Norbert Elias and System Collapse

[IrateCitizen]

As part of my graduate studies in history, I recently read a significant portion from The Civilizing Process by Norbert Elias. This was part of a seminar on historiographical methods and analysis, focusing on different social theories and the way they affect the work of historians in trying to explain the past.

I found Elias's work to be quite fascinating. Basically, it theorizes that the process of "civilization" is largely the result of people subordinating their impulsive drives -- the repression of the id by the ego and superego, in Freud's terminology -- as their social organization changes over time. Elias says that this process is mutually reinforcing and not entirely rational. People demonstrate greater self-restraint as their social organization becomes more complex and interdependent. Likewise, increased levels of self-restraint propel a greater level of complexity and interdependence. Central to Elias's notion of "progress" along the scale of impulsiveness to self-restraint is the level of security under which people live. In societies that do not provide a high level of physical or material security, the impulsiveness of the id reigns. For those that achieve a high level of security, the restraint of the ego and superego keep the id in check.

To support this idea, Elias cites the changes in human behavior as Western Europe changed from a feudal society of warrior-nobles and knights into the court society of absolutist kings and aristocratic nobles. In the former, the use of violence was highly decentralized. Most people did not have adequate levels of security -- especially physical security. To venture on the roads outside of town was to invite the certain predations of highwaymen or rival soldiers. Disputes between individuals (particularly nobles) were settled by violent confrontation. By contrast, in the society of absolutist kings, the use of violence was monopolized by the monarch. Nobles could no longer settle their disputes through violence, so the court society (with its emphasis on manners, fashion, elaborate titles and intrigue) evolved instead as a forum for noble competition and a means of differentiating the aristocracy from the commoners. The latter was also a much more complex and interdependent society than the former. Finally, the former had a general world view largely characterized by fear and emotion (superstition and religion), while the move toward "civilization" appealed increasingly to empirical rationalism (observation and science).

As far as historical reference goes, Elias provides a decidedly Marxist superstructure for his theories. Basically, his history begins in medieval Europe and proposes a rather linear view of civilization's development, as well as describing Western Europe as the vanguard of civilization's progress. I was left wondering about how Elias would describe the notion of a society moving away from "civilization" -- from a highly complex, centralized, interdependent society to one that is decidedly less so.

Central to any analysis of collapse through Elias's lens is the loss of material or physical security. Also, the relationship between changing social organization and the loss of security must be viewed as a mutually reinforcing process. I believe that if Elias had gone back a little further, he could have found an excellent model for this process: the Roman Empire.

The collapse of the Roman Empire was certainly predicated by internal problems -- declining harvests, political intrigue, etc. However, these internal problems greatly contributed to the rolling back of the frontier by Germanic barbarians. When the highly complex society of Rome lost steam, it lost its cohesive force among its populace. Where the citizens of Rome once were willing to sacrifice for her, now they concerned themselves with the circuses of the Colosseum even as the empire crumbled around them. A substantial internal proletariat -- people who lived within Roman borders but felt no affinity or allegiance to Roman ideals -- swelled in number. A fine example of this proletariat is offered by the rapid spread of Christianity through Rome, in spite of its initial criminalization by the Roman authorities. (Arnold Toynbee, A Study of History)

So, the short version is that eventually complexity imploded, the "barbarian" conquered the "civilized," and Europe plunged into the Dark Ages. However, traces of the "civilized" still remained after 476 A.D. -- namely the Catholic Church. It is strange that what initially was a proletarian movement within Rome (Christianity) became its vehicle for the preservation of classical culture as society became less complex, less secure, less rational and more violent. What this demonstrates, however, is that the move either forward or backward on the scale of "civilization" is often a process of negotiation between the old and the new, the more and less "civilized." Even as Rome fell, it planted the seeds of what would eventually bloom after the Dark Ages had passed. Many ideas of the Renaissance, scientific revolution and Enlightenment found their genesis in the work of classical Greek and Roman scholars.

Fast-forward now to the present. Currently, we face a wide range of predicaments -- climate change, peak "everything," overpopulation, unsustainable debt, etc. The unprecedented complexity and interdependence of our social organization is largely the result (and cause) of increased material and physical security. What happens if these predicaments cause this security to deteriorate? Will we become stuck in a downward spiral like Western Europe after the fall of Rome, unable to regroup until after they hit rock bottom? Or will we be able to adjust our organization to meet new realities? Will the negotiation between complex and decentralized take place in a more rational manner this time around, or is a lack of rational forethought a fait accompli of this process?

