Is history repeating itself? Is it possible to draw parallels between past and present events?

Miscellaneous / by admin / June 04, 2022

It is worth learning from the mistakes of mankind, and not reproducing them.

Writer Jorge Luis Borges believed that there are only four plots in literature. And no matter how the authors twist them, one of them is easy to recognize in any book. The French theater critic Georges Polti was generous and singled out 36 dramatic plots.

Life in this regard seems to be practicing a more creative approach (sometimes in vain!). But she is also accused of lack of ingenuity. In different languages, there are expressions that mean "history repeats itself." For example, in English it is idiomhistory repeats itself / Merriam‑Webster history repeats itself. There are whole conceptsCyclical Theory / Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences cyclicity, which describe the development of society or its individual subsystems as a cycle of certain events and phenomena.

The thesis that history could repeat itself was put forward in Antiquity, assuming that descendants would be able to predict the future from the events of the past.

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Thucydides

Ancient Greek historian, late 5th century BC. e.

If anyone wants to investigate the certainty of past and the possibility of future events that may someday be repeated according to property of human nature in the same or similar form, it will be enough for me if he considers my research useful.

Subsequently, the idea that the events of the past can be repeated, put forward repeatedly. Therefore, there is a great temptation to consider any incident through the prism of what has already happened, and to assume that everything will be exactly the same. But let's see why we tend to look for repetition and whether it is worth doing so.

Why do we like looking for historical analogies so much?

Everything is simple here: we are comfortable with certainty. It is easy to live when you know what happened yesterday, what will happen today and tomorrow. The routine involves deviations, but they are quite safe and insignificant.

We begin to look for historical analogies when something large-scale happens and terriblethat threatens our daily lives. Nobody says, “Oh, I won a million. But history repeats itself, so I will buy another lottery ticket.” Usually it means something unpleasant. Moreover, events can develop as you like for reasons beyond our control.

In order to somehow outline the route of further movement, some kind of landmarks are needed. This is exactly what we are looking for in the past: if event A ended like this 100 years ago, then event B will end the same way today. Even if things were bad, historical research can still be reassuring. Because a terrible (but concrete) end is better than a horror without end.

Olesya Pisareva

Psychologist-sexologist.

All our fears can be divided into physical and psychological. With the physical, everything is clear, it is designed to preserve the vital activity of the body: someone attacks, which means you need to run. With the psychological, everything is much more complicated. It is this fear that most binds.

Its peculiarity lies in the fact that it lives in the future. That is, we are trying to plan something, predict, rely on someone's promises (husband, wife, employer, government), but we expect a catch. Moreover, our history gives many reasons for this.

Looking for historical parallels is currently useless. Over the past century, the speed of life has increased several times. The last two years since the beginning of the pandemic have led to so many changes in the life of all mankind, which used to happen in two or even three decades. And there are two ways: either we adapt, trying to maintain faith in the old world order, closing our eyes and not accepting the inevitable changes, or we boldly move on.

Adaptation is more familiar to us and stable for us, while development is always associated with the unknown. At the same time, adaptation fetters thinking with familiar boundaries, and development opens up all the ways to search for the best. Although uncertainty to some extent exists in both cases.

Why does history sometimes repeat itself?

Discussing this topic, it is difficult to ignore the fact that some historical events of different scale still happen to be repeated. For example, Hegel wrote in Lectures on the Philosophy of History: “Napoleon was defeated twice, and the Bourbons were expelled twice. Through the repetition of what at first seemed only accidental and possible, it becomes a real and established fact. But you can't argue that both events happened. But can we really take this as confirmation of the repeatability of history? Cyclicity can have several causes.

Some events are inevitable

Sometimes there isn't much variety. For example, all rulers die sooner or later; there are no immortals among them. It's just that in democratic regimes, they usually first - after the term prescribed by law - leave their posts. And dictators remain to the last. So it is hardly necessary to consider the death of an autocrat and the subsequent change of regime, or at least a thaw, as a mystical repetition. What other options were there?

We only see similarities

If we want to believe in something - even in the cyclical nature of history, even in a flat Earth, we will willingly listen to arguments that support our point of view and ignore what refutes. This is due to the cognitive distortion confirmation bias.

Belief in a Certain Outcome Determines Our Actions

If a person is sure that it will be like this and not otherwise, it is natural for him to behave differently - as future events imply. And appropriate actions increase the chances (or risks) of a particular outcome. That is why fortune-telling sometimes still come true.

But not one person, but a group of people, including a rather large one, can correct their behavior due to belief in something. Accordingly, this is sometimes reflected in large-scale events.

Representatives of the same society have similar attitudes

Members of a large group are often characterized by similar behavior that is passed down from generation to generation. It would seem that Russia is great, but the phrases “But you didn’t forget your head at home” and “Tell everyone, we also want to laugh” remind everyone of the school in the same way. But it's not just teachers across the country who behave in the same way in some situations. Despite individual differences, many of us behave similarly because we share the same installations.

What do experts think about the repetition of history?

Historians urge to be more careful in forecasts.

Ilya Strekalov

Candidate of Historical Sciences, Senior Lecturer at the Home School "InternetUrok".

First of all, it is important to understand that the main principle of understanding and studying history is, pardon the tautology, the principle of historicism.

Historicism is the study of each era, each period in the context of the conditions that existed at the time of events. There is always a temptation to say, for example, that today's dispute between supporters of Russian and Western experience is a continuation of the dispute between "Slavophiles" and "Westerners" in Russian society of the 19th century. But at the same time, no one takes into account that the “Slavophiles” and “Westernizers”, as currents of social thought, appeared in the special conditions of the tsarist autocratic Russia, strict censorship, the dominance of the "theory of official nationality" and the need to comprehend the era of Europe after Napoleonic wars.

Therefore, what happened in the 19th century and what exists in the 21st century are two completely different things. The same can be said about revolutions, be it English, French, Russian, or, finally, what is commonly called revolutions in different countries today. In addition, the desire to declare that history repeats itself leads to the fact that we simply do not notice how the substitution or change in the meaning of concepts takes place.

Undoubtedly, there are processes in society that coincide in one way or another, but it is impossible to repeat history - the historical conditions of each era are always different, even if they seem to be similar.

However, this does not mean that the lessons of history are useless.

Lada Konovalova

History teacher, deputy head of the educational department of the Home School "InternetUrok".

It is impossible to extrapolate the experience of the past to today, but you can better understand what is happening by analyzing similar events in the past.

The best help in understanding analogies can be the works of classical literature, allowing you to think about possible options for the development of the situation, the memoirs of one or another period. The Russian literary critic and theorist Vissarion Grigoryevich Belinsky owns the phrase: "You need to know the past in order to understand the present and foresee the future." Indeed, we question history in order to understand the present and slightly open the veil of the future. The latter becomes possible taking into account the laws of development of society. The Hegelian laws of dialectics will also make it possible to realize that current events are some kind of reproduction of the previous ones, and at the same time they are carried out at a fundamentally new level.

It is important to understand that you cannot enter the same river twice, because the input data changes: the level of development of the economy, education, science, culture... Russian historian Vasily Osipovich Klyuchevsky believed that "history is a lantern to the future that shines on us from the past", it's like once that this science teaches us to comprehend and analyze the events of other times, helps to better understand and explain many modern Problems. Who understands the past, he is able to realize the future. However, it is not possible to calculate the outcome of an event with absolute certainty - there are too many players on the field of action.

History gives us a fork of probabilities. And events can even go according to one of the scenarios proposed by the past. But don't rely on them too much. This is just an excuse to find places where you can fall and lay straws there.