From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Declinism refers to the belief that a society or institution is on a downward trajectory. More specifically, it is the tendency, influenced by cognitive biases such as rosy retrospection, to view the past more positively and the future more negatively.[1][2][3]
Mentioned as “the great summit of declinism” by Adam Gopnick, “was established in 1918, in the book that gave decline its good name in publishing: the German historian Oswald Spengler’s best-selling, thousand-page work The Decline of the West.”[4]
History[edit]
This belief can be traced back to Edward Gibbon’s work[5]: The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, published between 1776 and 1788. This work argues that the Roman Empire collapsed due to the gradual loss of civic virtue among its citizens,[6] who became lazy, spoiled, and inclined to hire foreign mercenaries to handle the defense of the state. Gibbon believed that reason needed to triumph over superstition to prevent Europe’s great powers from suffering a similar fate to the Roman Empire.[5]
The popularization of declinism can be attributed to Spengler’s book, The Decline of the West, which was released in the aftermath of World War I and captured the pessimistic spirit of the times. Spengler wrote that history has seen the rise and fall of several “civilizations” (including the Egyptian, the Classical, the Chinese, and the Mesoamerican). He claimed that they go in cycles, typically spanning 1,000 years. Spengler argued that Western civilization is inevitably in decline.[5]
The notion that Western civilization is in decline has been a recurring theme throughout history, often presenting variations on the same themes.[7] Historian Arthur L. Herman, in the introduction to his book The Idea of Decline in Western History, wrote:
…intellectuals have been predicting the imminent collapse of Western civilization for more than one hundred and fifty years…Yet when I point this out as evidence that, to paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of the demise of the West might be greatly exaggerated, I usually meet with strong skepticism.[7]
Cause[edit]
Declinism has been described as “a trick of the mind” and as “an emotional strategy, something comforting to snuggle up to when the present day seems intolerably bleak.”[8]
One factor in declinism is the reminiscence bump in which older people tend “to best remember events that happened to them at around the ages of 10-30.”[2] As one source puts it, “[t]he vibrancy of youth, and the thrill of experiencing things for the first time, creates a ‘memory bump’ compared with which later life does seem a bit drab.”[8] Gopnick suggests that “the idea of our decline is emotionally magnetic, because life is a long slide down, and the plateau just passed is easier to love than the one coming up.” Citing the widespread love of “old songs,” he writes: “The long look back is part of the long ride home. We all believe in yesterday.”[4]
Another factor is the positivity effect in which “as people get older,
