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Edward Jayne
Kondratieff
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Kondratieff |
A Kondratieff Model of U.S. Cultural History The Kondratieff economic cycle, the largest and most elusive of them all, is said to occur over roughly a fifty-four period of economic growth and absorption. Twenty years of steady growth are succeeded by slightly more than thirty years of absorption dominated by as many as three depressions (or recessions). Also, transitions from one period to the other are predictably demarcated by peak and trough wars, the first culminating periods of growth and the second periods of absorption. What I am proposing here is that most of the impressive periods of creative and intellectual achievement in the United States have preceding the peak wars--respectively the Civil War, World War I, and the Vietnam War. Each of these intervals has featured its own version of freedom, so we can expect something new when the next period of high achievement emerges within the next decade. |