Are We Moving Ahead -- or Heading Back?

Our fellow Americans, at long last, are getting it. Not only is the Age of Reagan over; it's becoming increasingly clear that the entire post-WWII order has come to the end of its run. The world as we have known it is passing away; and with it, so does our ability to put much faith in the future. Everywhere you go these days, the discussion ultimately comes down the underlying uncertainty: So...that happened. Now: what comes next?

In the futures biz, we call this a discontinuity -- the place where one long-standing set of trends comes crashing down (and with them, the power bases and institutions that were built on those once-solid assumptions); and a whole new future under a completely different set of rules and assumptions becomes possible. A lot of the debate that's being hashed out in blog comments and over dinner tables around the country has to do with whether this moment is an unraveling that will end with America as a backward, insular, second-rate nation; or a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to move forward toward a new and better way of life. We're increasingly aware that the choices we make now will set in place the trends and rules that govern the next era; and we feel the eyes of our grandchildren on us as we try to make the right ones.

Into that discussion, I herewith offer a theory of social change that may shed some light on what the potentials and pitfalls of this moment are. This theory, worked out by psychologist Clare Graves [1] in the late 1950s, observes that cultures go through a natural progression of developmental stages as they grow from small clan structures to large, complex industrial states, and then onward to social democracy. Popularized by Chris Cowan and Don Beck in the mid-1990s under the term "Spiral Dynamics," [2] it's an old theory -- but one I'm pondering often these days as I try to peer out and see what might lie ahead.

Let's start with a quick summary of the stages:

1. Subsistence. The first human organizations are small family bands that barely endure a hand-to-mouth existence. Life is nasty, brutish, and short -- and completely focused on the basics of survival. The priorities are eating, sleeping, hunting, breeding, and seeking shelter -- there is no time for anything else.

2. The Clan. Here, family bands coalesce into a larger unit that may include up to a few hundred people. As the burdens of survival are shared, culture begins to rise and flourish. The clan may be nomadic at first; but as this stage ripens, it will settle into a permanent village. Fiercely collectivist and relatively egalitarian, these groups are led by a council of elders, under the spiritual direction of shamans and the more practical insight of war chiefs. Nature gods play a central role in the way the clan identifies itself and understands the world. It's usually hard for members of a clan to imagine themselves as having independent identities apart from their tribe.

3. The Warlord/King. Eventually, one of the war chiefs aggregates enough power to take control of the village and its surrounding resources, setting himself up as king. And from that point on, his every whim is law; and feeding his ego becomes the central mission of society.

People cooperate because this centralized authority does usually pave the way for a more tightly organized and efficient society. Loyalty is a prized virtue, but threats to power are dealt with more brutally than at any other stage. This phase is also when social hierarchies run the deepest, with women and foreigners always on the low end of the pole. Cultures in Stage 3 typically put their resources into building walls, armies, palaces, and monuments to war gods -- all of which are designed to enhance the power and prestige of the king.

4. The Institutional State. Successful kingdoms eventually create a large community of institutions into which the king delegates his power. Over time, the power of the throne devolves increasingly into the hands of these administrative, religious, educational, financial, and trade bureaucracies. Usually, Stage 4 begins when people have had enough of a bad king's excesses -- and also have enough trust in their institutions to allow them to govern instead. It's where we finally see democratic forms of government typically begin to take root, as the rule of one man is rejected in favor the rule of common law. Even religion becomes more hierarchical and rule-bound, dependent on scriptures and popes to maintain order.

Stage 4 societies are big infrastructure builders. This is where you see the biggest investments in roads, schools, utilities, and other amenities that add to the common wealth. This establishes a solid political, social, and physical infrastructure for the growth of an industrial base, and facilitates reliable markets, currency, and courts -- and the emergence of a national identity. On the downside, this stage also demands a high level of conformity and rule-following -- and that, in the end, is what pushes the society onward to Stage 5.

