I enjoyed the author's dissection of Spengler's philosophy, but took a little bit of issue with the very end, when he attempted to apply said philosophy to our current political state. It just ended up feeling hollow and insubstantial, which really was unavoidable. Spengler's philosophy, so far as I can tell from secondary discourse, is incredibly impressionistic, and relies on a series of sweeping movements and generalizations to make its points. Which doesn't make it irrelevant or inapplicable, per se- it's easy to see how, upon a little reflection, a reader might "get the feeling" that Spengler was onto something. But that's a function of his style, which feels at once at home in the avant garde circles of early 20th century Western Europe, while at the same time feels hopelessly anachronistic in today's prevailing culture of Gradgrindian data analysis and the appeal to linear thought. Unfortunately, there's just little room or patience for these sorts of sweeping, romantic thought-movements in academic discourse today.

So it doesn't really come as any surprise that contemporary thinkers alternately can't let go of, and yet can't effectively apply Spengler's philosophy, to modern historical and political analysis.

Ultimately, this is illustrated by a) Spengler's own failed prognostication in regards to Germany's unequivocal ascendance to the throne of "civilization," and b) Merry's own quick attempt to apply the theory to the contemporary United States at the end of the essay. Spengler's prediction, and its failure to bear fruit, speaks for itself. As for Merry's conjecture that we're seeing it play out specifically in America's constant march towards exceptionalism... who knows. The examples he gave were far from convincing. I certainly don't think that the divide between governmental and civic intent implies anything other than the quintessential historical difference between the governor and the governed- that is to say, the state must act in ways that benefit the state as a whole rather than ways that benefit each of its citizens individually, and the citizens must settle for reaping the overall reward of state primacy even if it was ill-gained. There's nothing new here- even a cursory read of The Prince tells you as much- and in light of this, Merry's insistence that we're seeing an unprecedented divide between state and private interest, and that the divide in and of itself proves a precursor to collapse, rings a bit hollow.

The problem with apocalyptic predictions is that somebody's always crying one out, and eventually one of them can't help but be right. Until then, they all sound equally viable and absurd. Spengler certainly had a compelling idea on a really wide scale, and Merry might too be onto something, but we won't know until things truly fall apart. And given that all of Spengler's examples spanned a series of centuries both in ascension and decline, something tells me that the Fed's moves to combat deeper recession won't really be the straw that breaks the camel's back, or even herald in the circumstances that'll allow that straw to fall.

Dunno if any of that was particularly well-written or cohesive. Anyhow, great essay nonetheless, makes me want to dig into Spengler.

The most recent interpretation of Spengler's view of history, Samuel Huntington's "The Clash of Civilizations?," seems a bit more prescient than the most recent interpretation of Hegel's view of history, Francis Fukuyama's "The End of History?."

I felt like Spengler's theory was basically the practice of saying something true and then saying something else right afterward and pointing to the first thing as evidence that the second thing must be true.

Yeah, there's a solid prediction of the progression of Western civilization but I don't see any evidence that different civilizations can be taken as wholly independent.

How can Spengler posit that mankind has no systematic flow to it, that each civilization is a separate rise-and-fall saga?

America wouldn't have existed without the British, who wouldn't have existed without the Romans, who were hugely influenced by the Greeks. The Persians and the Egyptians influenced the Greeks, and were in turn influenced by them as well. Etc.

I guess it's true that natural geographic barriers (vast steppes, Urals, Siberian waste) mean that the influence eastern civilizations had on the west is less obvious and less pronounced, but it's there. And they certainly influenced each other. How does he deal with the Chinese dynasties that rise out of the ashes of one another?

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I fail to see why both ideas of history presented in the article can't be true. Can't history be a series of civilizations that reach their apogee, accomplish things, and then decline -- while also fitting into a grander historical template? Isn't that what we have? Collective human knowledge, et al.

Incidentally,

Thus, it sometimes seems as if America is on autopilot as it moves haltingly but with seemingly inexorable force toward ever-greater involvement in the world even as discomfort increases within the electorate.

Dead on.