AFAIK, the argument over when the western empire fell is not so much about the facts, so much as the meaning of the word "fall". it's inherently arbitrary to point to the "end" of a civilization with routine violent regime changes, varying degrees of centralized control, continuous contraction/expansion of borders, and cultural/ethnic mixing from the territories. everything we think of as "roman" was constantly in flux. if you look solely at centralized political/military power, the western empire clearly fell in the late 400s AD. if you look at cultural influence, you might argue it lives on today in the catholic church.
Those two, as far as I know, are the same thing. I know biological "race" has some negative connotations, but I guess you could also say "ecotype" to refer to roughly the same thing, which I reckon was what you were trying to do--correct me if I'm wrong.
If you think we are, you’d have to agree that the EU is post-decline. The UK, France (the list goes on) are all countries that are past their peak of power, influence and prestige.
But I would argue those EU countries haven’t declined in a negative sense. They’ve just evolved into something other than a global superpower.
Europe has some issues too but they don't have the same systemic failures we have. Also, Europe can be independently successful or failing from the us.
France in comparison is building alliances in the Mediterranean, the Middle East and Africa. I believe they have a lot of growth in their future. They are far form done and very much realpolitik and with expansion in mind( plus one of the few countries that still holds colonies across the world).
History tends to get highly filtered and very little attention is paid to the incredibly bumpy road those times represent.
The other issues aren't exactly unconcerning, but I think we have to acknowledge that this is a quite peaceful time. For most of history, what we call "unrest" was the status quo, and there were in addition wars of open territorial conquest which are nearly extinct today.
- Continued urbanization is essential to growth as we know it
- Non-urban voters are less attuned to what cities need to grow
Then regardless of political ideology, our disticts + FPTP method of growing makes non-negligible growth of the real economy very difficult.
In fact, even during its heyday, the Roman Empire defied defied definitions. Were you Latin? Roman? A citizen? These and other terms all meant different things as the civilization progressed. There was almost a determined effort to keep shifting definitions around such that the Roman Empire never died. In fact, IIRC, there's a 60 Minutes segment where they interview some Greek monks living on an island. The flag they're flying? The flag of the Byzantine Empire, of course. (Also, the word "byzantine" is mostly our own invention. They considered themselves thoroughly Roman)
Having said all of that, it's completely obvious to any outside observer that major changes occurred, many of which had a negative impact on the population. So something happened. Until one starts in with definitions of what exactly constitutes a valid OEM part for our Theseusian ship and what doesn't, folks are free to completely ignore the discussion, no matter how bad things get.
I recently read "Decadent Society" as part of a binge on what another commenter calls "conservative intellectual" literature of the past couple of years. I'm not sure Douthat really makes a great case for his thesis but there is, to me, a sort of haunting note of truth to it--a sense of your "Fizzle" having entered a feedback loop that is difficult to ascertain from the inside.
Since I did march through the literature binge, I'll add that some conservative authors are quite a bit more pointed in their analyses than is Douthat. "Age of Entitlement," and "Return of the Strong Gods" are two titles that come to mind.
or these? (techno genre) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FteYOA2cDkg
(they're evidently sweeping out of the steppe in all directions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvW8JEuIo58 )
A false dichotomy, since humans are uniquely able to harmonize with any environment through observation and planning. The need to buy stuff is the only reason we think of “progress or stagnation”
- How fast can we respond (provide a solution) to problem <x> - What are our dependencies, and how does it affect our ability to respond to problems <X>
Or in other words, we run out of things, or encounter problems we cannot adapt to.
Frankly, the historical record is not encouraging. Usually, when this topic comes up people chime in with easy takeaways like "people have always complained about this, and it rarely amounted to anything", "look at this thing that happened recently that's never happened before. It's proof that we're doing better than any other civilization ever has", or "things have not been going according to my value system, therefore doom is approaching!"
It's possible to cite example-after-example of these phrases coming up when the conversation happens in the historical record. And yet. And yet at times civilizations do die, and there was plenty of warning while it was happening. The problem is that denial and complaceny is tough to fight. When the Emperors took over Rome, it kept the Senate around. They gradually stopped having power, but by keeping them around, it was possible for the illusion of things staying the same to remain. People, with the very smallest prodding, are more than happy to believe that everything is as good as it used to be, plus there's all this new cool stuff we've never seen before!
Hell, ask a few people when the Western Roman Empire ended. Good luck with that. There are folks who will tell you it never did end. If you're that far in denial, how could you ever reason from your current historical position to the long run?
Many times I think conversations like this are much more interesting by the types of responses you get than the actual merits of the case presented.
If our civilization is entering the great 1984/Brave New World Fizzle, I can tell you with certainty that there will be fierce denial that such a thing is occurring. Just like always.