Into the Fourth Turning

Into the Fourth Turning



A Casey Research interview with Neil Howe, co-author of The Fourth Turning

The Fourth Turning is an amazingly prescient book Neil Howe wrote with the late William Strauss in 1997. The work, which describes generational archetypes and the cyclical patterns created by these archetypes, has been an eye-opener to anyone able to entertain the notion that history may repeat itself. At the time the book was published, the Boston Globe stated, "If Howe and Strauss are right, they will take their place among the great American prophets." Read this visionary interview published in The Casey Report, and see for yourself.

DAVID GALLAND: Could you provide us a quick introduction to generational research?

NEIL HOWE: We think that generations move history along and prevent society from suffering too long under the excesses of any particular generation. People often assume that every new generation will be a linear extension of the last one. You know, that after Generation X comes Generation Y. They might further expect Generation Y to be like Gen X on steroids – even more willing to take risk and with even more edginess in the culture. Yet the Millennial Generation that followed Gen X is not like that at all. In fact, no generation is like the generation that immediately precedes it.

Instead, every generation turns the corner and to some extent compensates for the excesses and mistakes of the midlife generation that is in charge when they come of age. This is necessary, because if generations kept on going in the same direction as their predecessors, civilization would have gone off a cliff thousands of years ago.

So this is a necessary process, a process that is particularly important in modern nontraditional societies, where generations are free to transform institutions according to their own styles and proclivities.

In our research we have found that, in modern societies, four basic types of generations tend to recur in the same order.

DAVID: The four generational archetypes. Can you provide a sketch of each for those of our readers unfamiliar with your work?

HOWE: Absolutely.

The first is what we call the Hero archetype. Hero generations are usually protectively raised as kids. They come of age at a time of emergency or Crisis and become known as young adults for helping society resolve the Crisis, hopefully successfully. Once the Crisis is resolved, they become institutionally powerful in midlife and remain focused on outer-world challenges and solutions. In their old age, they are greeted by a spiritual Awakening, a cultural upheaval fired by the young. This is the typical life story of a Hero generation.

One example of the Hero archetype is the G.I. Generation, the soldiers of World War II, who became an institutional powerhouse after the war and then in old age confronted the young hippies and protesters of the 1960s. Going back in American history, we have seen many other Hero archetypes, for example the generation of Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison, and President Monroe. These were the heroes of the American Revolution, who in old age were greeted by the second Great Awakening and a new youth generation of fiery Prophets.

After the Hero archetype comes the Artist archetype. Artist generations have a very different location in history -- they are the children of the Crisis. For Hero generations, child protection rises from first cohort to last. By the time Artists come along, child protection reaches suffocating levels. Artists come of age as young adults during the post-Crisis era, when conformity seems like the best path to success, and they tend to be collectively risk averse. Artists see themselves as providing the expertise and refinement that can both improve and adorn the enormous new institutional innovations that have been forged during the Crisis. They typically experience a cultural Awakening in midlife, and their lives speed up as the culture transforms.

A great example of the Artist archetype is the so-called "Silent" Generation, the post World War II young adults who married early and moved into gleaming new suburbs in the 1950s, went through their midlife crises in the '70s and '80s, and are today the very affluent, active seniors retiring into gated lifestyle communities.

The third archetype is what we call a Prophet archetype. The most recent example of this archetype is the Baby Boom Generation. Prophet generations grow up as children during a period of post-Crisis affluence and come of age during a period of cultural upheaval. They become moralistic and values-obsessed midlife leaders and parents, and as they enter old age, they steer the country into the next great outer-world social or political Crisis. Boomers, for example, grew up during the Postwar American High, came of age during the Consciousness Revolution of the 1960s and '70s, and are now entering old age.

Finally there is what we call a Nomad archetype. Nomads are typically raised as children during Awakenings, the great cultural upheavals of our history. Whereas the Prophet archetype is indulgently raised as children, the Nomad archetype is underprotected and completely exposed as children. They learn early that they can't trust basic institutions to look out for their best interests and come of age as free agents whose watchword is individualism. They are the great realists and pragmatists in our nation's history.

The most recent example of the Nomad archetype is Generation X. This generation grew up during the social turmoil of the 1960s and '70s and are now beginning to enter midlife. They are the ones that know how to get things done on the ground. They are the stay-at-home dads and security moms trying to give their kids more of a childhood than they themselves had. Their burden is that they tend not to trust large institutions and do not have a strong connection to public life. They forge their identity and value system by "going it alone" and staying off the radar screen of government. It could be very interesting to see the rest of the life story of this generation, particularly as they take over leadership positions.

