The Fourth Turning 2020

The Fourth Turning 2005-2025

By Richard Turnock

January 19, 2012

The next great catastrophe will become a major event in America’s history like the Revolutionary War, Civil War and WWII.  About 2020-2025, the next great catastrophe will end the Fourth Turning that started about 2005 as predicted in “The Fourth Turning” by Strauss and Howe.

If we stand back and analyze the current situation, we might be like someone in 1932 trying to predict what will happen from 1940 to 1945.  No one could have predicted Pearl Harbor or Germany invading France.  However, there are hints and trends that become apparent using the vast information resources and global awareness available now.

The Occupy movement has changed the narrative in many ways to highlight the key factors that will contribute to the buildup to the next great catastrophe.  First, Occupy is a learning organization that functions differently than our traditional public education system.  The concept of a General Assembly implements transformative learning theory (defined by Jack Mezirow) for adult learning.

The NYCGA creates a process and procedures that use prior interpretation to construct a new interpretation of the meaning of each person’s experience in order to guide future action.  What counts in this learning process is what individual learners want to learn.  Participants have the opportunity to reflect and write or talk about their experience in order to create meaning.  The NYCGA blocks out power relationships by not having a formal leader and creates a more democratic experience that supports transformative learning.

Second, the Occupy movement’s focus on inequity and injustice connects them with revolutions and the overthrow of dictators worldwide while taking action in America using nonviolence.  Occupy has staked out a space in society separate from traditional organizations such as political parties, unions, corporations or NGOs. Occupy wants to change the policies, laws and governance to fight against inequity and injustice.

Conservatives continue to fight against communism and socialism.  Every policy proposed by Democrats, Occupy or liberals is labeled as a step toward socialism.  Every action taken by Occupy is labeled as a step toward communism.  Conservatives are going to win some battles over the next ten years but they are going to lose the war.  Conservatives will be discredited and labeled as focused on the past at a time when America needs to unite around a common goal to deal with the reality of 2020-2025.

America is beginning to move away from supporting competition, individual rights, free market economy and corporations with the same rights as people because these values and beliefs will not be used and useful during the great catastrophe of 2020-2025.  America needs a society based on cooperation and collaboration to fight against inequity and injustice in America and on a global scale.  To do this America will need to change policies in public education, energy, environment, global security and every other aspect of culture and society.

Around 2020, a catalyst will ignite a catastrophe and America will respond by uniting to cooperate and collaborate in a fight to save civilization.  In my opinion, catastrophic weather events and rapidly rising sea levels due to global climate change will trigger a mass migration of hundreds of millions of people worldwide.  This will cause governments to collapse and lead to significant consequences for America.  This seems to me to be the most likely scenario.  Global climate change has a decade long delay from when CO2 enters the atmosphere until the greenhouse effect stabilizes the average temperature of the atmosphere at a new, higher temperature.

The dynamics of climate change will result in a rapid rise in the average temperature of the atmosphere as we approach 2020 and everyone will be surprised at how fast the weather changes to destabilize the food supply, limit access to fresh water and flood land near the oceans.  The dynamics of global climate change increase the volatility of weather events causing for example, in the Pacific NW of America, warmer, wetter winters and hotter, drier summers.

2011 marked the 15th consecutive year with a national average temperature for the year above normal, with much of the warmth coming from increases in nighttime low temperatures. Measured against the 20th-century records, 2011 would find itself in a tie as the second-warmest year on record. Data from NOAA's National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) also show that the proportion of the country affected either by extremely dry or extremely wet conditions in a given year has expanded.

The actions we take now that put CO2 into the atmosphere will be the tipping point around 2020 that will lead to the next great catastrophe.  Actions everyone can take now and leading up to 2020 include but are not limited to:

• practicing cooperation
• practicing collaboration
• practicing talking about inequity in America
• practicing talking about injustice in America
• practicing net zero carbon footprint

Conservatives will continue to resist changes by fighting against an enemy from the past that no longer exists as a threat.   Conservative beliefs and values in the individual, free market economics and small government are the direct result of the fight against communism and socialism after WWII.  Conservatives are yelling into the wind of the present and future that is blowing their words away with the reality of income and wealth inequality, immigrant and gay/lesbian injustice, and public education and health care inequity.  Soon they will be yelling for security for protection from the consequences of global climate change.

By 2020, cooperation and collaboration will be the skills most useful for survival.  Individual effort, competition and materialistic goals will be punished.  The economy, political parties and governance of America will be transformed in order to deal with the new landscape from rising sea levels, warmer atmosphere and displaced people. America needs to practice cooperation and collaboration to fight against inequity and injustice.