Suchergebnisse

The subjective well-being of the population - or the 'level of happiness' - is a popular topic for scientific research and socio-political discussions both domestically and internationally. In this regard, a direction of research is gaining traction; its proponents consider the level of happiness to be a predictor of the current socio-political stability. An analysis of the literature revealed that, despite the abundance of works on the topic of subjective wellbeing, its relationship with income - as well as with the political activity of the population - there are only a few articles devoted to the analysis of the impact of this indicator on socio-political instability. This article attempts to carry out a cross-country analysis of the impact of deviations in subjective well-being below the value that would be expected at the given level of economic development. The proposed quantitative analysis has made it possible to reveal the presence of a statistically significant influence of this deviation on the revolutionary activity of both an armed and unarmed nature. It is noteworthy that the identified patterns do not apply to all groups of countries - only to middle-income economies - and that each subgroup also has its own patterns. Thus, the mean values of subjective life satisfaction, which are lower than what could be expected with the given level of economic development, are significant predictors of the risks of armed revolutionary insurgencies in lower middle-income countries. At the same time, in upper middle-income countries, they are already predictors of unarmed revolutionary uprisings.

In this chapter, we analyze the relationship between Kondratieff waves and major technological revolutions on the basis of the theory of production principles and production revolutions, and offer some forecasts about the features of the Sixth Kondratieff Wave/the Fourth Industrial Revolution. We show that the technological breakthrough of the Sixth Kondratieff Wave may be interpreted as both the Fourth Industrial Revolution and as the final phase of the Cybernetic Revolution. We assume that the sixth K-wave in the 2030s and 2040s will merge with the final phase of the Cybernetic Revolution (which we call a phase of selfregulating systems). This period will be characterized by the breakthrough in medical technologies which will be capable of combining a number of other technologies into a single system of new and innovative technologies (we denote this system as a system of MANBRIC-technologies - i.e. medical, additive, nano-, bio-, robo-, info-, and cogno-technologies).

In the present paper, on the basis of the theory of production principles and production revolutions, we reveal the interrelation between K-waves and major technological breakthroughs in history and make forecasts about features of the sixth Kondratieff wave in the light of the Cybernetic Revolution that, from our point of view, started in the 1950s. We assume that the sixth K-wave in the 2030s and 2040s will merge with the final phase of the Cybernetic Revolution (which we call a phase of self-regulating systems). This period will be charac-terized by the breakthrough in medical technologies which will be capable to combine many other technologies into a single complex of MANBRIC-technologies (med-bio-nano-robo-info-cognitive technologies). The article of-fers some forecasts concerning the development of these technologies.

The present volume is the fourth issue of the Yearbook series entitled 'Evolution'.
The title of the present volume is 'From Big Bang to Nanorobots'. In this way we demonstrate
that all phases of evolution and Big History are covered in the articles of the present
Yearbook. Several articles also present the forecasts about future development.
The main objective of our Yearbook as well as of the previous issues is the creation
of a unified interdisciplinary field of research in which the scientists specializing in different
disciplines could work within the framework of unified or similar paradigms, using the
common terminology and searching for common rules, tendencies and regularities. At the
same time for the formation of such an integrated field one should use all available opportunities:
theories, laws and methods. In the present volume, a number of such approaches
are used.

The present article analyzes the world order in the past, present and future as well as the main factors, foundations and ideas underlying the maintaining and change of the international and global order. The first two sections investigate the evolution of the world order starting from the ancient times up to the late twentieth century. The third section analyzes the origin and decline of the world order based on the American hegemony. The authors reveal the contradictions of the current unipolar world and explain in what way globalization has become more profitable for the developing countries but not for the developed ones. The authors also explain the strengthening belief that the US leading status will in-evitably weaken. In this connection we discuss the alternatives of the American strategy and the possibility of the renaissance of the American leadership. The last section presents a factor analysis which allows stating that the world is shifting toward a new balance of power and is likely to become the world with-out a leader. The new world order will consist of a number of large blocks, coa-litions and countries acting within a framework of rules and mutual responsi-bility. However, the transition to a new world order will take certain time (about two decades). This period, which we denote as the epoch of new coali-tions, will involve a reconfiguration of the World System and bring an increas-ing turbulence and conflict intensity.

The escape from the "Malthusian trap" is shown to tend to generate in a rather systematic way quite serious political upheavals. Some demographic structural mechanisms that generate such upheavals have been analyzed, which has made it possible to develop a mathematical model of the respective processes. The forecast of political instability in African and West Asian countries in 2012–2050 produced on the basis of this model is presented.

