When societies fall
Reflection on what we can learn from Crises, Power Plays & Visions
The time of crises is here. Wars, climate change, pandemics and polarization are testing societies. Why do some collapse under the pressure while others survive - or even thrive? Historical researchers at the Seshat Research Center have studied over 200 historical societal crises to find answers. Their findings point to three key factors that determine whether societies stand or fall:
- External shocks can trigger crises, but they alone do not explain why societies fall, which leads to the next point:
- Inequality in society and poor leadership both contribute to crises worsening and spiraling out of control.
Seshat's first two points are intuitive - societies with high inequality and weak leadership are ill-equipped for crises. But the third point goes against common assumptions about how societies are driven into crisis. It is not just the hardships of the people and incompetent leaders, but also the behavior of the elite:
- Increased competition for status-laden positions and jobs for a society's elite drives and exacerbates crises.
Thus, it is not only the hardship of the people that forces societies into deep crises from which they sometimes cannot recover. The difficulty of providing their elites with secure positions can also cause the ground to shake. The pattern observed by the Seshat researchers is that people who have acquired great wealth try to convert their material resources into social power and recognition. Quite simply, status and influence are worth paying for. As the ability to secure status and prestige diminishes, dissatisfaction increases. In addition, the willingness to accept the solutions that society offers to crises also decreases, which can then escalate an external shock into a full-blown crisis and the total collapse of a social system.
Beyond Curiosities – History's Crises Are Relevant Today
What Hoyer and his colleagues are doing is not just an interesting historical curiosity to spice up dinner discussions ("Why did the Roman Republic fall?"1). Quite the contrary. No one can escape today's crises. Climate change, pandemics, war, energy crises, polarization, crisis of confidence, AI risks - the list goes on. Taken together, the collection of crises forms a tapestry of crises that could undoubtedly bring down even very heavy institutions.
So, to return to Hoyer's three points, we can tick off the first one. There is pressure from external crises and risks. This alone should be a source of concern: based on his data, Hoyer estimates that 40% of societies that have experienced serious crises have lost control, resulting in loss of territory or societal collapse. If this were to happen today, it would be equivalent to the collapse of 80 of the world's 200 or so independent states.
Relative Inequality Matters Too
As if that weren't enough, we have a state of increasing economic inequality in the world2. A common objection is that people are getting better off anyway. But the pattern is clear: inequality itself exacerbates crises and cannot be easily dismissed. Status is an ordinal relationship, meaning that it matters whether you have the most, the least, or the middle.
Even when it comes to access to status-laden positions, there are some worrying signs. In his article, Hoyer points to scandals in which the wealthy buy their way into elite universities, where the goal is not only education for jobs, but also the status and networks that come with an education there. Today it is not enough to have a high level of education, there is an inflation of bachelors, masters and doctorates. An article from Victoria University3 in Melbourne describes how there are now more PhDs than academic jobs. This further increases the competition for places in the truly prestigious institutions.
More and More People Crowd Around the old Waterholes
Even being rich is not enough to achieve a distinctive status. The number of people with a fortune of at least a hundred million dollars has doubled in the last twenty years4. As for simple millionaires, they have quadrupled since the turn of the millennium5. In both cases, the number of millionaires is growing faster than the world's population (to make matters worse, the United States, China and Europe - where most millionaires are located - have aging and eventually shrinking populations). Being a millionaire is less unique and therefore less of a status symbol in itself.
Institutions for Private or Public Benefit?
The work of Hoyer and his colleagues at Seshat seems to dovetail nicely with this year's Nobels’s Prize in Economic Sciences6. The prize was awarded to Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson and James A. Robinson for their work on how social institutions create the conditions for a country's prosperity. In their work, they find that institutions designed to involve citizens in wealth creation lead to more robust and prosperous economies.
Institutions built to extract resources for rulers or colonial masters make it harder for countries to prosper. In terms of Hoyer's three points, one can imagine systems that create a lot of opportunity at one end of the scale, as opposed to systems that reserve status and opportunity for a few who can maneuver high up in a fixed hierarchy.
