A version of this column appears in the July issue of The Business Monthly serving Howard and Anne Arundel counties
After 250 years, one historian found that many of the empires of the past lasted about that long, generally starting small, expanding to great size and prosperity over time and then slipping into decline.
This was a thinly populated continent north of Mexico before the Europeans came. It had an estimated 2 to 8 million native people, far less than the more populous south in the Americas. To the surprise of most people who hear it, the United States of America is now the third most populous country in the world at about 342 million. India and China are four times larger but overall still much poorer yet catching up.
By almost any standard, the USA is the richest and most powerful country the world has ever seen. The power is not just military, but financial, cultural and legal. That accumulation of power has happened mostly in the last 80 years since the end of World War II, in which much of the rest of the developed world was devastated.
A thin little 1978 book called The Fate of Empires by Sir John Glub studying history going back 4,000 years suggests that around 250 years is how long empires last. After starting small, they gout go through typical periods of aggression, growth, affluence, intellectual dominance and then gradual decline. Glubb’s analysis does not deal much with the United States, but a dozen earlier empires including the Greek, Roman, Spanish, Ottoman and British. Here is a summary of Glubb’s analysis.
Affluence and decline
After earlier periods of growth, commerce, expanded trade and innovation. comes the age of affluence:
“There does not appear to be any doubt that money is the agent which causes the decline of this strong, brave and self-confident people. The decline in courage, enterprise and a sense of duty is, however, gradual,” says a summary of Glubb. “Education undergoes the same gradual transformation. No longer do schools aim at producing brave patriots ready to serve their country. Parents and students alike seek the educational qualifications which will command the highest salaries.”
Sound familiar?
This is followed by the age of intellect with great advances in science, but debates become intellectual and society weakens.
Then we come to the signs of decline. “True to the normal course followed by nations in decline, internal differences are not reconciled in an attempt to save the nation. On the contrary, internal rivalries become more acute, as the nation becomes weaker,” Glubb says. Other hallmarks of decline:
- “One of the oft-repeated phenomena of great empires is the influx of foreigners to the capital city.” In our case, Glubb refers to our financial capital, New York.
- “The heroes of declining nations are always the same—the athlete, the singer or the actor.”
- “History, however, seems to suggest that the age of decline of a great nation is often a period which shows a tendency to philanthropy and to sympathy for other races
- “Historians of periods of decadence often refer to a decline in religion.”
These are obvious parallels to recognize with the U.S. experience in recent years.
Then there is our national debt. Our continued wealth and affluence is being financed through massive debt, much of it held by other nations. What are we doing about it? Nothing except making it worse. And the Social Security programs that even conservatives have come to love are slowly going bankrupt.
Glubb’s conclusion
“Decadence is not physical. Decadence is a moral and spiritual disease, resulting from too long a period of wealth and power, producing cynicism, decline of religion, pessimism and frivolity. The citizens of such a nation will no longer make an effort to save themselves, because they are not convinced that anything in life is worth saving.”
It is the last sentence that I have trouble believing about our country. It offends our sense of American optimism, that things can get better because they always have –after Civil War, Depression, discrimination based on race and gender, and failing foreign wars.
As we celebrate the 250th, it seems there is less to celebrate than there was 50 years ago. The president’s pledge to make America great again seems to be making things worse, as he quickly destroys the institutions and structures that were built with great effort over many decades.
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