2 ms·

Resist the temptation of applying this to other situations. Some caveats: - The US didn't actually embark on anything resembling austerity in 2008-2016. - The

Resist the temptation of applying this to other situations. Some caveats: - The US didn't actually embark on anything resembling austerity in 2008-2016. - The narrative that the current US Oresident was swept into office by economic complaints has not held up well. Among other things, it's become quite clear that Trump voters were not primarily those under economic threat. Race, education, and gender were far more meaningful predictors of voting (R)[0]. - Any such causality also fails if you compare economic conditions in 2016 to, for example 2012. Or, if you want to focus on economic anxiety and not headline numbers such as unemployment, 2008. - Economic factors also fail to explain the decidedly different situations with similar outcomes we've seen in Britain, or Austria. - Even the poster child for austerity in modern politics, Greece, has somehow managed to keep it together, somehow. [0]: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/education-not-income-predicted-who-would-vote-for-trump/ http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/education-not-income-pre...

tlogan 9y ago
I agree - it is very hard to find the cause. I'm thinking the raise of extreme nationalism and populism (i.e., nazis) seems to caused more by pace of changes (rate of it) in the society and economy than by economical problems or even immigration. It seems like that Nazis are more a reaction on the pace of the changes. For example, science was rapidly changing (weird quantum mechanic and even weirder general relativity are both from Germany), society was becoming very liberal (religious tolerance, etc.), economy (fiat currencies, etc.) and so on. In short, "change" anxiety causes this.
- mikeash 9y ago
  I wonder if it’s just cyclical. Nazism and similar ideologies are clearly attractive. They hook into some fundamental part of the human psyche. They are also repellant. Their success depends on which of these factors is stronger. A big part of what makes them repellant is seeing what the real world consequences are. It’s hard to find Nazism attractive when you’ve seen it produce genocide and the near total destruction of its country in war. But that was a long time ago. There aren’t many people left alive who remember that time. The horrors are going from concrete to abstract. I hope it’s not true, but maybe we can’t shift away from it until we have another example of how bad it is.

tlogan 9y ago

I agree - it is very hard to find the cause. I'm thinking the raise of extreme nationalism and populism (i.e., nazis) seems to caused more by pace of changes (rate of it) in the society and economy than by economical problems or even immigration. It seems like that Nazis are more a reaction on the pace of the changes. For example, science was rapidly changing (weird quantum mechanic and even weirder general relativity are both from Germany), society was becoming very liberal (religious tolerance, etc.), economy (fiat currencies, etc.) and so on. In short, "change" anxiety causes this.

mikeash 9y ago
I wonder if it’s just cyclical. Nazism and similar ideologies are clearly attractive. They hook into some fundamental part of the human psyche. They are also repellant. Their success depends on which of these factors is stronger. A big part of what makes them repellant is seeing what the real world consequences are. It’s hard to find Nazism attractive when you’ve seen it produce genocide and the near total destruction of its country in war. But that was a long time ago. There aren’t many people left alive who remember that time. The horrors are going from concrete to abstract. I hope it’s not true, but maybe we can’t shift away from it until we have another example of how bad it is.