DAVID: Could you tell us the general age ranges of these archetypes now?

HOWE: One Hero generation that is alive today is the G.I. Generation, born between 1901 and 1924. They came of age with the New Deal, World War II, and the Great Depression. They are today in their mid-80s and beyond, and their influence is waning.

Today's other example of a Hero archetype is the Millennial Generation, born from 1982 to about 2003 or 2004. These are today's young people, who are just beginning to be well known to most Americans. They fill K-12 schools, colleges, graduate schools, and have recently begun entering the workplace. We associate them with dramatic improvements in youth behaviors, which are often underreported by the media. Since Millennials have come along, we've seen huge declines in violent crime, teen pregnancy, and the most damaging forms of drug abuse, as well as higher rates of community service and volunteering. This is a generation that reminds us in many respects of the young G.I.s nearly a century ago, back when they were the first boy scouts and girl scouts between 1910 and 1920.

DAVID: Then following the Hero, we have the Artist, right?

HOWE: Yes. As I mentioned earlier, one example of that archetype is the Silent Generation, born between 1925 and 1942. This generation was too young to remember anything about America before the Great Crash of 1929, and too young to be of fighting age during World War II.

That 1925 birth year is filled with people like William F. Buckley and Bobby Kennedy, first-wave Silent who just missed World War II. Many of them were actually in the camps in California waiting for the invasion of Japan when they heard that the war was over. Part of their generational experience is that sense of just barely missing something big. Surveys show that this generation does not like to call themselves "senior citizens." They did not fight in World War II. They did not build the A bomb. They are more like "senior partners." Unlike G.I.s, they are flexible elders, focused on the needs of others. Many of them are highly engaged in the family activities of their children and grandchildren. In politics, they are today's elder advisors, not powerhouse leaders.

There is a new generation of the Artist archetype just now beginning to arrive. They started being born, we think, around 2004 or 2005. We did a contest on our website to choose a name for this new generation, and the winner was Homeland Generation, reflecting the fact that they are being incredibly well protected. So we are tentatively calling them the Homelanders.

This generation will have no memory of anything before the financial meltdown of 2008 and the events that are about to unfold in America. If our research is correct, this generation's childhood will be a time of urgency and rapid historical change. Unlike the Millennials, who will remember childhood during the good times of 1980s and '90s, the Homelanders will recall their childhood as a time of national crisis.

So, those are the two examples today of the Hero archetype, and two examples of the Artist archetype.

DAVID: What about the Prophet and the Nomad generations?

HOWE: There is only one Prophet archetype generation alive today: the Boomer Generation. We define them as being born between 1943 and 1960. Those born in 1943 would have been part of the free-speech movement at Berkeley in 1964, the first fiery class whose peers include Bill Bradley, Newt Gingrich, and Oliver North. The last cohorts of this generation came of age with President Carter in the Iran Hostage Crisis.

For the Nomad archetype, we again have only one example alive today, and that is Generation X. We define Gen Xers as being born between 1961 and 1981. Actually, there may be a few members of the earlier Nomad generation still around – those of the Lost Generation born from 1883 to 1900, but today they would be around 110. This was the generation that grew up during the third Great Awakening, the doughboys who went through World War I. They were the generation that put the "roar" into the "Roaring '20s" – the rum runners, barnstormers, and entrepreneurs of that period. They were big risk-takers.

DAVID: Is the Millennial Generation the next group up in terms of controlling or being a powerful force in society?

HOWE: It depends what you mean by a powerful force in society.

DAVID: Who is going to be in the driver's seat?

HOWE: Let me put it this way. The generation that is about to be in the driver's seat in terms of leadership is Generation X, the group born 1961 to 1981. In fact, we now have our first Gen-X President, Barack Obama, who was born in 1961 and who is in every way a Gen Xer, despite being born at the very early edge of his generation. His fragmented family upbringing, with his father leaving while he was young and his mother moving all over the world, is typical of the Gen X life story. A telling anecdote from his biography is that, when he arrived at Columbia University, he spent his first night in New York sleeping in an alley because no one had arranged to have an apartment open for him.

