Tragedy and Hope by Carroll Quigley- Summarized ch. 1

Preface

Inasmuch as my desire is to invest intelligently and lead my clients into prosperity, I consider Quigley’s Tragedy and Hope essential to understand what he terms “financial capitalism” so that one can successfully navigate the landscape of the financial system and use it to create a truly free society.

Quigley's Tragedy and Hope is a historical exposition of western civilization to its present in the context of a general theory of civilization cycles. I think it's important to put our modern life in context and guide our children into a better future and that this book provides exactly that.

Part One—Introduction: Western Civilization In Its World Setting

Chapter 1—Cultural Evolution in Civilizations

Today there are more individuals concerned with the survival of human race than ever before in history. From discussion of the life cycles of civilizations raised a consensus, people live in societies differentiated by their cultures. Some cultures evolve beyond the others and hence these special societies are called civilizations. Civilizations have been observed to experience rise and fall in a specific process as follows:

A civilization somehow appears, after a slow start, enters a period of vigorous expansion, increasing its size and power, both internally and external conquest, until gradually a crisis of organization appears. When the civilization has been reorganized, it seems somewhat different. Its values and ideas somewhat changed. Nevertheless, it becomes stabilized and eventually stagnant. After a Golden Age of peace and prosperity, internal crises again arise. At this point there appears, for the first time, a moral and physical weakness which raises doubt in the civilization's ability to defend itself against external enemies. Racked by internal struggles of a social and constitutional character, weakened by loss of faith in its older ideologies and by the challenge of newer ideas incompatible with its past nature, the civilization grows steadily weaker until it is submerged by outsiders, and eventually disappears.

Western civilization, however, has gone through the process differently. In more than a dozen other civilizations the Age of Expansion was followed by an Age of Crisis and reorganization, and this, in turn, by a period of “Universal Empire” in which a single political unit ruled the whole extent of the civilization. But Western civilization transitioned from the stage of reorganization into a period of expansion instead of the usual stage of “Universal Empire”.

The Age of Expansion is generally marked by four kinds of expansion: (1) of population, (2) of geographic area, (3) of production, and (4) of knowledge. The expansion of production and the expansion of knowledge give rise to the expansion of population, and the three of these together give rise to the expansion of geographic extent. This geographic expansion gives the civilization a new peripheral area which makes the previous peripheral area into part of the civilization’s core or a semi-peripheral area between the core area and the fully peripheral area. 

The process of expansion begins in the core area so that it begins to slow up in the core at a time when the peripheral area is still expanding. Eventually, the core passes from the Age of Expansion to the Age of Conflict before the periphery does so that at one point the periphery becomes wealthier than the core. But eventually, in most civilizations the rate of expansion begins to decline everywhere.

It is this decline in the rate of expansion of a civilization which marks its passage from the Age of Expansion to the Age of Conflict, which is the most complex and critical period of the life cycle of a civilization. It is marked by four chief characteristics: 

• it is a period of declining rate of expansion.
• it is a period of growing tensions and class conflicts.
• it is a period of increasingly frequent and increasingly violent imperialist wars.
• it is a period of growing irrationality, pessimism, superstitions, and otherworldliness.

All these phenomena appear in the core area of a civilization before they appear in more peripheral portions of the society.

The age of Conflict gives rise to the other characteristics of the age, in part at least. After the long years of Expansion, people's minds and their social organizations are adjusted to expansion, and it is a very difficult thing to readjust these to stagnation. Social classes and political become violent in face of a slowing expansion. From this come class struggles and imperialist wars. The outcomes of these struggles within the civilization are not what determines the future of the civilization itself, it’s the reorganization of the structure of the civilization and its success in resuming normal growth. This success is to be achieved by removing the class struggles and imperialist wars, which increase the speed of the civilization's decline because they dissipate capital and divert wealth and energies from productive to nonproductive activities.

In most civilizations the Age of Conflict ends in the Age of the Universal Empire. As a result of the imperialist wars of the Age of Conflict, the number of political units in the civilization are reduced so that by conquest one faction eventually emerges triumphant and becomes the single political unit for the whole civilization. Just at the core area passes from the Age of Expansion to the Age of Conflict earlier than the peripheral areas, sometimes the core area is conquered by a single state before the whole civilization is conquered by the Universal Empire. When this occurs the core empire is generally a semi-peripheral state, while the Universal Empire is generally a peripheral state. 

