Introduction

For many years, it has been evident to me that Western civilization has about run its course, and is in a state of rapid decline. While the fall of earlier civilizations did not destroy the nations that underlay them (e.g., Greek and Roman societies continued to exist long after their civilizations had collapsed), their vibrant character did not return. Like dormant seeds, the creative spirits that nourished earlier periods of greatness germinated in later times or places (e.g., the resurrection of Greek classicism in the Renaissance, Roman engineering in the industrial revolution, the pioneering work of the Persian civilization in mathematics and medicine that were essential to the scientific revolution, or the Pythagorean belief in the mathematical orderliness of the physical world that continues to influence the work of contemporary theoretical physicists). The qualities that have made Western culture so beneficial to mankind may be reborn elsewhere or, if we are able to reverse the present entropic decline, our culture may undergo a creative transformation. But if Western civilization is to revitalize itself, we must come to an understanding of [1] the conditions that are necessary to the health of any culture, and [2] how present institutionalizing practices are interfering with such conditions.

Historians who have focused on the collapse of earlier civilizations have noted a number of factors that led to such declines. When creative systems are institutionalized, they become insulated from the necessities of adaptability and resilience. These institutionalizing practices turn social organizations into their own purposes for being, thus becoming ends in themselves rather than the flexible systems for accomplishing the creative ends for which they were established. The consequence has been to diminish the capacity of civilizations to sustain themselves, ultimately leading to their downfall. Among the major rigidifying practices that have been identified are: "standardization and uniformity," replacing the "differentiation and diversity" that characterize more creative societies; bureaucratization, and other restrictive regulations; increased militarism and the drive for a "universal state;" "division and discord;" social disintegration, and a general increased failure of systems to make "effective responses to new situations."

Will Durant stated that "[a] great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself within. The essential causes of Rome’s decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic dispositions, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars." The nineteenth century historian, Jacob Burckhardt, observed that "[t]he essence of history is change," and that "the way of annihilation is invariably prepared by inward degeneration, by decrease of life." The Durants expressed the point a bit more poetically: "civilizations begin, flourish, decline, and disappear – or linger on as stagnant pools left by once life-giving streams."

Are you able to relate to any of this in your daily life? Major business interests employ the powers of the state to protect their established positions from the threats of open competition. In furtherance of such ends, legislation is passed to control trade and pricing practices, the licensing of new firms, and numerous other prohibitions, tariffs, restrictions, taxation benefits, and other regulations, designed to channel economic activity in directions that serve the more dominant business interests. The propping up of ailing industries – such as through government loan guarantees – or providing billions of dollars in research and development funding, has added to the processes of institutionalization that ultimately leads to "a loss of creative power in the souls of creative individuals." In such ways, the systems that produce the values upon which a civilization depends for its survival, become ends in themselves, or "vested interests," thus stifling creative processes.

Institutionalizing practices are reinforced by other organizations such as school systems and the media. In the words of Ivan Illich: "[s]chool is the advertising agency which makes you believe that you need the society as it is." Illich adds: "[o]nce a man or woman has accepted the need for school, he or she is easy prey for other institutions. Once young people have allowed their imaginations to be formed by curricular instruction, they are conditioned to institutional planning of every sort."

The structuring of thought – whether through the propagation of dogmas, "politically correct" speech codes, or outright censorship – are additional ways in which established interests seek to preserve their positions, practices that reflect "the intractability of old institutions to the touch of new social forces."

There is no historical determinism at work here. Human beings enjoy free will, and we have the capacity to redirect the course of events in our lives. We can choose to rethink the assumptions upon which our social systems will be based. The collapse of institutionalized thinking and the systems it has spawned need not entail the collapse of civilization itself. As we discover decentralized and unstructured ways of working together, we may restore to our culture the individual liberty, resiliency and spontaneity that are essential to any creative civilization. We need to recall that when the age of the dinosaurs came to an abrupt end, our mammalian ancestors began to proliferate. The collapse of modern-day leviathans provides us an opportunity to reclaim society on behalf not of institutions, but of human beings. As the institutional establishment understandably fears, the turbulence of our modern world may be but the prelude to a more prosperous, free, and humane civilization than has heretofore existed, if only we know what to do with that opportunity.

First Chapter                                Table of Contents