The question of sociological nature of civilization has long plague the thinkers, from the basin of Mediterranean in the 14^th centuries, to the modern-day California. One of the most asked question is about the journey of civilization; is it directional or cyclical?

Malik Bennabi, a prominent Muslim writer on human society proposed the idea that the socio-psychological development of society could be explained through three points; the age of object, person and, foremostly, idea. He, of course, came to this conclusion by deriving the idea of the another great thinker – so great that even intellectuals in the East and West, contemporary and after his time, heavily studied his ideas – that is, none other than Ibn Khaldun.

Ibn Khaldun perceives history as a process in which harsh, nomadic people with high internality and low material culture are forced to conquer, dominate and take advantage of the capital of sedentary and increasingly industrialized societies. He says that every nation or empire has a human-like period of birth, puberty, senility and demise. He predicts that sovereign powers last for about 120 years and then collapse.

He believed that dynasties are made of four stages. The first stage is the founding generation that plays a significant and involved part in the state creation process; the level of patriotism and commitment of the first generations is greatest among all generations. Although this generation maintains the very tough conditions for political life, they don’t forget their former hard life outside the crowd to defend society.

A high point of politics is reached in the second stage. This group recalls the straits on the foundation of the state to the point that the masses have heard from the previous generation. They still have a fairly good sense of unity, but there is a deterioration compared to their first generation. They increase the prosperity and strength of the state with the aid of this sense of unity or also called asabiyya. At this point, however, some positive attributes, such as bravery, start to vanish, especially to the first generation. The lack of this good attribute often represents a precautionary indication of a dynasty collapse from the peak.

The desire to win over, bravery and savagery finally die in the third stage and the leaders are not involved in such things as preserving their empire and the state’s future because they are wealthy and debauchery centred. The leaders of this age either completely neglect or disregard the challenges faced by their ancestors. That is the process in which society begins to fail and transforms its face into such a total collapse.

The final stage is where waste and government revenue squandering adds to financial difficulties. The consumption and luxury excessively increase in this phase. In the dynastic administration, work is dominant for an incompetent individual and all of these insufficient representatives and reliance upon wealth is pushing the state down. In the dynastic administration, work is dominant for an incompetent individual and all of these insufficient representatives and reliance upon wealth is pushing the state down. The absence of more powerful asabiyya to govern and protect a territory is the reason for the collapse of the dynasty.

Ibn Khaldun’s idea could actually explain the events that are happening to some modern societies – or we can term it as modern ‘civilizations’ – as Bennabi applied it to explain the deterioration of the Muslim world in ‘The Question of Ideas in the Muslim World’. The deterioration that gains the world attention now, as it affects the whole world, is the declination of the United States of America (US), specifically in terms of economy.

United States of America also deal with the deterioration stage. In general, the fall in America began soon after World War II and followed by the conflicts of Indochina and the defeat of China. In 1970, the share of global capital in the United States had fallen to about 25% but was already large and firing down.

Real incomes are declining, economic growth is dropping, businesses are not profitable in world economies, white-collar workers are no longer safe, the nation’s economy is failing, the budget debt is growing, the welfare sector is worsening, and the division between rich and poor is increasing are the proves that America is dealing with declination. We can see that after years of development of economy, infrastructure and culture since US independent’s day, America is leaning towards the stage of downslope as what Ibn Khaldun mentions in his stages of dynastic development. 

US corporations controlled the global market during the industrial period and it’s beneficial to the Americans. However, this condition was expected to stop in future. Being the only global market put the US in a comfort zone with their wealth and requires a lot of production from outside coming into the country. This leads to a race in other countries to produce more to be in the global market and to fuel US needs. The sign of increasing prosperity between developed nations makes the US being left a bit behind.

After the end of the Chinese Civil War and the establishment of the People’s Republic of China. China started to boost their economy by venturing in industrializations. China has taken several steps to promote its international trade ties, optimizing the position of imports, exports and private capital in economic growth.

On February 21, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon landed in China for an official tour. He became the first U.S. President to tour the People’s Republic of China since its creation. Nixon has laid out preparations for a permanent U.S. trade mission to China. Due to this action, China getting is eager to boost its industry and export it to other parts of the world.

We can see that, at the first place, US action in making a deal with China was to make sure that they can exploit more from China but the Open Door Policy helps China to trade export more of their products and help them in the race to be one of economic world power. It’s believed that China will be number one in the world economy by 2025 as China has undergone unprecedented development in the last few decades, cracking the walls of a tightly controlled closed market to become a major manufacturing and export centre.

Now, what would Ibn Khaldun think of today’s America?

Najwan Arief is an undergraduate student majoring in political science at International Islamic University Malaysia. He is very fond of watching Netflix series as well as a hardcore Eurovision fan.

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