Intro -- Foreword -- Acknowledgements -- Contents -- About the Authors -- 1: Introduction: Big History Context -- References -- 2: Introduction: Globalization Context -- 2.1 How Old Is the Global World? -- 2.2 How Old Is Globalization? -- 2.3 A Proposed Periodization of Globalization -- References -- 3: Archaic Globalization: The Birth of the World-System -- 3.1 The Archaic History of Globalization -- 3.1.1 Pre-history of Globalization, Eighth to Fourth Millennia bce -- 3.1.2 The Urban Revolution, 3500-2500 bce -- 3.1.3 2500-1000 bce: A Period of Typostasis -- 3.1.4 The Axial Age and the Start of the Epoch of Empires, First Millennium bce -- 3.1.5 The ``Lost Millennium,´´ 150-1000 ce -- 3.2 The Early Stages of Globalization: Networks of Diffusion and Exchange of Domesticates, Technologies, and Luxury Goods -- 3.2.1 Diffusion of Domesticates -- 3.2.2 Diffusion of Technologies -- 3.2.2.1 Copper, Bronze, and Iron Metallurgy -- 3.2.2.2 Invention and Diffusion of War Chariots -- 3.2.3 Long-Distance Trade: Diffusion of Tools and Luxury Goods -- 3.2.4 Silk Roads: The ``Circulatory System´´ of Ancient Globalization -- 3.2.5 The Appearance and Diffusion of World Religions -- 3.3 Conclusion -- References -- 4: Global Dynamics 1-1800 ce: Trends and Cycles -- 4.1 Trend Component of Global Dynamics, 1-1800 ce -- 4.1.1 Relative Indicators of Global Dynamics -- 4.1.2 Absolute Indicators of the Global Dynamics -- 4.1.3 Trends in the Pre-modern Era -- 4.2 Cyclic Component of Global Dynamics in 1-1800 ce -- 4.2.1 Structure of Sociodemographic Cycles -- 4.2.2 Sociodemographic Dynamics in the History of Certain Countries -- 4.2.3 Synchronization of Sociodemographic Cycles -- 4.3 Conclusion -- References -- 5: Proto-modern and Early Modern Globalization: How Was The Global World Born? -- 5.1 Where Did the Global World Stem from?.

The present working paper analyzes the world order in the past, present and future as well as the main factors, foundations and ideas underlying the maintaining and change of the international and global order. The first two sections investigate the evolution of the world order starting from the ancient times up to the late twentieth century. The third section analyzes the origin and decline of the world order based on the American hegemony. The authors reveal contradictions of the current unipolar world and explain in what way globalization has become more profitable for the developing countries but not for the developed ones. The paper also explains the strengthening belief that the US leading status will inevitably weaken. In this connection we discuss the alternatives of the American strategy and the possibility of the renaissance of the American leadership. The last section presents a factor analysis which allows stating that the world is shifting toward a new balance of power and is likely to become the world without a leader. The new world order will consist of a number of large blocks, coalitions and countries acting within a framework of rules and mutual responsibility. However, the transition to a new world order will take certain time (about two decades). This period, which we denote as the epoch of new coalitions, will involve a reconfiguration of the World-System and bring an increasing turbulence and conflict intensity.

This yearbook is the fourth in the series with the title Globalistics and Globalization Studies.
The subtitle of the present volume is Global History & Big History. The point is that today our
global world really demands global knowledge. Thus, there are a few actively developing
multidisciplinary approaches and integral disciplines among which one can name Global Studies,
Global History and Big History. They all provide a connection between the past, present, and
future. Big History with its vast and extremely heterogeneous field of research encompasses all
the forms of existence and all timescales and brings together constantly updated information from
the scientific disciplines and the humanities. Global History is transnational or world history
which examines history from a global perspective, making a wide use of comparative history and
of the history of multiple cultures and nations. Global Studies express the view of systemic
and epistemological unity of global processes. Thus, one may argue that Global Studies and
Globalistics can well be combined with Global History and Big History and such a multidisciplinary
approach can open wide horizons for the modern university education as it helps to
form a global view of various processes.

Do human societies from around the world exhibit similarities in the way that they are structured, and show commonalities in the ways that they have evolved? These are long-standing questions that have proven difficult to answer. To test between competing hypotheses, we constructed a massive repository of historical and archaeological information known as "Seshat: Global History Databank." We systematically coded data on 414 societies from 30 regions around the world spanning the last 10,000 years. We were able to capture information on 51 variables reflecting nine characteristics of human societies, such as social scale, economy, features of governance, and information systems. Our analyses revealed that these different characteristics show strong relationships with each other and that a single principal component captures around three-quarters of the observed variation. Furthermore, we found that different characteristics of social complexity are highly predictable across different world regions. These results suggest that key aspects of social organization are functionally related and do indeed coevolve in predictable ways. Our findings highlight the power of the sciences and humanities working together to rigorously test hypotheses about general rules that may have shaped human history.

Do human societies from around the world exhibit similarities in the way that they are structured, and show commonalities in the ways that they have evolved? These are long-standing questions that have proven difficult to answer. To test between competing hypotheses, we constructed a massive repository of historical and archaeological information known as "Seshat: Global History Databank." We systematically coded data on 414 societies from 30 regions around the world spanning the last 10,000 years. We were able to capture information on 51 variables reflecting nine characteristics of human societies, such as social scale, economy, features of governance, and information systems. Our analyses revealed that these different characteristics show strong relationships with each other and that a single principal component captures around three-quarters of the observed variation. Furthermore, we found that different characteristics of social complexity are highly predictable across different world regions. These results suggest that key aspects of social organization are functionally related and do indeed coevolve in predictable ways. Our findings highlight the power of the sciences and humanities working together to rigorously test hypotheses about general rules that may have shaped human history. ; This work was supported by a John Templeton Foundation Grant (to the Evolution Institute) entitled "Axial-Age Religions and the Z-Curve of Human Egalitarianism," a Tricoastal Foundation Grant (to the Evolution Institute) entitled "The Deep Roots of the Modern World: The Cultural Evolution of Economic Growth and Political Stability," Economic and Social Research Council Large Grant REF RES-060-25-0085 entitled "Ritual, Community, and Conflict," an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council under the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme Grant 694986, and Grant 644055 from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme (ALIGNED; www.aligned-project.eu). T.E.C. is supported by funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant Agreement 716212). ; Peer Reviewed