The 14 Rules for Predicting the Future



In this article, Steve LeVine is getting his point across that you cannot one hundred percent accurately predict a country's next move, as in the phrase that" history repeats itself". There is a bit of truth in that, but much more likely to pick out the direction a situation will go in opposed to the actual outcome. LeVine  covers 14 rules to do so, and these are infallibly are mirror in countries around the world. He reviews how the size, power, and even geological placement effect how leaders may react to certain situations.


Instead of going over each individual rule, many of them can be generally grouped together. There is a general concept the countries with "brother country support" seem to just be hanging on to the edge. There may be chaos and discontent between citizens, they will never be pushed over the edge. They are just barely muddling along. Touching back upon unhappy citizens, a large reason why they grow unhappy is because they aim to enhance their conditions. They want to improve their economic situation, boost their level of liberty, and make sure that their children will have a successful and healthy future.

 The amount of power, or lack there of in a nation can dictate the way a government will act in the future. When regimes like a dictatorship, although they seem so staunchly set in their ways, with a little bit of outside pressure from an existential threat, they will react accordingly in order to remain in power. It is like a child, they'll push their limits but once they feel their parents watching them, they settle down in order to avoid being reprimanded. Another rule touches upon this, the Caesar Rule; if a dictator for example needs to be removed from power, sometimes the only options are defection, or just plain out assassination.

Rulers in different regimes have different personalities that are reflective of how they run their states. People like Putin, Churchill, and Hitler all had boisterous, idiosyncratic personalities that lead them to dominate world events.


Overall, LeVine covers numerous aspects of how countries are run, and how it will effect said country's regime, citizens, and future. How they are controlled, how they control others, and the way factors such as geological location and a leader's personality can help predict how a ruler with conduct himself in the future. Now, this is not a precise set of rules for fortune telling, but a general guide line of how things may occur.