolution was made possible by the Enlightenment, which was made possible by the ability of people to seek good explanations, with dissenting opinions allowed, which create dynamic societies with hypothetically limitless growth. This book was written in 2012. One is perhaps less optimistic after seeing the past decade unfold, but as long as Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, and their ilk are allowed to solve problems that advance civilization, we'll be ok.
As a counterpoint, I was very persuaded by Beej's counterintuitive argument that, when only looking at the history of the US, a random American born today has a 37% chance of experiencing a revolution/civil war/mass uprising in their lifetime (https://hwfo.substack.com/p/the-surprisingly-solid-mathematical).
This doesn't require you to make historical predictions based on inferences drawn from Bronze Age meteorological patterns or whatever: all of the relevant events took place in the last quarter-millennium, which I think could reasonably be characterised as "medium-term past".
Robin Hanson disagrees with this because of global (even Africa!) fertility collapse
Paleolithic:Neolithic::Industrial Revolution:Seventh Millennium