[peacetalksforall]

1. I want to take my message from the people in this hemisphere. There is something

going on. Former roles of little people to be submissive and obedient to their leaders who have always been in military uniform or suits, ties, and shiny shoes are changing. These people who the IMF, WorldBank, US and Europeans decided they could co-rule (along with their 'native born uniform and shiny shoes leaders) appear to have impetus from change of attitude, recognition of their true status, exhaustion from bank crashes and episodes of wild inflation. For some reason they are finding do-ability resolution. Helped with the oil of Venezuela and a leader who is giving some of the oil profits to help some of these nations with their debt to U.S. and European lords, we're seeing change. Thanks to a former hit man who had the guts and integrity to write and speak, we're gaining in reality. Thanks even to finding the burial places of the victims of massacres.

You ask good questions - this one, for example:

Or will we be able to adjust our organization to meet new realities?

There is a new reality in this hemisphere from pole to pole -

It is the reason I cringe and cry when I hear U.S. leaders threatening these people by threatening their leaders through foment and plants. The leaders coming in, moreso in South America, are representing little people, not ruling them, in the style of previous uniform and shiny shoes death, debt, and poverty partners of the U.S. and Europe.

I hope this movement will not crumble. At least these people are more capable of riding out the economic downturn that the U.S. and Europe kicked off than we are - for the short term. They were made to be capable, by us.

As to rational manner and rationsl forethought - these people are capable. That may have been all they asked for through all those decades.

Perhaps we need to look out there, before looking in. The tables have turned. There are a lot of little people out there, just as there are plenty here. We all still want and need basics and we deserve it. Basics start with the children. No weapons of steel and chemicals against their precious bodies. No excuses. No lies. No thefts. The idea that we can take their earth resources, then leave them poor and massacred, has to end. There is hope in this hemispher.

A grand difference today is communication between the serfs. Even if a way was found to kill the internet, they can never take back what we've all learned and our hightened awareness.

[tom_paine]

2. The most likely outcome: Humanity will do what it always does.

You yourself have touched on the many psychological imperatives, that we are utter incapable of dealing with through reason, it seems, no matter how much reason we try to apply.

Because they are hardwired into us, and we have not the species-level ability to overcome them at any cost. This is true of virtually all human beings since time began.

You've heard me say this before, so I won't go deeper and repeat myself.

I'll just say, we will do what we have always done, almost without exception since human history began.

Dark Ages? You betcha. And with our current population, when the next Dark Age hits, it will probably make the other look like a kindergarten spat, when one considers the relative height and therefore fall of the "carrying capacity" and "overshoot".

In other words, how much overshoot and die-off was required to get indo-European population down from Roman Carrying Capacity to Dark Ages Carrying Capacity?

Answer: A whole lot less overshooting and dying off than WE are going to have to do in the next century or two, depending on how fast things happen.

It would seem a commonsensical thing to assume greater realtive levels of overshoot and dieoff mean greater social upheaval "on the ground" during the process, and may mean a much longer process.

And that's IF the global environment will even allow our species to get to the "next reneissance" before extincting us during the Dark Age to come.

[IrateCitizen]

3. I certainly see that as one POSSIBLE outcome.

There will more than likely be a significant downward adjustment of world population in the coming decades. Death will probably become a much more familiar thing to all of us. I tend to not think much beyond that (in terms of extinction, as you mention) -- because there's really no productive purpose in going there, at least from a "What can I do right now?" perspective on things.

However, I also do not completely write off the ability of human societies (on a smaller scale) to develop out of the adjustments we make to deal with the predicaments we face. I think the outcomes will be somewhere in the middle -- which still isn't a comfortable place for any of us used to modernity. Those with a greater likelihood of surviving will be those who have prepared by developing reasonable means of physical and material (especially food) security outside of our current centralized institutions. In this sense, I still hold out hope that something with a significantly lower standard of living but also with an improved quality of life may eventually arise.

Of course, when you delve into these subjects and view things through an ecological lens, I think you ultimately have to remain an optimist because, if you truly believe the worst is likely to happen, what's the point of keeping on?