His life story has a "dazed and confused" aspect. He made his own way against a background of adult neglect and lack of structure. It's interesting that he is the first leader in America to call himself "post-Boomer." As a matter of fact, he talks regularly about how he intends to put an end to everything dysfunctional about Boomer politics: the polarization, the culture wars, the scorched-earth rhetoric, the identity politics, all of that. I understand a lot of people do not believe he can actually do this, but it's interesting that this is the rhetoric he chooses. That rhetoric is one reason why the vast majority of Millennials voted for him.

Obama is the opening wedge of Gen Xers who will assume very high leadership posts. They are not yet the senior generals in control of the military, but they are taking over the reins of government and, of course, the top spots in American businesses.

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Persistent ignorance

An excellent peice from "Financial Armageddon....

Persistent Ignorance

It's funny -- or sad, depending on your perspective -- how those who supposedly know best -- the highly paid "experts" on Wall Street -- keep misreading what is happening in the real economy.

For example, all signs point to the fact that what we have been going through these past few years is not just a garden-variety recession, but a full-fledged meltdown spawned by the bursting of the biggest credit/housing bubble in history.

Yet the "Wrong Way' Corrigans" who never saw the unraveling coming, who insisted that the crisis would remain "contained" or otherwise end quickly, who kept seeing rebounds and bottoms that never quite materialized, and who are now proclaiming an end to the "recession" -- their word -- persist in trying to mislead or confuse the masses with their profoundly ignorant assurances.

The latest delusion is the notion that allegedly "good" earnings from corporate America herald the beginnings of an economic recovery. In "The Thesis Continues To Validate: GE," The Market Ticker's Karl Denninger puts paid to this silly theory.

GE (NYSE: GE) was out this morning with earnings and continues to validate my central thesis: severe economic contraction.

Revenues were down 17% - another double-digit contraction, and this is particularly troublesome in what it says about the global economy, given GE's global reach.

Again, we continue to see the same sort of theme in industrial and consumer products reporting - Harley Davidson (NYSE: HOG) reported units shipped down 30% year over year yesterday, and now GE out with a 17% year over year revenue decline.

Stocks are, at their core, priced on earnings growth, with the most-common ratio used for such metrics being P/E/G, or Price-to-earnings-growth.

But earnings are not growing, they're contracting - dramatically - in percentage terms over year-ago levels. How can it be otherwise? Even with no inefficiencies due to firms having too many employees for the revenue contraction that is occurring, a 30% reduction in business done should lead to a 30% decline in profits earned. Add to that the fact that firms are nearly always behind the curve and you have profit declines that are much larger - in some cases 100% or even going from a profit to a loss.

This is not a circumstance that will reverse in the immediate future; in order for it to do so, revenue must come back up, and in order for revenue to come back to pre-bust levels, we would have to re-inflate the credit bubble - which simply cannot happen.

Multiples are going to continue to contract. Those analysts and market callers who are all over the momentum trade can in fact make a good buck trading the momentum, but that's all they're trading - they sure aren't trading earnings acceleration or even stabilization.

The move in the market off the 666 levels in March has been driven by a false premise, egged on by CNBC and the other "mainstream media" - that this is a typical recession, it is short-lived, and we will soon go back to previous spending and business patterns.

That is not going to happen, yet it is what everyone in the media and analyst community is looking for and basing their valuation and market timing calls on.

I don't know how long we have to continue to put up numbers like this before people wake up, but wake up they eventually will. When Harley Davidson ships 30% fewer motorcycles, when GE sells 17% less "stuff" (including their financial cooking) and when company after company, including Intel, IBM and others come out with revenue numbers that are down double-digit percentages on an annualized basis, there is no possible way you can justify the multiples that these firms are selling at.

When The Port of Long Beach shows container shipments down nearly 30%, when freight carloadings are down nearly 25% year over year, when sales tax receipts are down in the double digits and when income tax collections, both personal and corporate have effectively collapsed there is simply no argument that "the recession is over" or that "trend growth is around the corner."

The fact of the matter is that port, rail and tax receipts are not subject to being "gamed" by government number-crunchers, they do not play "seasonal adjustments" (since they're year-over-year numbers), they do not represent wishes, dreams, or desires.

They represent real-time, high-frequency, "right now and in your face" economic performance metrics and are impossible to argue with.

