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Musings Report 2023-50 12-9-23 Existential Threats, Existential Crises
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Existential Threats, Existential Crises
We see references to "existential challenges" or "existential threats" fairly regularly: online quasi-monopolies are an existential challenge to small bricks-and-mortar retail stores, for example, and China is often cited as an existential threat to the global dominance of the U.S.
These share a key trait: the threats are external, i.e. they arise from external forces.
In my lexicon, "existential crises" arise internally from unresolved contradictions and conflicts within an individual, relationship, family, community, city, state, province or nation. This phenomenon is thus scale-invariant, playing out in individuals, groups and entire nations / empires.
Such internal conflicts may be exacerbated or triggered by external events, but the core issues are internal in structure and origin.
For example, an individual may experience an existential crisis as a result of their business failing, a divorce, a forced move to another locale and career, or a collapse of their health, for example, burnout.
In each case, the individual can identify the proximate cause of their crisis of confidence and identity--events that triggered failures that shook their sense of self, purpose and direction in life--but the roots of the crisis typically run deep into the nature of their character, formative experiences and relationships.
This is illuminated by how different individuals can suffer the same shattering losses but one's identity and relationship survives the impact while the other one questions the foundations of their life: how did this happen? Why did it happen? They question themselves, their decisions, their goals, and perhaps even their faith, and faith in themselves.
On the national level, existential crises may erupt when foundational issues that were successfully papered over for decades suddenly explode into the public sphere in ways that cannot be papered over with face-saving compromises.
These national existential crises can take many forms. Historian Chris Wickham identifies fundamental changes in the concepts of public power and the balance of how resources are distributed as key dynamics, as these can transform the way rulers / elites and the citizenry deal with each other.
Historian Peter Turchin describes "leverage points" (echoing Donella Meadows) where the society's response to crisis undermines collective action and national resilience. These responses aren't random, but arise from structural patterns which reach "tipping points" of systemic breakdown when they fail to resolve the crisis.
In my analysis, there are two issues that are brewing up an existential crisis in the U.S.: extreme wealth and income inequality, and the always-uneasy contradictory forces of national interests and global power projection.
I often post charts and statistics of wealth and income inequality that are shockingly extreme, yet we seem to accept this staggering divide where the bottom 50% of households own almost no real wealth and the top few percent own the majority of income-producing assets.
Our blasé resignation to this inequality may not survive a prolonged recession, for there is a contradiction here that undermines democracy: if the elite own the vast majority of the wealth and collect most of the income, they effectively influence the government. In such a state of material inequality, democracy decays to "in name only."
To change the way elites and the citizenry deal with each other, this wealth and income inequality must be re-balanced, or the price could be instability of the sort that few currently consider possible in the U.S., an existential crisis in which the national identity and core values come into question, and the status quo is structurally incapable of fashioning a real resolution.
Highlights of the Blog
Irony Alert: The American Dream Is Only Affordable Overseas 12/6/23
We Feel Poorer Because We Are Poorer: Here's Proof 12/4/23
Best Thing That Happened To Me This Week
I received a letter from new subscriber Red D., who wrote:
"I'd like to buy you a beer or two to thank you for the effort you put into thinking and communicating on your website. You are one of a kind when it comes to explaining complex subjects."
Thank you very kindly, Red. This is the highest praise possible, for this has always been my goal: to share whatever I've learned.
From Left Field
NOTE TO NEW READERS: This list is not comprised of articles I agree with or that I judge to be correct or of the highest quality. It is representative of the content I find interesting as reflections of the current zeitgeist. The list is intended to be perused with an open, critical, occasionally amused mind.
Many links are behind paywalls. Most paywalled sites allow a few free articles per month if you register. It's the New Normal.
The Best Homemade Tomato Soup -- I have to agree, have made this multiple times....
Tangy Green Tomato Chili -- I liked this...
Vegetarian Green Tomato Chili -- and this.one, too...
How To Buy T-Bills Direct From the US Treasury (Adam T., 13 min)
Series I Savings Bonds, currently 5.27% -- Treasury Direct
About Form 8949, Sales and other Dispositions of Capital Assets -- a warm-up to tax preparation season....
Muscle Mass, Strength and Longevity
6 Upper Body Strength Exercises for Older Adults: National Institute on Aging (15 min) -- good for any age...
The Best Upper Body Exercises For Seniors (No Equipment) (16 min)
Upper Body Workout With Weights For Seniors - Intermediate (15 min)
Combined Vitamin D, Omega-3 Fatty Acids, and a Simple Home Exercise Program May Reduce Cancer Risk Among Active Adults Aged 70 and Older: A Randomized Clinical Trial
How to Build a Universe That Doesn’t Fall Apart Two Days Later (Philip K. Dick, 1978) -- worth re-reading...
The Top 1% of Americans Have Taken $50 Trillion From the Bottom 90% -- And That's Made the U.S. Less Secure.
"Think of the life you have lived until now as over and, as a dead person, see what’s left as a bonus and live it accordingly." Marcus Aurelius
Thanks for reading--
charles |
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