Civilizational decline can accelerate along an S curve like Soviet collapse

Evidence

Historians are still working to explain why the Soviet Union collapsed like it did. Global superpowers don’t usually disappear overnight. We know that the economy was riven with contradictions and lagged behind the world’s most advanced countries; we know that the political system was inflexible; and we know that the Party had used repression to construct and maintain political power. But all three of these things were true, and remain true, in many other countries that go right on existing. They might be true for the vast majority of governments on the planet. — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn, 106 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Saturated social systems collapse into absorbing black holes — Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, 249; Traditional societies and structures can collapse under external pressures; Soviet ideology’s global appeal collapsed when its economy stagnated — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 252 (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• Economic rigidity and repression alone do not explain state collapse #complicates (0.75) — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn, 106