If you, as an investor, are trying to use the market as a "forward indicator" of economic conditions, you need to look at these numbers to see whether or not what the stock market is telling you can be validated with actual economic performance - not in quarterly reports to be published in a few months (the typical economic lead-time cited for the market) but in the "right here and now" reality of economic activity.

What those high-frequency data sources are telling us, here and now, today, is that we are in the middle of a 25-30% economic contraction - exactly as I predicted would occur in 2007.

The problem with this level of indicated weakness in the economy is that we have shielded firms, especially banks, from taking the losses that should have come last year and in 2007 related to their over-extension of credit. Now those institutions are going to have to live with the reality of a much smaller economy, meaning that they will be forced to turn to dramatically increasing credit costs to customers to avoid drowning (e.g. increasing credit card rates and spreads), which is exactly what they're doing. This in turn will suck even more money out of consumers pockets, dragging consumption down even further and will force even more defaults.

This is a vicious cycle that can only be broken when the defaults that are being hidden behind the curtain of our financial institutions are forced into the open and disposed of. Yes, this will likely cause those firms to go bust. But the economic penalty we are and will continue to pay for allowing The Bezzle to continue in these firms will, if not stopped, soon choke off any hope of recovery, just as it did in 1930, and lead to precisely the same sort of economic result.

Everyone seems to be hollering about the "wonderful performance" of the banks that have reported thus far, but let's be honest - if you can borrow for nothing and charge 30% interest on plastic, you make a fortune, right? Well, for a while - until the squeeze of contracting incomes and increasing interest charges force your customers to default, at which point the charge-offs and defaults this forces in the rest of your portfolio (e.g. mortgages) kill you dead.

I see exactly nothing in any of the reported numbers thus far this quarter suggesting that we've turned an economic corner or that there will be a recovery this year or even next.

We could be near or at the bottom, but we're not, and it is precisely because we have protected the financial institutions from the consequences of their own folly in preference to the borrower (to a large degree the consumer) that this has happened. I have warned repeatedly that the actions of our regulators and government, on the path they are on, will make durable economic recovery impossible.

The anvil of these bad loans, being carried far above actual fair-market value, will remain as a millstone around the neck until we either earn them out or default them.

Our government and regulators have chosen "earn them out". The problem is that this path cannot succeed because "earn them out" requires that the economy return to trend growth - that is, 3-4% GDP - before next year. That is not going to happen; the government backstop and artificial support only work so long as they continue, and we cannot continue to borrow two trillion a year for the purpose of propping up these institutions in excess of their natural earnings power in the economy.

Yet without defaulting the bad debt that's exactly what has to happen.

If Roubini's prediction of sub-1% growth (if that) for the next couple of years is correct the squeeze between available revenue and required cash-flow from operations to keep the numbers black at the bottom of the page will become python-like over the next 12-18 months, and as the grip tightens reportable earnings will continue to contract, ultimately leading to a collapse when cash flow is exceeded by expenses.

This is the dreaded "double dip", except that it won't be a "W" as Roubini has postulated - it will look like the first three legs, but the right side "/" will instead be a flat line as credit capacity on the borrowing side collapses, destroying the banks ability to profit - without borrowers there is no interest to charge and no money to make!

Bottom line: Those who bet on the market "going much higher" from here are going to find themselves once again holding a bag handed to them by the media and market callers, just like they did in 2000 when it was said "this is just a small correction in the market" as the Nasdaq came off 5,000.

http://www.financialarmageddon.com/2009/07/persistent-ignorance.html

The Generational dynamics of Iran ~ An interesting hypothesis, imo

What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object?

There have now been two really exciting international events for Generational Dynamics this year.

The first was the end of the Sri Lanka crisis civil war. We got to see and analyze the climax of a crisis civil war as it's happening in real time.

Now we get to see a "Summer of Love." type Awakening era event as it's happening in real time in Iran.

The comparison with America's Summer of Love Awakening era event in 1967, along with the 1968 riots at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, is very apt. Although the sequencing and details are different, the generational behaviors and attitudes are almost identical.

First of all, Iran's protestors are like America's Boomers -- that is, they're in the Prophet generational archetype, the first generation growing up right after the end of a crisis war. America's Boomers grew up right after World War II, and Iran's protestors grew up right after Iran's last crisis war, the 1979 Islamic Revolution, followed by the Iran/Iraq war that ended in 1988.

