One Word to Rule Them All

ANACYCLOSIS

ONE WORD TO RULE THEM ALL

RULE BY THE When scarcity prevails and humanity struggles to STRONGEST survive, people submit to the power of the strongest man.

RULE BY When the state attains security and stability, KINGS rulers derive authority from the approbation and loyalty of their subjects.

RULE BY When kings or usurpers abuse the people and The history of TYRANTS violate custom, kingship degenerates into an most states is oppressive tyranny. confined to the events described RULE BY THE When the state’s leading men curtail tyranny and above this line. Most states in NOBILITY restore law and custom, tyranny is subdued by the history have not aristocracy. advanced below this line because When the leading dynasties oppress their own most states have RULE BY THE not developed an WEALTHY citizens, aristocracy becomes an oppressive independent oligarchy or plutocracy. middle class.

RULE BY THE When a middle class obtains political rights for its Democracy is military or fiscal contributions, alongside historically rare MIDDLE CLASS and when it oligarchy emerges democracy. emerges, it comes in waves, as was PLUTOCRACY When the state attains military supremacy, its seen in Classical plutocrats siphon the world’s wealth, plundering Antiquity and in STRIKES BACK the modern West. citizen and foreigner alike. Once democracy is entrenched in GAME OF When the state’s middle class collapses, the people an autonomous rally behind demagogues who denounce plutocrats state, the cycle DEMAGOGUES will run its full and foreigners. course.

RETURN OF The demagogue who ends the civil strife returns THE MONARCH political society to some form of monarchy, thus completing the cycle.