5. The Entreprenurial/Corporate State. Eventually, the business and finance people begin to chafe at the regulatory excesses of late Stage 4, and press for a liberalization of the rules that limit their growth. At the same time, there's usually a social liberation movement that asserts the rights of the individual, and rejects Stage 4 conformity. Newly freed corporations take over a bigger and bigger role in governing (or not governing) an anything-goes society. Trade networks expand exponentially, and vast fortunes are amassed -- which leads to the rise of oligarchies. Financial dealings grow increasingly shady as oversight mechanisms vanish. Social inequality grows, and trust in institutions evaporates. Eventually, Stage 5 ends as excessive greed runs the country into financial ruin.

6. The Collectivist State. The excesses of Stage 5 sensitize the culture to the dangers of greed and individualism, and the next phase represents a decisive collective response. In this stage, social democracies proliferate; and there's a renewed emphasis on equality, justice, sustainability, and the common good. Business is put under strong governmental control. Public policy focuses on civic goods, and taking the long-term view. Infrastructure decisions are aimed at improving overall quality of life, rather than aggrandizing political power or enriching private interests.

The difference between Stage 6 and Stage 4 is that the later stage is far more careful to nurture the needs of individuals; rejects most forms of hierarchy (which is what drives Stage 4 bureaucracies), and is far more deliberately collectivist. Where Stage 4 sets the stage for entrepreneurship, Stage 6 seeks to control it and bend it toward the common good.

7. Networked Democracy. We're now getting into largely uncharted territory: few societies in history have ever gotten as far as Stage 6, let alone moved on beyond it. But Graves guessed that a mature Stage 6 would eventually become so complex that it would make sense to break it down into smaller parts. The result would be a confederation of local and regional governments that worked closely on national-level issues and held to a common set of laws and standards; but retained a strong, diverse range of local cultures, economies, religions, and languages.

Though he was writing long before the personal computer was invented, Graves' vision of a collaborative political organization based on a coequal-nodes-on-a-network model is instantly recognizable to those of us who do political work on the web today. And though the US state model was an early prototype, the EU may well be the first functioning example of a Stage 7 society.

A few things to note about this theory:

First, this is emphatically not a progress theory, in which higher levels are assumed to be "better" or "preferable" to lower ones. Rather, this is a development/evolution theory that describes of how one kind of social order lays the foundation for other, more complex forms down the road. Each level is necessary and valid; and each has healthy and unhealthy ways of manifesting itself. In fact, given the universality of this pattern, it's arguable that each stage may well be the most reasonable way to organize humans under the given conditions.

Second, you may have noticed that Stages 1, 3, 5, and 7 all put their emphasis on power exercised by individuals; and 2, 4, and 6 all put power in the hands of the collective. It turns out that we fairly regularly oscillate between both impulses as we grow healthy societies.

Third, Graves noted that there's an ontology-recapitulates-phylogeny aspect to his model. He argues that the development of societies mirrors the development of individual humans. In Stage 1, we are babies, preoccupied with eating, sleeping, learning, and surviving. In Stage 2, we are toddlers and young children, strongly identified with our families, dependent on parental authority, and given to magical thinking. By Stage 3, we have entered the early school years, and are preoccupied with the relationship between rules, power, and asserting the demands of our own ego. In later childhood, we accept the rules and norms of society, become more conforming, learn about teamwork, and settle into Stage 4.

Come adolescence, we erupt into Stage 5: self-absorbed, eager to meet risk, and focused intently on establishing our own futures, often without much regard for what our ambitions might cost others. As adulthood sets in and we take responsibility for children, homes, careers, and enterprises, we move to Stage 6, which demands that we take a broader, more balanced and holistic view when weighing priorities. And finally, later in life (if all goes well), we become autonomous actors again, this time empowered with a lifetime of skills and insight that will make us very effective in working on behalf of the larger society.

Finally, it's important to note that Graves' model is not a one-way trip. Nations under tremendous economic, environmental, or military stress can and do take steps back down the ladder. Generally, this re-simplification gives them a better chance to regroup and restructure themselves to adapt to hard times. Nor is the progression inevitable: static societies can settle into a stage and stay there for centuries (like India); or slide back and forth across the border of two adjacent stages for generations.