And so, Dear Reader, if you're one of the many people who love Iran's protestors, but who hate America's Boomers, then you may be in conflict with yourself. If you want to know what today's doddering Boomers were like when they were kids, just look at today's Iranian protestors.

(For more information on generational archetypes, see "Basics of Generational Dynamics.")

Let me put it another way: Today's Boomers are anxious, frightened, moralistic, judgmental, arrogant and narcisstic. If you'd like to know what these Boomers were like when they were cute kids, just look at today's Iranian protestors. You'll see that they're fearless, moralistic, judgmental, arrogant and narcissistic. The only thing that growing old does to them is to change them from fearless to frightened.

Thus, it's not surprising that Iran's young protestors are becoming more and more furious and outraged about what they see as a complete betrayal by the government. Like our Boomers, they're arrogant and narcissistic. They'll demand the moral high ground, and they'll never back down unless Iran's security forces perpetrate a massacre -- and even then, the protestors will be back when they think it's safe.

Outrage versus pragmatism


That's only half the story. The other half is about the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, whose harsh Friday speech I described a couple of days ago.

Khamenei was born in 1939, 30 years after the end of the Constitutional Revolution, Iran's previous crisis war. That means that Khamenei is in the Nomad generational archetype, like our Generation-Xers, including President Obama.

So this is a delicious twist. Like today's Xers, Khamenei grew up in the shadow of the previous Prophet generation, the one that grew up right after the end of the Constitutional Revolution. Khamanei probably hated them as much as today's Xers hate the Boomers.

So now Khamenei is dealing with a new Prophet generation, and as the saying goes, he must feel like it's "déjà vu all over again." The young protesters are just like the older generation he grew up with -- just as arrogant and narcissistic -- except that now they're much younger than he is. And he probably has the same visceral hatred for them.

Like Gen-Xers, people in any Nomad generation are considered to be "pragmatic," doing anything that's necessary to get the job done. So we can assume that Khamanei will take whatever "pragmatic" action he believes that he has to take to regain control, and defeat the protestors.

There's an old philosophical paradox: What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object?

Since the protestors -- the irresistible force -- are going to continue protesting, and Khamenei -- the immovable object -- is going to use whatever he force he has available to end the protesting, we have a kind of political variation of the old paradox.

I always say on this web site that the attitudes and behaviors of a small group of politicians are irrelevant to the great events of a society or country, except insofar as the politicians' attitudes reflect those of the masses of people. What matters are the attitudes and behaviors of those masses of people, entire generations of people. That's a fundamental concept of Generational Dynamics.

Unless Khamenei and the clerics perpetrate massive slaughter on the protestors, there really is no question about who will win this political battle -- the protestors. I'll discuss this further later in this report.

A Revolutionary Confrontation

One key to understanding the generational confrontation in Iran today is a statement that I heard several times from BBC commentators: "The Islamic government has always been contemptuous of the way the Shah of Iran, [Iran's pre-1979 leader,] buckled 30 years ago in the face of popular protest."

To put this into context, think of Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (Nomad archetype) as being the Barack Obama of the 1979 Islamic revolution. In 1979, Khamenei would have been contemptuous of all the accomplishments of Iran's previous Prophet and Artist generations, just as Obama is contemptuous of the accomplishments of the Boomer and Silent generations. According to the BBC statement, Khamanei was particularly contemptuous of the way that his predecessor, the Shah of Iran, buckled to popular protest.

Khamenei was in the generation of protestors in 1979. Today, he's in the position that the Shah occupied in 1979, and he's in the generation that opposing the protestors. Even so, the generational dynamics are very similar. He's not going to buckle to the protestors, Iran's new Prophet generation. He's as contemptuous of this new Prophet generation as he was of the previous Prophet generation, including the Shah.

The revolutionary guards have ordered demonstrators to "end the sabotage and rioting activities" and said their resistance was a "conspiracy" against Iran.

A statement posted on the revolutionary guards' website warned protesters to "be prepared for a resolution and revolutionary confrontation with the guards, Basij and other security forces and disciplinary forces".

This promise of "revolutionary confrontation" may have stopped some protestors in their tracks, but it's infuriating to the Prophet generation, who will never agree to give up the moral high ground.

This is the confrontation between an irresistible force and an immovable object, as I described it above, and if Iran were in a Crisis era (like 1979), this could result in a violent revolution.

Iran's political split


But it's not a Crisis era. Iran is in a generational Awakening era.

