According to Xenakis (2014) the Strauss and Howe’s theory is good, but it has some flaws. The two authors read the diaries, biographies, and letters of the Anglo Americans which refers to the history and traits of people from this time. The biggest concern is subjectivity. Other scholars may not have come to the same conclusion as the two writers (Xenakis 2014).
The two authors noted that the Fourth Turning model has a number of faults. The model was only tested against six Anglo-American Crisis periods dating back to the 1400. The most important error is the fact that they could not find a Hero generation after the Civil War (Xenakis 2014). This means there is no consistency and it puts the validity of the theory in doubt.
Xenakis (2014) observed this challenge and then he modified the Fourth Turning model with his own model called Generational Dynamics. Out of all the changes he made the researcher will be investigating the following definitions. The First, using Crises Wars as anchors. Second, Principal of Localisation and third, Merging timelines. The researcher feels it’s important to conceptualise these concepts as it will lead to a better understanding of the South African Baby Boomers and the Y generations.
2.8.1 Using Crisis War as anchors
Strauss and Howe, according to Xenakis (2014), were not able to explain how a cycle period starts. A cycle can either be started or restarted with the crisis war of a nation. The statement is a very important declaration since it supports the fact that generational changes can appear in any part of the world at any time (Xenakis 2014).
One of the most important aspects of a crisis war is the determination of the people fighting the war to win at any cost.
These types of wars test the humanity of either of the warring sides. The idea of genocide and mass atrocities becomes part of the norm (Xenakis 2014). Hatred for the enemy spreads like wild fire between young and old people. This type of war will change a nation either for the better or the worst. The hatred for the enemy flames the war on either side. The author of Generation Dynamics uses the Serb war in the Balkans in the early 1990’s as an example and the mass genocide of Rwanda in 1994.
2.8.2 The Principal of Localisation
An important academic aspect of Generational Dynamics is that it expands Strauss and Howe’s Fourth Turning Model from only using the six Anglo-American generations to making it valid in any place in the world. This principal was used to split the Anglo-American timeline into United States and England (Xenakis 2014).
Strauss and Howe (1997:120) clarify the Crisis era by comparing it to a “raging typhoon”. A typhoon according to The New Oxford School Dictionary (1990:423) “is a violent hurricane in the Western Pacific or East Asia seas”. It is arguably one of the worst storming systems known to mankind.
Xenakis (2014) explains the difficulty lies in the context of the Strauss and Howe model. A typhoon in one part of the world does not automatically mean there is a typhoon in another part of the world at the same time. When a country is experiencing a crisis war it does not mean all the countries in the world are experiencing a crisis war at that specific time. The United States had the Vietnamese war, for example. This was a crisis war for Vietnam, but not for South Africa.
The American Revolution, according to (Xenakis 2014), can also be seen as a crisis war, but only for the colonized, because for them this was a struggle for life or death.
For the British it was a non-crisis war, they were experiencing great political upheaval and anti-war movements in Britain similar to that in America during the Vietnam War.
So according to the Principal of Localisation, each country has its own timeline according to their crisis wars. Once a country has identified its crisis war then one can determine whether this phenomenon happens every 80 years (Xenakis 2014).
2.8.3 Merging Timelines
This is a very important addition to the Principal of Localisation, because it indicates how two different nations can live together with different generational timelines alongside each other. Once those two nations go to war their timelines merge. It is also possible for the timelines to diverge (Xenakis 2014). The principal is very important to remember as it lays the foundation for the South African timeline later in this chapter.
The diagram below shows the timeline of Nation A and Nation B. The black squares represent the nations and the black lines represent the timeline. In figure 2.3 the nations have separate timelines. Figure 2.4 shows what happens after a crisis war when timelines merge.
Figure 2.3: Two different timelines of two different nations A
B
Source: Adopted from Xenakis (2014).
Figure 2.4 The merging of timelines after these two nations went to war with each 0000000000other
A
B
Source: Adopted from Xenakis (2014).
In the next section the researcher will investigate the South African generations using both The Fourth Turning Model of Strauss and Howe as a foundation and then incorporate John Xenakis’s Generation Dynamics to give an accurate view of where in the generational timeline South Africa is.