February Book Review:
The Fourth Turning

The Fourth Turning: An American Prophecy – What the Cycles of History Tell Us About America's Next Rendezvous with Destiny by William Strauss and Neil Howe is a book that strongly asserts its ideas, not just some wild conspiracy theory. Each turning lasts about 20 years, placing the end of this cycle near 2025 or sometime during this decade.

The Fourth Turning is a crisis, a decisive era of secular upheaval when the values of the current regime give way to a new civic order. If you like historical pattern theories, you're going to love this book. It will help you understand and navigate what's coming—I swear. If you feel like we're at a turning point, this book will enlighten both body and soul.

History moves in cycles, each lasting about as long as a human life. The four archetypes—Hero, Artist, Prophet, and Nomad—shape each era. When each archetype comes of age, society experiences a turning, shifting the collective mood and direction.

During the Fourth Turning, each generation, based on its archetype, will be called upon to play a unique role in guiding the nation through another major turning point in history.

In The Fourth Turning, people say this era could bring great catastrophe—floods, uprisings, even the end of the world. 

I read this book, and it's a 10 out of 10, I promise—you will love it. It's packed with facts, and it's a nonfiction book. It’s a no-nonsense read for people who love history and believe there's a way to see it in a new light. This book will change the way you look at history, showing that even in times of crisis, there is a dawn—a great new beginning that will reveal history for what it truly is.

Each turning is shaped by the behaviors of the generations passing through it, specifically by how they react to societal changes and events. According to the authors, the First Turning is a High, the Second Turning is an Awakening, the Third Turning is an Unraveling, and the Fourth Turning is a Crisis.

In the late 1990s, demographer and historian Neil Howe and his co-author William Strauss wrote The Fourth Turning: An American Prophecy – What the Cycles of History Tell Us About America's Next Rendezvous with Destiny. The book presents a theory that history moves in cycles.

I like to look at all sides of an argument, and political strategist Steve Bannon has a strong opinion on The Fourth Turning. In Washington, Stephen K. Bannon has expressed admiration for this provocative—but disputed—theory, which argues that the United States is nearing a crisis as disruptive and catastrophic as the most pivotal turning points of the last 250 years.

This prophecy, outlined in the 1997 book The Fourth Turning by two amateur historians, argues that world events follow predictable cycles of roughly 80 years. These cycles are divided into four phases, or turnings: growth, maturation, entropy, and destruction. According to the book, Western societies have followed these patterns for centuries, as naturally and inevitably as the changing seasons—spring, summer, fall, and winter.

Few books have been as influential in shaping Steve Bannon’s worldview. A voracious reader, Bannon tends to interpret politics and policy through the lens of historical cycles.

But what does The Fourth Turning reveal about how Bannon approached his role as President Trump’s chief strategist and his vision for the country’s future? Here are some excerpts from the book, along with explanations from The New York Times.

According to the authors, the Fourth Turning is a crisis—an era of destruction, often marked by war or revolution, in which institutions are torn down and rebuilt in response to a perceived threat to the nation's survival.

The Prophet (Idealist) generation is born during a High, a period of renewed community life and broad agreement on a new social order. Prophets grow up as indulged children in the post-crisis era, come of age as self-focused young crusaders during an Awakening, prioritize morals and principles in midlife, and eventually emerge as elder leaders guiding the next Crisis.