In a Crisis era, like Iran in 1979 and in the 1980s, civic unity is regenerated, and political bickering decreases and tapers off.

In an Awakening era, like Iran today, civic unity deteriorates, and political bickering increases.

That's what's happening in Iran, as the split among the ruling clerics is getting increasingly serious. Here's a New York Times report on the political split:

"TEHRAN — A bitter rift among Iran’s ruling clerics deepened Sunday over the disputed presidential election that has convulsed Tehran in the worst violence in 30 years, with the government attempting to link the defiant loser to terrorists and detaining relatives of his powerful backer, a founder of the Islamic republic.


The loser, Mir Hussein Moussavi, the moderate reform candidate who contends that the June 12 election was stolen from him, fired back at his accusers on Sunday night in a posting on his Web site, calling on his own supporters to demonstrate peacefully despite stern warnings from Iran’s top leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, that no protests of the vote would be allowed. “Protesting to lies and fraud is your right,” Mr. Moussavi said in a challenge to Ayatollah Khamenei’s authority.

Earlier, the police detained five relatives of Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former president who leads two influential councils and openly supported Mr. Moussavi’s election. The relatives, including Mr. Rafsanjani’s daughter, Faezeh Hashemi, were released after several hours.

The developments, coming one day after violent protests in the capital and elsewhere were crushed by police officers and militia members using guns, clubs, tear gas and water cannons, suggested that Ayatollah Khamenei was facing entrenched resistance among some members of the elite. Though rivalries among top clerics have been part of Iranian politics since the 1979 revolution, analysts said that open factional competition amid a major political crisis could hinder Ayatollah Khamenei’s ability to restore order."

This political split is the opening to a solution to the "revolutionary confrontation." The only solution that I can see, short of a huge massacre, is that Khamenei will be forced to back down to the protestors, leaving him to end his life with bitter memories of his failure as a leader. His political opponents, known as "pragmatic conservatives" and led by Rafsanjani, will be the winners.

The role of women in an Awakening era


During a generational Crisis era, women move in the direction of traditional stereotypical female roles and behaviors. See for example my 2004 posting, "'It's going to be the 1950s all over again.'" During Crisis eras, the protection of women becomes an important goal of society, and this continues during the Recovery era that follows the crisis war.

To understand this, think about what mothers were like in the 1950s. There is probably no era so misunderstood as the 1950s, which feminists have painted ridiculously as a time when men were forcing women to stay at home, and refusing to allow them to work outside of the home. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Mothers in the 1950s grew up during the 1930s, where they were surrounded by massive homelessness, starvation and suffering. People were living under bridges, and had to depend on soup kitchens just to get enough food to survive. Then, World War II began. Their brothers, fathers and uncles were tortured and killed on the Bataan Death March, and then were shot down like fish in a barrel on the beaches of Normandy. The women themselves took "Rosie the Riveter" jobs that they hated, but took them out of patriotism, and to support their brothers, fathers and uncles overseas.

It's not an exaggeration to say that these women were traumatized by their experiences. By the time the 1950s came, they considered it a wonderful gift from America that they could stay at home with the kids, living in their homes with white picket fences. This was the American way of life that they had earned in the Great Depression and the war, and they wanted to give that as a gift to their daughters.

The same thing happened to women growing up in Iran's Islamic revolution of 1979 and the Iran/Iraq war of the 1980s. Their fathers, brothers and uncles were maimed and killed by Saddam's forces, and some were gassed to death. It was even worse for these women than it was for American women in WW II, since the Iran/Iraq war took place on Iranian soil, especially because rape is always common during a crisis war. The mothers of daughters growing up after the war ended wanted their daughters to live happy lives enjoying the fruits of the Islamic revolution.

This is what happens to every nation in every Crisis war. But the daughters who grow up after the war ends do not feel the trauma of the war itself. They resent the restrictions placed on them by their parents, who only wish for them to have a happier life, free of the tortures and rape of war.

In Iran's Islamic culture, these restrictions took many forms. Young women would have to wear loose clothing and headscarves, and could not spend time alone with a male. These restrictions actually do make a lot of sense during a crisis war, but not in times of peace.

Neda Agha-Soltan and young women today

While a generational Crisis era is dominated by men, a generational Awakening era is dominated by women (or, at least, women's issues), as the austere rules of the Recovery era begin to unravel.

