carrol Quigley in “The Evolution of Civilizations” describes the rise and fall of six or seven civilizations (he says there are about 24 real civilizations in history). He notes that they fall because the rise of intellectualism destroys the ideological basis (generally a religion) which produced the civilization. So with nothing to believe in people turn to the irrational substitutes which claim to have answers or to pleasure-seeking and nihilism.
As people refuse more and more to fight for their civilization when it is attacked or uses its military, it becomes incapable of preserving itself from the attackers from outside the civilization. All those examined fall to invasion from lesser developed areas on the fringe of the civilizations.
He analyzes the Mesopotamian, the Canaanite, the Minoan, the Egyptian, the Classical, and Western Civilization. And finds the same things in them all in their rise and fall. The Western Civilization has been the only one which has come to the point of collapse (three times) and managed to reform itself and continue. He did not make a prediction as to whether it could do this again and puts the crisis of the 1930s at the heart of what must be reformed.
puts the crisis of the 1930s at the heart of what must be reformed.
The only civilization that is still around after some 3000 years are the Jews. If Jews could revive their language and country after so long being without it I think it is possible that the West could reform itself.
I am optimistic that we’ll get through this this time of darkness and decline but the West is going to have to go through some really bad times in order to do so because the only time we seem to learn is through lessons taught combined with pain.
Just because we live in a time where we seem to be on the edge of civilizational collapse doesn’t mean we should give up. Quite to the contrary. We should be digging in our heels and doing what is needed to buck the trend.