Western Civilization has been able to destroy other cultures due to its prolonged expansion. It has passed through three periods of expansion, has entered an Age of Conflict three times, and each time has had its core area conquered almost completely by a single political unit. Every reorganization of Western civilization has been able to enter a new expanding age, thus it has failed to go on to the Age of the Universal Empire, meaning that the four phenomena characteristic of the Age of Conflict (decreasing rate of expansion, class conflicts, imperialist wars, irrationality) were gradually replaced once again by the four kinds of expansion typical of an Age of Expansion (demographic, geographic, production, knowledge). This shift from an Age of Conflict to an Age of Expansion is possible by the new organizational powers returning to invest and accumulating capital on a large scale, just as the earlier shift from the Age of Expansion to the Age of Conflict is marked by a decrease of investment and eventually by a decreasing rate of accumulation of capital. In other words, deflation promotes the growth of a civilization and inflation promotes its decay.

Western Civilization began, as all civilizations do, in a period of cultural mixture. In this case it was a mixture resulting from the barbarian invasions which destroyed Classical Civilization in the period 350-700.By creating a new culture from the various elements offered from the barbarian tribes, the Roman world, the Saracen world, and above all the Jewish world (Christianity), Western Civilization became a new society. This society became a civilization when it became organized, in the period 700-970, so that there was accumulation of capital and the beginnings of the investment of this capital in new methods of production. These new methods are associated with a change from infantry forces to mounted warriors in defense, from manpower (and thus slavery) to animal power in energy use, from the scratch plow and two-field, fallow agricultural technology of Mediterranean Europe to the eight-oxen, gang plow and three-field system of the Germanic peoples, and from the centralized, state-centered political orientation of the Roman world to the decentralized, private-power feudal network of the medieval world. In the new system most men dedicated to tilling the soil and a minority were dedicated to defensive power. This system caused inequitable distribution of political power and thus, an inequitable distribution of the social economic income. This, in time, resulted in an accumulation of capital, which, by giving rise to demand for luxury goods of remote origin, began to shift the whole economic emphasis of the society from its earlier organization in self-sufficient agrarian units (manors) to commercial interchange, economic specialization, and, by the thirteenth century, to an entirely new pattern of society with towns, a bourgeois class, spreading literacy, growing freedom of alternative social choices, and new, often disturbing, thoughts. From all this came the first period of expansion of Western Civilization, covering the years 970-1270. At the end of this period, the organization of society was becoming a petrified collection of vested interests, investment was decreasing, and the rate of expansion was beginning to fall. Accordingly, Western Civilization, for the first time, entered upon the Age of Conflict. This period, the time of the Hundred Years' War, the Black Death, the great heresies, and severe class conflicts, lasted from about 1270 to 1420. By the end of it, efforts were arising from England and Burgundy to conquer the eve of Western Civilization. But, just at that moment, a new organization of society replaced the vested interests of the feudal system and began a new age expansion. This new Age of Expansion, frequently called the period of commercial capitalism, lasted from about 1440 to about 1680. The real impetus to economic expansion during the period came from efforts to obtain profits by the interchange of goods, especially semi-luxury or luxury goods, over long distances. In time, this system of commercial capitalism became stagnant because of the rise of monopolies. Meaning that a structure of vested interests in which profits were sought by imposing restrictions on the production or interchange of goods rather than by encouraging these activities. Monopolized commercial capitalism is called mercantilism, which became such a burden on economic activities that the rate of expansion of economic life declined and even gave rise to a period of economic decline in the decades immediately following 1690. The class struggles and imperialist wars that mercantilism caused are sometimes called the Second Hundred Years' War. The wars continued until 1815, and the class struggles even later. As a result, France by 1810 had conquered most of Western Civilization. But here, like in 1420 when England had also conquered part of the core of the civilization at the end of an Age of Conflict, the victory was meaningless because a new period of expansion began. Just as commercial capitalism had replaced the petrified institution of the feudal-manorial system (chivalry) after 1440, so industrial capitalism replaced the petrified institution of commercial capitalism (mercantilism) after 1820. The new Age of Expansion which made Napoleon's victory of 1810 impossible to maintain had begun in England with the Agricultural Revolution about 1725 and the Industrial Revolution about 1775. Nevertheless, it did not get started as a great burst of expansion until after 1820. Once started, it moved forward with an impetus such as the world had never seen before, and it looked as if Western Civilization might cover the whole globe. The dates of this third Age of Expansion might be fixed at 1770-1929, following upon the second Age of Conflict of 1690-1815. The social organization at the center of this new development might be called "industrial capitalism”. In the last decade of the nineteenth century, it began to become a structure of vested interests to which we might give the name "monopoly capitalism”. As early, perhaps, as 1890, certain aspects of the third Age of Conflict, began to appear in the core area, with a revival of imperialism, of class struggle, of violent warfare, and of irrationalities. By 1930 it was clear that Western Civilization was again in an Age of Conflict; by 1942 a semi-peripheral state, Germany, had conquered much of the core of the civilization. Germany was defeated by calling into the fray a peripheral state (the United States) and another, outside civilization (the Soviet society). 