For years I've been mocking Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's "morality police," who swoop down on women with loose headscarves, and carry them off the police station. Ahmadinejad has managed to piss off practically every young woman in Tehran.

Well, now the young women are getting even.

I wrote last week that Zahra Rahnavard, the wife of opposition candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi, had taken an active part in the campaign, after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had insulted her during his debate with Mousavi.




Neda Agha-Soltan - undated picture

A number of news stories have been reporting that women have been playing a leading role in the protestors, especially since the violence by the security forces began. There was a lengthy interview on CNN on Monday with a 19 year old girl who has been taking part in all the Tehran protests. She has been beaten by a baton by the security forces, but says that after you've been beaten once, further beatings don't matter. She says that she and a number of other women have been confronting the security forces, asking them, "Why are you killing your sisters, your mothers and your daughters? Why are you killing your own people?" The logic is that the security forces are less likely to kill or beat a woman than a man, so the women are taking the lead.

A pivotal event in the protests occurred on Saturday when Neda Agha-Soltan, a pretty young 26-year-old girl, was shot dead by the security forces, and the entire incident was captured in a video that's been spreading around the internet.

The video of Neda's death can be viewed below.

However, this 40 second video is VERY GRAPHIC. If you watch this video, you may have nightmares, and it may haunt you for a long time. However, if you think you can handle it, then watch it to understand why it's playing such an important role in Iran's chaotic political crisis:




Neda has become an icon for the Iranian protests, and for young Iranian women in particular.

The future of Iran's crisis

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, Ayatollah Khamanei doesn't stand a chance of getting through this unscathed. If he ever had a chance at all, it ended with the Neda video. He will be forced to back down, and since he's already staked his reputation on not backing down (see "Iran's government panics, as Supreme Leader hints at violence against protesters"), it will be a humiliating end to his career.

The reasoning in reaching this conclusion is as follows:

Khamanei has dug himself into a hole, so that no compromise is possible.


The only way to stop the protests is a huge massacre of the protestors, but my judgment of the Iranian/Persian culture is that such a massacre will not occur.

In fact, the political split into factions led by Khamanei and Rafsanjani will not tolerate much more violence.


However, to say that Khamanei will have to back down does not mean the end of the Islamic regime.

The Walter Cronkite effect

During the last week, all the political shots have been called by Khamenei, making it clear that Ahmadinejad is nothing more than a cypher in Iran's government. However, this did not increase the stature of Khamenei. Khamenei is supposed to be a spiritual leader who stays above the fray, but his actions this week have brought him down into the political mud with everyone else. So the stature of the entire Islamic "religious democracy" has been stained.

It's not clear whether Ahmadinejad can survive (politically) in the current crisis. But even if he does, his rantings about holocaust denial and pushing Israel into the sea will no longer have their former panache and charm.

More significant will be Iran's reputation as the biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the world, particularly as it applies to Hizbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza.

Early in 1968, during the Tet offensive of the Vietnam War, CBS reporter Walter Cronkite went to Vietnam, and came back and reported that the war was unwinnable. This report is thought to be the turning point in public opinion over the Vietnam war. It led immediately to the forced decision by President Lyndon Johnson not to run for another term, and later to increased protests and the resignation of President Richard Nixon.

A major part of Ahmadinejad's legacy is the huge amount of money he's spent funding Hizbollah and Hamas through Syria. This has always been a manifestation of Ahmadinejad's insanity anyway, since Hizbollah is Shia Muslim and Hamas is Sunni Muslim. But more to the point, Iran's economy has been deteriorating since Ahmadinejad took office in 2005, and many people blame his monetary support of these two terrorist groups.

All that would be needed at this time or in the near future is for someone prominent in Iran to make a similar "Walter Cronkite" type statement, referring to the funding of Hizbollah and Hamas.

Thus, this political crisis in Iran may have substantial effects on the balance of power in Syria, Lebanon, Israel and Palestine.

Finally, there may be a resolution of Iran's schizophrenia, as I've described for years as a country where the people, especially young people, are pro-American and pro-West, while the government was virulently anti-American and anti-West. One possible outcome of this crisis (over time) is that Iran will become much more pro-Western and much less anti-American. Iran would still be an Islamic "religious democracy," but its foreign policy would be substantially different.

http://www.generationaldynamics.com/cgi-bin/D.PL?d=ww2010.weblog&i=e090623#e090623