My rating: 5 of 5 stars
As soon as I finished this book, I rushed to check the year of publication.
Originally published as an article, ‘The Fate of Empires’ serves as a concise overview of numerous Empires throughout the ages in an attempt to give structure to their stories. The fact that it was published in 1978 serves as more proof for its truthfulness for every year that passes since.
Glubb begins his thesis by explaining that to truly benefit from history, we should learn from the entire history of the human race, not limit ourselves to the history of a select few nations, even within which the stories are carefully selected to omit anything unseemly. This made immediate sense to me. As Glubb himself alludes to, if China were to make a world-first discovery in any field of science, mathematics or technology, the rest of the world would rush to research and adopt it for their own benefit. Why then is the opposite approach taken for history? Why do we champion our own origins but ignore – or worse – vilify the histories of anyone else? The only true way to learn and benefit from the lessons of history is to study the history of mankind as a whole, not to cherry pick certain events from our own nation’s past and serve it as the main dish, else what more could it be but thinly veiled propaganda?
By studying history – everyone’s history – we get to see the patterns of human behaviour, we get to see how the system of ascension, prosperity, decline and collapse appear in a wide range of diverse environments with differently types of rulership and technologies. We will have a better understanding of what systems are effective and which aren’t. This is precisely what this book is about.
Glubb presents a structure he has drawn from various empires that all empires generally follow, through the age of the pioneers to one where the citizens of the civilisation are stuck in a cycle of despair, waiting for their inevitable end.
There is a single issue I have with this thesis. Glubb’s theory has its foundational underpinnings in one claim, that amongst the Empires he has studied, they lasted for roughly 250 years. He cites the British, Umayyad, Persian and Roman Empires (amongst a few others) as proofs for everything else that comes after.
I’m no expert on any these empires, but this claim seems to make use of a generous helping of ‘artistic liberty’ with their figures. To his credit, claiming such a thing in the first place is not an easy task. No matter what figure he would posit for the lifetimes of the mentioned empires, someone would be unhappy and accuse him of being wrong. If the mentioned empires did in fact last for wildly different periods in comparison to what the author claims however, then the stages of rise and fall do not seamlessly fit together as Glubb professes.
It is impossible to please everyone, but I can give him the benefit of the doubt in this matter until I learn enough myself to confirm or deny his claims.
Aside from this, it is hard to deny the logic and flow of the ideas put forth in this work, they seem evidently true. If a man’s life has period of rise, affluence, stagnation and decline, why not an empire made up of many men? The patterns of life seem to repeat everywhere and only the astute are able to spot them. I think Glubb has done a wonderful job collecting the signs and symptoms and weaving them together into a single theory.
Additionally, some of the ideas espoused within ‘The Fate of Empires’ resound even harder today. We have tech founders and CEOs openly promising that their advances in AI and robotics will fundamentally save the world in countless aspects, even worse, millions believe them. They place their hopes (and money) in these companies hoping for an escape from the sense of civilisational despair they feel. Unfortunately, such a sign is in fact a symptom of decline in of itself. Glubb writes that one of the stages of a civilisation contains within it the rise of intellectualism. People are inclined to believe that an extraordinary new technology can save them, when in fact the truisms of human nature triumph in every era. It is only via self-sacrifice and uncompromising loyalty to the nation by its citizens does a nation pick itself up and stand on its own two feet once more. In our age of ever-accelerating technology, how many countless millions believe the false promises of something which is fundamentally unable to meet the hype?
Another interesting idea that Glubb puts forth is that each civilisation, each people has its turn at some point or another at leading the world. The individual characteristics of these people and that of their resulting civilisation provides a unique trait that they display as they lead the world with their affluence and authority. The entire world is then able to take the positives from their traits and mankind is forever changed in this regard. When another civilisation takes the helm they will imprint their own traits and the cycle will inevitably repeat once more. Seeing as even the worst empires have something positive about them, this system serves as a way for mankind to collectively take steps forward upon the path to true progress. Each nation is able to leave their own contribution on this path, writing their page in history before another closes the chapter. This is a wonderful idea and one that immediately struck a chord with me. Glubb describes it as a possible manifestation of Divine Wisdom in action before our very eyes. I tend to agree wholeheartedly.
‘Search for Survival’ is a Q&A response to the overwhelming replies Glubb himself received as a result of the publishing of ‘The Fate of Empires’. while it isn’t structured as an essay in of itself, it serves as a refreshing and concise answer to many popular queries one may have had at his initial essay. The clarifications and explanations from ‘Search for Survival’ flesh out a few of the initial ideas from the original work and help to solidify his message.
One qualm I have however, is that Glubb states that he is not preaching about ‘the end being nigh’, for he is instead trying to raise the alarm that the decline of the nations he is referring to is one made by our own hands. Just as much as it is happening to us, we alone have the power to decide to reverse course. In theory this seems sound, but if the cycles of empire seem consistent with previous example beforehand, then with Glubb’s own theory it almost sounds inevitable. It feels like he tried to backtrack in ‘Search for Survival’ slightly due to the overwhelming attention he received for ‘The Fate of Empires’ in an attempt to assuage those who accused him of what we would today call ‘doomerism’. Aside from that however, I find his explanations enlightening.
Overall, ‘The Fate of Empires’ is a sobering read, aside from the small points of dispute mentioned, it is hard to fault Glubb’s rationale. We can see many of the aspects he speaks of in our world today, but the overall idea of each civilisation having a lifestyle (as Ibn Khaldun also mentioned centuries ago) is one worth internalising. We can be biased in thinking that things will never change, and for a lot of people’s lifetimes they haven’t. But just like nature has its seasons, so do men and the nations they build. It would be prudent for us to always be aware that the only thing constant in life is change, and ‘The Fate of Empires’ is a fantastic way to introduce oneself to the idea.
This is a 5 star book. It is great in such a way that it makes me think I have been too generous with other books I have also rated so highly, this cuts above the rest in a way that deserves its own distinction.
If you have any interest in history and learning from the patterns of the past, I highly recommend reading this work. If you have no interest in that sort of thing, I recommend this book for you even more, you may need it more than the rest of us.