[lbo-talk] USA and protests -or lack thereof-

[Percival Myers]

On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 9:54 AM, Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
>
> --- On Sat, 3/14/09, Jim Farmelant <farmelantj at juno.com> wrote:
>
>> Alexis de Tocqueville in his book, *The Ancien Régime and the Revolution*,
>> emphasized the role that increasing prosperity played in generating
>> resistance by increasing people's expectations of future improvements.
>> It's when these expectations turn out not to be met that people will
>> then rebel.  So misery by itself tends not to generate rebellion.  In
>> fact it usually breeds passivity.
>>
>
> [WS:]  That is also the central claim of Davies J-curve theory of social revolutions http://www.fragilecologies.com/jun27_03.html
>
> I think it explains quite a bit when it comes to social unrest in Eastern Europe under communism.  However, the problem with this approach is that it does not explain the absence of a revolution in situations that clearly fit the J-curve model e.g. the sudden drop in living conditions during the Great Depression in the US.  (In other words, the theory says "if p then q".  "P" obtains (Depression) but "q" (revolt) does not follow i,e "p but not q" which squarely contradicts the theory by the rule of modus tollens.)

Does this J-curve model allow for a Roosevelt and the New Deal? If so,
why do you think there is a problem with that model?


> I will also conjecture that J-curve theory is better suited for pre-modern societies, with more-or-less static frame of expectations, but does not fare as well in modern capitalist societies, where expectations are formed withing a far more dynamic frame.

If you mean, in societies where the unrest is recognized and something
can be-and-is done to placate it, I would tend to agree. If that's
what you meant, why didn't you say so less obscurely?

Percy