The Collapse of Complex Societies (review)

by Akshay Ahuja
This brings us to The Collapse of Complex Societies, Joseph Tainter’s attempt to synthesise all of the theories of decline and fall into a single model. Tainter’s argument is that investing in complexity inevitability generates decreasing marginal returns for the society that utilises it. In his analysis, persisting in the same methods even when they have ceased to work — as Summers suggests we do — sets a civilisation on track for collapse. [Read more] ...