Reordering the same events can produce entirely different outcomes

Evidence

A different kind of explanation that social scientists now label as path dependence belongs to the sequencing school. This explanation tries to explain particular outcomes by the specific sequencing of events. For example, if I boil the tea in milk and then add hot water I will get chai; if, on the other end, I first boil the tea in water and then add hot milk I will get tea with milk. A famous example of such theory is Barrington Moore’s essay on the social origin of political regimes, where each specific political order of states in the twentieth century – fascism, communism, or democracy – is explained by the sequencing of commercialization and the peasant revolution (Moore, 1966). — Georg Schreyögg and Jörg Sydow, The Hidden Dynamics of Path Dependence, 101

Categorization

• CANDY: Chai versus tea-with-milk as a one-line illustration of path dependence anyone can repeat.
• XREF: Connects to Barrington Moore’s Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy as a reading-list anchor.