Ibnu Khaldun's Pattern of History (Cycle of Civilisations).

Ibnu Khaldun, in his famous book, Muqaddimah, posits a theory on the cycles of empires and civilisations. (Download pdf version here.)
Empires and civilisations go through a cycle of "Conquest, Consolidation, Expansion, Stagnation, Degeneration & Conquest" (or rather, being conquered or overtaken by newer and stronger empire or civilisation).

This cycle has been proven, more or less, by ancient history.
From smaller unknown empires to bigger empires like Mesopotamia, Babylon, Sumeria, Greeks, Roman and others.

When the Western Roman Empire degenerated and collapsed, their areas were conquered by the Arabs who eventually formed, consolidated and expanded their empire known in history as the Islamic Empire.
The Islamic empires itself consisted of several kingdoms, (Abbasid, Umayyad, Fatimid, Ottoman, etc) but ideologically, they were similar.
(Within Islamic history, there were sub-cycles of this happening with the Abbasid, Umayyad, Fatimid, Ottoman and other smaller Islamic empires.)
But the peak of the Islamic empire was around the 11th Century.

The beginning of the end was when the Mongols conquered and destroyed Baghdad in 1258 (Siege of Baghdad).
It was not the actual end of the Islamic Empire itself, because the Mongols interaction with the Islamic civilisation resulted in the conversion of the Mongols to Islam, whereby they ruled the empire for some time.
From that moment, the Islamic empire persevered, in one form or another, but seeds of degeneration were planted.

Some historians would argue that Baghdad was conquered because the Islamic empire was already on the decline, and some others would disagree, and say that the Mongol conquest of Baghdad was the reason of the decline.
Whatever it was, the 1258 Siege of Baghdad was the turning point.
History is, like always, are more complicated of course, and reasons of decline are many and more multifaceted.
(If you want to know what were those, you have to study history in details.)

History wise, the end of the Islamic empire itself was "officially" marked by the end of the Turkish Ottoman Empire in 1924.

But between 1492 (Columbus discovered America) to 1924, the Western World were on the cycle of consolidation and expansion, which included the expansion into the Islamic empires, which coincided with the stagnation and the degeneration cycle of the Islamic empires.
(If you want to know more about the history during this time period, read the book "Destiny Disrupted", which I reviewed here.)

Arguably, from the mid of the 20th Century to the presence, the Western World are at their peak.
The question is, are they still at their peak, or are they showing signs of stagnation and/or degeneration?
To know this, you have to study history in details.
Reasons of stagnation and degeneration may not be the same, but the symptoms manifest will be similar.

The curious case is China.
China was consolidated into an empire about 2000 years ago.
All the tribes of China were unified under the first Imperial Dynasty, the Qin Dynasty. But, then, it stopped consolidating and expanding and focused inward for two thousand years (from 221 BC to a few decades ago.)
Sure, there were some skirmishes and battles with neighbouring states but more or less, China did not expand its territory further.
For two thousand years, the cycle was static and they never really finished the expansion cycle.

But, modern China is no more inward looking. They have embraced capitalism and are looking outward now. They are not expanding their land (yet), but they are most assuredly expanding their influence.

So, looking back at Ibnu Khaldun's cycle, we have the West which are arguably at, or past, their peak (and arguably experiencing the beginning of the stagnation and/or degeneration cycle) and China who is at the beginning of their expansion cycle (in influence if not in land area).

Nowadays, the modern sensibility does not favour war and land conquest. The modern conquest is about influence, trade and commerce. However, I may be wrong, and human nature is still the same no matter how modern we have become. In which case, World War III may be coming, if not sooner, than later (hopefully not in my lifetime. Thankfully, civilizational cycle can span many generations).

So be ready and stock up on your canned food and/or buy agricultural land far away from potential nuclear missiles targets.



Disclaimer: I am just an armchair historian and reading history is just a hobby. If you disagree with any of my analysis, you are welcome to comment below.