Extreme inequality
Welcome to Destabilized, a newsletter about the internet and other forces straining American society.
In his 2017 book, The Great Leveler, Stanford history professor Walter Scheidel makes the disconcerting case that across history the only thing that has successfully reduced economic inequality is disaster, whether revolution, war, or disease. That’s sobering to the tens of millions of Americans who believe the extreme inequality we see today is unstable in addition to being unjust. If you also believe, as many do, that extreme concentrations of private wealth and power are incompatible with self-governance, it turns out we’re in an irresistible force/unmovable object situation that history says will only be disrupted through violence or deadly disease.
In their September Noema piece, however, Jack A. Goldstone and Peter Turchin offer two examples that at least in part push the other way. In 1820s-30s Britain and 1930s America, democratic majorities fought and voted for changes to the societal balance of power that moved those unequal societies toward greater democracy.
The formula in both cases was clear and simple. First, the leader who was trying to preserve the past social order despite economic change and growing violence was replaced by a new leader who was willing to undertake much-needed reforms. Second, while the new leader leveraged his support to force opponents to give in to the necessary changes, there was no radical revolution; violence was eschewed and reforms were carried out within the existing institutional framework.
Third, the reforms were pragmatic. Various solutions were tried, and the new leaders sought to build broad support for reforms, recognizing that national strength depended on forging majority support for change, rather than forcing through measures that would provide narrow factional or ideologically-driven victories. The bottom line in both cases was that adapting to new social and technological realities required having the wealthy endure some sacrifices while the opportunities and fortunes of ordinary working people were supported and strengthened; the result was to raise each nation to unprecedented wealth and power.
I am not sure what Professor Scheidel would say in argument against these two examples - perhaps that they increased the degree of democracy without meaningfully decreasing inequality. But if increased democratization can be achieved democratically and without violence, perhaps a decrease in inequality can as well. Let’s hope so because the alternatives aren’t good.
The Only Thing That's Curbed Inequality: Catastrophe - Walter Scheidel, The Atlantic (5 minutes)
Gawker, Peter Thiel, Trump, the Brittle Grip and the Case of the Century - Josh Marshall, TPM (6 minutes)
The Great Climate Migration Has Begun - Abrahm Lustgarten, New York Times (40 minutes)
Welcome To The ‘Turbulent Twenties’ - Jack A. Goldstone and Peter Turchin, Noema (14 minutes)