One good example of the whole model in action is Saddam's Iraq, which was a late Stage 3 country that was rapidly laying down the institutional infrastructure to bring it to Stage 4. (There were solid financial, educational, and physical institutions in place that people trusted; a national identity was finally emerging: and Saddam's sons were so notoriously brutal that the likelihood of a democratic revolution at his death, or shortly thereafter, was high.) They were getting close enough that the Bush Administration's stated objective to "bring democracy to Iraq" (e.g. force it into Stage 4) was probably possible if they'd managed the occupation correctly and honestly.

But, of course, that wasn't the real objective; and their handling of it was neither correct nor honest. Instead, Bush's corporate cronies were eager to fast-forward the country directly to Stage 5, where it could be turned into a profit center. It apparently never occurred to them that this transition is impossible without a strong late-Stage 4 government in place to build infrastructure, guarantee currency, and enforce contracts -- though some of them are finally realizing this now.

Ironically, though, the end result of the invasion was to push the country back down the ladder toward late Stage 2/early Stage 3. Iraq today has been busted back to a feudal state, its infrastructure in shambles, its politics dominated by a resurgent group of tribal religious leaders and would-be warlord/kings. In chaotic and violent conditions, it's natural for people to hand over power to strongmen who can maintain basic order and enable society to function coherently. The results are hardly paradise from a political perspective; but people will eagerly endorse it if it's the only way on offer to ensure their own survival and security.

Since the current generation of Iraqis has had a strong taste of a stable, modern Stage 4 society, we can hope that they'll be strongly motivated to move back out of this phase soon. However, if things go on like this for more than a couple of decades, this generation will pass -- and their memories of how (or why) to build a next-stage state will pass with them. And so will their hopes of avoiding the fate of Afghanistan, which is another example of a country that devolved all the way back to a clan structure.

So where's America in all this? Historically, we were one of the very first Stage 4 nations to emerge, and have had several flirtations with Stage 5 through the years (every one of which ended, predictably enough, in financial ruin). In the FDR era, we were well on the way to establishing the social democracy predicted for Stage 6; but the corporatists dragged us back to Stage 5 -- and held us there for decades.

It's also interesting to note that in times of transformative crisis -- the Revolution, the Civil War, WWII, and now -- we've always invested our presidents with extraordinary powers that were, in hindsight, dangerously king-like. Under this model, a slight reversion to Stage 3 at such moments might even be considered a healthy impulse. Times of high chaos are usually resolved more quickly -- and with better results -- when there's one person firmly in control of society's institutions, setting a clear vision for the future, and actively organizing us to get there. We've been fortunate in the past to be able to trust that power to the judgment of transformative presidents like Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Roosevelt -- all of whom made mistakes, but generally had their hearts in the right places. (The first three were affirming the primacy of the Stage 4 institutional state; FDR, as noted, was peeking over the horizon at Stage 6.) On the other hand, our current president is the textbook example of what hell can be unleashed when we put this unusual level of power into the untrustworthy hands of a Stage 3 tyrant wannabe.

You can hear both of these possibilities at work in our current conversations. On one hand, there's plenty of fear that we're under the kind of economic and environmental pressure that would force us to reorganize under a more simple structure -- maybe even all the way to a Stage 3-style authoritarian government. There's certainly no shortage of Americans who'd like to take us there; and their numbers may grow as the crisis deepens. Our usual tendency to give extraordinary powers to crisis-era presidents will be taken as evidence that this is happening.

But, on the other hand, there's also a growing awareness that the late-Stage-5 breakdown we're enduring now presents a historic opportunity -- and, in fact, is a natural gateway -- through which America can finally step into the Stage 6 green democracy so many of us have envisioned for so long. The social democracies of Europe confronted this same transition in the aftermath of World War II, and chose to domesticate their feral financiers and turn themselves into more sustainable Stage 6 societies. Now, it could finally be our turn.

No model is complete in and of itself; but a good theory can allow us to draw the right lessons from history and understand the underlying forces at work when the current trends evaporate and clues on the ground grow thin. I'm finding a lot of reassurance in Clare Graves' spiral dynamics model right now. It clarifies the threats -- and possibilities -- that this moment offers America. And it offers historical support for the idea that our salvation lies in greater government involvement in creating a humane and sustainable future -- and that we now have a rare opportunity to make that next stage a reality.