The_Guardian_-_2016-12-29

independence, Catalan independence, and so forth.” If complexity and globalisation gave
recognisable benefits, he said, the phenomenon would not be so widespread. Quite so, but this is the
exact way in which modernity is failing.
Visions of imminent social collapse might be taking all this a bit too far. Or maybe not, for as Tainter
writes: “Civilisations are fragile, impermanent things.” Are modern societies vulnerable? It’s a
common belief, he says, that our technological capacity, energy resources and our knowledge of
economics and history mean our civilisation should be able to survive “whatever crises ancient and
simpler societies found insurmountable”.
But as a corrective, he then quotes the revered German classicist Ulrich von Wilamowitz-
Moellendorff’s sobering take on the lessons of the Roman empire. Gin and Radiohead at the ready,
then: “Civilisation can die, because it has already died once.”
This article was downloaded by calibre from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/dec/29/trump-brexitsociety-complex-people-populists
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