large percentage of the population yearned for strong leadership, discipline, and productivity. Examples of
revolutions from the left to the right include Germany, Spain, Japan, and Italy in the 1930s, the fall of the Soviet
Union in the 1980s to the early 1990s, the 1976 coup in Argentina replacing Isabel Perón with a military junta, and
the coup leading to the Second French Empire in 1851. Like the other examples, there are many, many cases to
look at—more than I could examine carefully or explain here. However, all those that I examined worked or didn’t
work for the same reason. Like those of the left, these new internal orders succeeded when they produced broad-
based economic successes and failed when they did not. They were also more evolutionary than revolutionary as
the periods of peace and prosperity in which wealth, and typically wealth gaps, increases are much longer. That is
why we see that the long-term trends have been to greater total wealth and broader distribution of the wealth. That
big picture can be easily lost when one is in and experiencing one part of the Big Cycle.
Typically the people who lead the civil war/revolution were (and still are) well-educated people from middle-
class backgrounds. For example, three of the key revolutionary leaders of the French Revolution were Georges-
Jacques Danton, a lawyer raised in a bourgeois family; Jean-Paul Marat, a physician, scientist, and journalist raised
in a bourgeois family; and Maximilian Robespierre, a lawyer and statesman also from a bourgeois family. This
revolution was initially supported by many liberal aristocrats, like Marquis de Lafayette, who were raised in
moderately well-off families. Similarly, the leaders of the Russian Revolution were Lenin, who studied law, and
Trotsky, who was raised in a bourgeois family of intellectuals. The Chinese Civil War was led by Mao, who was
from a moderately well-off family and studied a variety of subjects such as law, economics, and political theory,
and Zhou Enlai, who was from a middle-class scholarly family of civil servants. They also typically were (and
still are) charismatic and able to work well with others to build big, well-run organizations that have the
power to bring about the revolutions that they led. If you want to look for the revolutionaries of the future,
you might keep an eye on those who have these qualities. Over time they typically evolve from being
idealistic intellectuals wanting to change the system to be fairer to brutal revolutionaries willing to win at all
costs.
While having large wealth gaps during economically difficult times was typically the biggest source of
conflict, there were always also other reasons for conflict that added up to a lot of opposition to the
leadership and the system. Typically in revolutions the revolutionaries with these different grievances joined
together to make revolutionary changes; so while they looked united during the revolution, after winning the
revolution, the leaders of it typically fight with each other over issues and for power.
As previously mentioned, during the civil war/revolution stage of the cycle the governments in power almost
always had an acute shortage of money, credit, and buying power. That shortage created the desire to grab
money from those who had it, which led those that had wealth to move them into places and assets that were
safe, which led the governments to stop these movements by imposing capital controls—i.e., controls on
movements to other jurisdictions (e.g., other countries), to other currencies, or to assets that are more
difficult to tax and/or are less productive (e.g., gold).
To make matters even worse, typically when there was internal disorder, such as civil wars and revolutions,
foreign enemies were more likely to challenge the country. This happens because domestic conflict causes
vulnerabilities that make external wars more likely. For example, internal conflict splits the people within a
country, is financially taxing on them, and demands attention that leaves less time for the leaders to tend to other
issues—all things that create vulnerabilities for foreign powers to take advantage of. That is the main reason why
internal wars and external wars tend to come close together. Other reasons include: emotions and tempers are
heightened; strong populist leaders who tend to come to power at such times are fighters by nature; when there are
internal conflicts leaders find that a perceived threat from an external enemy can bring the country together in
support of the leader so they tend to encourage the conflict; and being deprived leads people/countries to be more
willing to fight for what they need, including resources that other countries have. Almost all civil wars have had
some foreign powers participating in attempts to influence the outcome to their benefit.
Entering and leaving civil wars and revolutions aren’t clear when they are happening, though it is clear that
one is happening when deeply in the middle of it. While historians assign dates to the beginnings and ends of
civil wars, they are arbitrary. The truth is that almost no one at the time knows that a civil war has begun or that it
has ended although they know when they are in them. For example, many historians have designated July 14,
1789, as the day the French Revolution began because an armory and prison called the Bastille was stormed by a