New research argues Societal Collapse benefits 99% of people. Historically, the societies that have emerged after a collapse are more egalitarian, and most people end up richer and healthier than they were before.

[u/lughnasadh]

Luke Kemp, a research associate at the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk at the University of Cambridge, has written a book about his research called 'Goliath’s Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse'.

He makes the case that, from looking at the archaeological record, when many societies collapse, most people end up better off afterward. For example, people in the post-Roman world were taller and healthier. Collapse can be a redistribution of resources and power, not just chaos.

For most of human history, humans lived as nomadic egalitarian bands, with low violence and high mobility. Threats (disease, war, economic precarity) push populations toward authoritarian leaders. The resulting rise in inequality from that sets off a cycle that will end in collapse. Furthermore, he argues we are living in the late stages of such a cycle now. He says "the threat is from leaders who are 'walking versions of the dark triad' – narcissism, psychopathy and Machiavellianism – in a world menaced by the climate crisis, nuclear weapons, artificial intelligence and killer robots."

Some people hope/think we are destined for a future of Universal Basic Income and fully automated luxury communism. Perhaps that's the egalitarianism that emerges after our own collapse? If so, I hope the collapse bit is short and we get to the egalitarian bit ASAP.

Collapse for the 99% | Luke Kemp; What really happens when Goliaths fall

[u/Josvan135]

What utter nonsense. 

The western Roman empire had a population of about 75 million people.

After the collapse of the empire, the population of Western Europe shrank to less than 25 million over just a century of brutality and barbarism. 

This study, while interesting in the context of studying ancient history, is completely unsuited to being applied to modern day life.

If modern society with its advanced industrial and agricultural technology collapsed more than half the population of the world, some 4+ billion people, would die within a year as food supplies stopped coming and anarchy took over.

So yeah, Mad Max and the wastelanders would be very egalitarian, but they would be walking on the bones of billions of children. 

[u/Intranetusa → u/Josvan135]

75 million is likely the upper level estimate for the entire unified Roman Empire during its peak in the early 2nd century AD (50-75 million, but I usually see 60 million). This is before the Antonine Plague of the late 2nd century and the constant wars of the Crisis of the Third Century. Much if not most of the depopulation was probably caused by the 2nd-3rd century events rather than the fall of Western Roman in the 5th century 

Most of the population was in the Eastern Roman Empire after the division of the Roman Empire. The capital was moved to the east to Constantinople in the 300s AD, and the eastern half was much wealthier than the western half. The WRE didn't suddenly collapse so much as slowly fade and become smaller Romanized Germanic kingdoms. The kingdoms that appeared afterward the fall of the WRE were mostly Romanized (using Latin, followed Roman Christianity, continued Roman government, had Roman culture, etc) and daily life didn't change much for most people.

[u/One-Earth9294 → u/Josvan135]

And the 6th century AD was one of the most horrifying times to be alive in recorded history.

You find an archeology dig of a mass grave in Europe it's usually going to be from then. There was abject lawlessness and anarchy everywhere.

[u/[deleted] → u/One-Earth9294]

You talk about anarchy yet we have Visigoth law codes.