The_Guardian_-_2016-12-29

‘Declining returns make complexity a less attractive problem-solving strategy.’ Photograph: Andrew
Kelly/Reuters
All this began to sit in my thoughts as I was putting together a radio documentary about the new
populism, and reading a book by the US anthropologist and historian Joseph Tainter, which brims
with implied parallels between far-flung periods of history and more recent events. It may be some
token of our turbulent times that it’s titled The Collapse of Complex Societies: I was alerted to it after
reading a brilliant post-Brexit piece authored by French writer Paul Arbair, and I have been dipping
into it ever since.
The book was published in 1988, just before the fall of communism was about to offer another case
study in what it describes. One key pattern, it argues, applies to whole chunks of history: the way that
increasingly complicated systems initially deliver big economic benefits, only for diminishing returns
to set in, as systems of power and control become overstretched. Ever-increasing burdens are not
matched by material rewards, and popular resentment kicks in.
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Tainter’s text covers the demise of ancient Rome and collapse of Mayan civilization in the 9th
century, the Minoans and Hittites, and the Chinese Zhou dynasty. He talks about common features of
these societies’ fall: “revolts and provincial breakaways”, the end of long-distance trade, resource
depletion, declining economic growth, and a point many societies have eventually crashed into: when
they are “able to do little more than maintain the status quo”. Currencies become debased; “bridges
and roads are not kept up”. Precipitous changes in climate often underlie what happens.
Tainter, and though he cautioned me against generalised comparisons, he agreed that complexity held
the key to a lot of current developments. “The simpler past seems more attractive than today’s
complex reality, and so people vote [thanks to] inchoate frustrations,” he told me. “They choose
simplicity and locality over complexity; identity over internationalism. Politicians promote
themselves by giving voice to this. Hence, in addition to Brexit, we have calls for Scottish