This brand new section from March 2020 onwards will specialize in material showing evidence of historical cycles, and specifically, what I call 'The Pulsation of the Commons'.

The main sources are:

• The Pulsing Paradigm, from the school of Biophysical Economics (Howard T. Odum, etc ..)

• The work on Secular Cycles by the school of Cliodynamics by Peter Turchin et al.

• The work of Peter Pogany in Rethinking the World, i.e. the pendulum between stable systems and chaotic transitions

• The HANDY Model for Civilisational Collapse Scenarios, and the case studies provided by Mark Whitaker in: Political Origins of Environmental Degradation and the Environmental Origins of Axial Religions

• The Double Movement within capitalist society, i.e. the lib/lab pendulum identified by Karl Polanyi in the Great Transformation

However, human society is marked by 'cultural evolution' (Pogany) and like in the bio-physical world, there is an 'arrow of time', and in the case of human society, overall, an increase in social complexity and an accumulation of scientific and technical knowledge. This evolution of societal regimes involving greater and greater numbers of people, has to be coupled with the pulsation paradigm. This gives us an indication of an evolving spiral, in which thermodynamic cycles, socio-economic regimes, and human 'modes of apprehension (Gebser, Pogany), correlate to each other.

Typology

Provided by Robert Conan Ryan, first draft:

"4 paradigms (Scientific, Cultural, Political, Technomic)

SCI Paradigm:

• Kuhn and Toulmin synthesis
  • Kuhn: black swans (anomalies) and revolutionary periods of theory (new fields of theory)
  • Toulmin: scientific instruments (scale breakthroughs) and change in the philosophy of science ( new commonsense logic)

CULTURE Paradigm:

• updated Graves spiral dynamics;
• 80 year Generational conflict historical cycles;
• Turchin secular cycles and neo-marxist class conflict cliohistory;
• Historical Grand Narratives (dialectic idealistic waves) in the formal humanities;
• educational/academic and journalistic crisis cycles (culture media wars)

POLITICAL Paradigm:

• Political Compass Cycle (Kligsberg foreign policy cycle,
• plus an updated Schleisinger Domestic Policy cycle, creates a four phase political quadrant bias cycle

TECHNOMIC Paradigm:

• Carlota Perez Paradigm shifts and 4- S curves of industrial creative destruction; sectoral models of economic progress and dematerialization; Neo-Georgist land cycle ; Neo-Austrian and Post-Keynesian credit leverage cycles.

The "Fifth Paradigm"

... is a mystery of the natural environment risk cycles ... floods,, hurricanes, climate volatility,, etc....which is an area that requires more simulation science advances before we can add it to this model."

Key Resources

Key Articles

• Lene Rachel Andersen on the Five Phases in the Evolution of Human Cultural Sensibilities. By Gregg Henriques.

See also:

1. Gebser’s Five Structural Mutations of Consciousness and the Role of Dark Ages
2. Giambattista Vico's Stages in World History
3. Sri Aurobindo's Four Stage Cycle of Society
4. Viconian Civilizational Cycles
5. William Irwin Thompson on the Four Cultural Ecologies of the West
6. William Irwin Thompson’s Five Stages of Human Evolution

Key Books

• Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital. The Dynamics of Bubbles and Golden Ages. Carlota Perez. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, 2002

[1]

• Ecological Revolution: The Political Origins of Environmental Degradation and the Environmental Origins of Axial Religions; China, Japan, Europe. by Mark D. Whitaker.

This book describes the ebb and flow of slow ecological degradation and the period uprisings of anti-systemic movements throughout human history, across continents.

Quotes

On Riding Cycles and the Distribution of Power

"Two American historians – George Modelski and William Thomp­son – explored the question of how the rise of great powers can be explained. They concluded that the most important prerequisite for the development of a great power is the leading mastery of a Kondratieff­ cycle. The reasons for this are easy to understand. Those who lead in comman­ding the basic innovation of a Kondratieff cycle, develop the most highly productive economy; those who have the most highly productive economy are able to finance the largest armies and fleets and the most modern weapons; those who own the most modern weapons and most powerful militaries can force their way on other countries and sooner or later become a political superpower."

- Leo and Simone Nefiodow [2]