It is not yet clear whether Western Civilization will continue along the path marked by so many earlier civilizations, or whether it will be able to reorganize itself sufficiently to enter upon a new, fourth, Age of Expansion. If the former occurs, this Age of Conflict will undoubtedly continue with the fourfold characteristics of class struggle, war, irrationality, and declining progress. In this case, we shall undoubtedly get a Universal Empire in which the United States will rule most of Western Civilization. This will be followed, as in other civilizations, by a period of decay and ultimately, as the civilization grows weaker, by invasions and the total destruction of Western culture. On the other hand, if Western Civilization is able to reorganize itself and enters upon a fourth Age of Expansion, the ability of Western Civilization to survive and go on to increasing prosperity and power will be bright. 

Leaving aside this hypothetical future, it would appear thus that Western Civilization, in approximately fifteen hundred years, has passed through eight periods, thus:

• Mixture 350-700
• Gestation, 700-970
• 3A. First Expansion, 970-1270
• 4A. First Conflict, 1270-1440 Core Empire: England, 1420
• 3B. Second Expansion, 1440-1690
• 4B. Second Conflict, 1690-1815 Core Empire: France, 1810 3C. Third Expansion, 1770-1929
• 4C. Third Conflict, 1893- Core Empire: Germany, 1942.

 The two possibilities which lie in the future can be listed as follows:

• 3D Reorganization and Continuation of the Process.
• 5 Fourth Expansion, 1944.
• 6 Universal Empire (the United States).
• 7 Decay through Invasion (end of the civilization).

 From the list of civilizations previously given, it becomes somewhat easier to see how Western Civilization was able to destroy (or is still destroying) the cultures of six other civilizations. In each of these six cases the victim civilization had already passed the period of Universal Empire and was deep in the Age of Decay. In such a situation Western Civilization played a role as invader. The Westerners who burst in upon the Aztecs in 1519, on the Incas in 1534, on the Mogul Empire in the eighteenth century, on the Manchu Empire after 1790, on the Ottoman Empire after 1774, and on the Tokugawa Empire after 1853 were performing the same role as the Visigoths and the other barbarian tribes to the Roman Empire after 377. In each case, the results of the collision of two civilizations, one in the Age of Expansion and the other in the Age of Decay, was a foregone conclusion- Expansion would destroy Decay. During its various expansions Western Civilization has collided with only one civilization which was not already in the stage of decay. This exception was the civilization now represented by the Soviet Empire. It is not clear what stage this "Orthodox" Civilization is in, but it clearly is not in its stage of decay.

 Orthodox Civilization began as a period of mixture (500-1300) and is now in its second period of expansion. The first period of expansion, covering 1500- 1900, had just begun to change into an Age of Conflict (1900-1920) when the vested interests of the society were wiped away by the defeat at the hands of Germany in 1917 and replaced by a new organization of society which gave rise to a second Age of Expansion (since 1921). During much of the last four hundred years culminating in the twentieth century, the fringes of Asia have been occupied by a semicircle of old dying civilizations (Islamic, Hindu, Chinese, Japanese). These have been under pressure from Western Civilization coming in from the oceans and from Orthodox Civilization pushing outward from the heart of the Eurasian land mass. The Oceanic pressure began with Vasco da Gama in India in 1498, culminated aboard the battleship Missouri in Tokyo Bay in 1945, and continued with the Anglo-French attack on Suez in 1956. The Russian pressure from the continental heartland was applied to the inner frontiers of China, Iran, and Turkey from the seventeenth century to the present. Much of the world's history in the twentieth century has arisen from the interactions of these three factors (the continental heartland of Russian power, the shattered cultures of the Buffer Fringe of Asia, and the oceanic powers of Western Civilization).