Not as Simple as Throwing Money at the Problem
Arguing for inclusion and opportunity is of course easy in theory, but the historical examples themselves do not always tell us how such a will is born. What history teaches us is that it is not as simple as new technologies or redistributive policies that mitigate inequality in a distributive way to avert crises. In many of the historical examples of collapse highlighted in Seshat's reports, there was no shortage of radical policy reforms or large sums of money to address the problems.
According to Hoyer, societies that turned the tide and did not let a crisis get out of hand any more than it had to are characterized by broad social support, leadership, and a willingness to innovate and sacrifice old privileges when necessary. Not unlike the conclusions of the Nobel laureates that inclusive institutions focused on the common good perform better. Hoyer himself highlights how England in the 1840s implemented social reforms that mitigated the effects of the Industrial Revolution. Perhaps we can add to the list how Sweden moved from one of the most conflict-ridden labor markets on the brink of revolution in the early 20th century to a spirit of consensus and nation-building. In the language of modern organizations, moving forward requires vision, innovation and flexibility - skills built with foresight.
Not a Doomsday Prediction
The purpose of this article is not to make doomsday predictions. However, from a futurist's point of view, it is important to emphasize that a good future does not create itself. The vision of the Kairos Future is a world where everyone puts the future first, which means not turning a blind eye to the fact that the future may contain unpleasant outcomes that need to be addressed. Because whatever probability you want to assign to the risk of severe crisis and even societal collapse, it is not zero. Given the high consequences, it is therefore something we should try to prevent, even if we think the risk is small.
Leading from the future means taking signals in the present seriously, pausing to ask "Could this happen?" and then "How do we make the future the best it can be?” The difference between a future-proof plan and a pious hope is whether alternatives have been considered and prepared for. Related to the theme of this article, leadership is also about making the future a place to aspire to, not a place to protect against.
Optimism, Vision and the Link to Crisis Resilience
Crisis resilience leadership from a future perspective is therefore about vision and strategy going hand in hand. In difficult and pessimistic times, people and societies go into an austerity mode. We look more closely at what we have and avoid taking major risks. In times of crisis, risk-taking becomes more risky because you risk losing everything, compared to good times when more people have a surplus to play with. On the other hand, in optimistic times, when there seem to be both resources and opportunities to spare, it becomes less important to protect one's position relative to what is already there – there is greener grass out there to enjoy.
The empowering power of a motivational vision should not be underestimated. Just ask the collective body of athletes and organizations that manage to use vision as a tool to motivate themselves to positive action. A positive image of the future that is not a utopia, but something that can be acted upon at all levels, from the strategic to the tactical to the everyday practical, builds confidence in the future. Shared visions also create the consensus that seems to make us more resilient to crises.
Focus on Areas of Promising Opportunity
An important piece of the puzzle in making these visions work is to credibly identify areas of opportunity where success is not about elbowing your way through a zero-sum game. The future is malleable, and the possibilities are many. If we can rethink resources, such as creating value from waste and ecosystem services, and take advantage of the great opportunities offered by technological development, we can lay the foundations for inclusive and sustainable development.
Finally, Hoyer and his colleagues reinforce a point that we in the futures community often like to emphasize: the future is not predetermined, it requires action. History shows that crises can be overcome - with inclusive institutions, courageous leaders, and shared visions. Leading from the future means daring to imagine a better society and then taking the concrete steps needed to get there.
Want to know more about how we work with future-driven strategies? Read more here or contact Johanna Danielsson, CEO and Senior Partner Kairos Future.
[1] Alluding to the social media fad where women ask men how often they think about the Roman Empire: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2023/09/14/roman-empire-trend-men-tiktok/a>
[2] Joe Hasell at Our World In Data explores the issue in depth here, summarizing that economic inequality can be said to have increased since the late 1980s. https://ourworldindata.org/how-has-income-inequality-within-countries-evolved-over-the-past-century
[4] See this report for example https://citizensinternational.com/centimillionaire-era/
[5] Global Wealth Report https://www.ubs.com/content/dam/assets/wm/global/insights/doc/global-wealth-report.pdf?campID=UC:E:601227:601243:275609551:0:1640977188:1640981663:en:0
[6] https://www.nobelprize.org/uploads/2024/10/advanced-economicsciencesprize2024.pdf