The Fourth Turning

This book was published about 25 years ago. There is a recent update that came out earlier this year. I wanted to read the initial book first to prepare me for the second. The author has been interviewed on several You Tube channels so I was familiar beforehand with his viewpoint.

The publisher's summary:

First comes a High, a period of confident expansion. Next comes an Awakening, a time of spiritual exploration and rebellion. Then comes an Unraveling, in which individualism triumphs over crumbling institutions. Last comes a Crisis—the Fourth Turning—when society passes through a great and perilous gate in history.

William Strauss and Neil Howe will change the way you see the world—and your place in it. With blazing originality, The Fourth Turning illuminates the past, explains the present, and reimagines the future. Most remarkably, it offers an utterly persuasive prophecy about how America’s past will predict what comes next.

Strauss and Howe base this vision on a provocative theory of American history. The authors look back five hundred years and uncover a distinct pattern: Modern history moves in cycles, each one lasting about the length of a long human life, each composed of four twenty-year eras—or “turnings”—that comprise history’s seasonal rhythm of growth, maturation, entropy, and rebirth. Illustrating this cycle through a brilliant analysis of the post–World War II period, The Fourth Turning offers bold predictions about how all of us can prepare, individually and collectively, for this rendezvous with destiny.

Unfortunately, I was bored reading the book. The introduction would have been sufficient for me to understand the cycles. However, 25 years ago this information must have been mind blowing. In contrast, today I didn't find much more information about each cycle as they were presented. I must admit, though, that the categorization of time into these cycles is brilliant. The prediction about our current time of chaos lasting until 2030 was sobering. I am not looking forward to 5 more years of chaos. 

Next month I plan on reading The Fourth Turning is Here. It will be interesting to see what the authors say about our current place in time. While I was bored with the book I am rating it 3 out of 5 stars for the ideas presented.