Looking around the globe today, you’ve probably gritted your teeth and wondered: “Why the &%!# are we repeating history?” Authoritarianism, nationalism, tribalism—extreme inequality, social breakdown, rising demagoguery— check, check, check. You’d be right. So here are seven lessons we should have learned from history but didn’t.
- When too much money piles up in too few hands, economies stagnate.
- When economies stagnate, the social order breaks.
- When the social order breaks, demagogues arise.
- When people get broken along with the social order they live in, strongmen give them strength.
- If strongmen are giving broken people strength, politics as usual can’t be.
- Authoritarianism is defeated by offering people the lives they want to live (not by prosecutors, scandals, judges, or celebrity tweets).
- Democracy is the most fragile way of life of all.
[more, including all the details.]