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Woman's Progress, May 1895

Progress is movement towards a perceived refined, improved, or otherwise desired state.[1][2][3] It is central to the philosophy of progressivism, which interprets progress as the set of advancements in technology, science, and social organization efficiency – the latter being generally achieved through direct societal action, as in social enterprise or through activism, but being also attainable through natural sociocultural evolution – that progressivism holds all human societies should strive towards.

The concept of progress was introduced in the early-19th-century social theories, especially social evolution as described by Auguste Comte and Herbert Spencer. It was present in the Enlightenment's philosophies of history. As a goal, social progress has been advocated by varying realms of political ideologies with different theories on how it is to be achieved.

Measuring progress

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Specific indicators for measuring progress can range from economic data, technical innovations, change in the political or legal system, and questions bearing on individual life chances, such as life expectancy and risk of disease and disability.

GDP growth has become a key orientation for politics and is often taken as a key figure to evaluate a politician's performance. However, GDP has a number of flaws that make it a bad measure of progress, especially for developed countries. For example, environmental damage is not taken into account nor is the sustainability of economic activity. Wikiprogress has been set up to share information on evaluating societal progress. It aims to facilitate the exchange of ideas, initiatives and knowledge. HumanProgress.org is another online resource that seeks to compile data on different measures of societal progress.

Life expectancy in 1800, 1950, and 2015 – visualization by Our World in Data

Our World in Data is a scientific online publication, based at the University of Oxford, that studies how to make progress against large global problems such as poverty, disease, hunger, climate change, war, existential risks, and inequality.[4] The mission of Our World in Data is to present "research and data to make progress against the world’s largest problems".[5]

The Social Progress Index is a tool developed by the International Organization Imperative Social Progress, which measures the extent to which countries cover social and environmental needs of its citizenry. There are fifty-two indicators in three areas or dimensions: Basic Human Needs, and Foundations of Wellbeing and Opportunities which show the relative performance of nations.

Indices that can be used to measure progress include:

Scientific progress

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See also: History of science, Technological change, and Invention

Scientific progress is the idea that the scientific community learns more over time, which causes a body of scientific knowledge to accumulate.[6] The chemists in the 19th century knew less about chemistry than the chemists in the 20th century, and they in turn knew less than the chemists in the 21st century. Looking forward, today's chemists reasonably expect that chemists in future centuries will know more than they do.[6]

From the 18th century through late 20th century, the history of science, especially of the physical and biological sciences, was often presented as a progressive accumulation of knowledge, in which true theories replaced false beliefs.[7] Some more recent historical interpretations, such as those of Thomas Kuhn, tend to portray the history of science in terms of competing paradigms or conceptual systems in a wider matrix of intellectual, cultural, economic and political trends. These interpretations, however, have met with opposition for they also portray the history of science as an incoherent system of incommensurable paradigms, not leading to any scientific progress, but only to the illusion of progress.[8]

Whether other intellectual disciplines make progress in the same way as the sciences is a matter of debate. For example, one might expect that today's historians know more about global history than their ancient counterparts (consider the histories of Herodotus). Yet, knowledge can be lost through the passage of time, or the criteria for evaluating what is worth knowing can change. Similarly, there is considerable disagreement over whether fields such as philosophy make progress - or even whether they aim at accumulating knowledge in the same way as the sciences.[9]

Social progress

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See also: Moral progress, Social Progress Index, and EU Social Progress Index

Aspects of social progress, as described by Condorcet, have included the disappearance of slavery, the rise of literacy, the lessening of inequalities between the sexes, reforms of harsh prisons and the decline of poverty.[10] The social progress of a society can be measured based on factors such as its ability to address fundamental human needs, help citizens improve their quality of life, and provide opportunities for citizens to succeed.[11]

Social progress is often improved by increases in GDP, although other factors are also relevant. An imbalance between economic and social progress hinders further economic progress, and can lead to political instability.[11] Where there is an imbalance between economic growth and social progress, political instability and unrest often arise. Lagging social progress also holds back economic growth in these and other countries that fail to address human needs, build social capital, and create opportunity for their citizens.[11]

Status of women

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How progress improved the status of women in traditional society was a major theme of historians starting in the Enlightenment and continuing to today.[12] British theorists William Robertson (1721–1793) and Edmund Burke (1729–1797), along with many of their contemporaries, remained committed to Christian- and republican-based conceptions of virtue, while working within a new Enlightenment paradigm. The political agenda related beauty, taste, and morality to the imperatives and needs of modern societies of a high level of sophistication and differentiation. Two themes in the work of Robertson and Burke—the nature of women in 'savage' and 'civilized' societies and 'beauty in distress'—reveals how long-held convictions about the character of women, especially with regard to their capacity and right to appear in the public domain, were modified and adjusted to the idea of progress and became central to modern European civilization.[13]

Classics experts have examined the status of women in the ancient world, concluding that in the Roman Empire, with its superior social organization, internal peace, and rule of law, allowed women to enjoy a somewhat better standing than in ancient Greece, where women were distinctly inferior.[14] The inferior status of women in traditional China has raised the issue of whether the idea of progress requires a thoroughgoing rejection of traditionalism—a belief held by many Chinese reformers in the early 20th century.[15]

Historians Leo Marx and Bruce Mazlish asking, "should we in fact abandon the idea of progress as a view of the past," answer that there is no doubt "that the status of women has improved markedly" in cultures that have adopted the Enlightenment idea of progress.[16]

Modernization

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Main article: Modernization theory

Modernization was promoted by classical liberals in the 19th and 20th centuries, who called for the rapid modernization of the economy and society to remove the traditional hindrances to free markets and free movements of people.[17] During the Enlightenment in Europe social commentators and philosophers began to realize that people themselves could change society and change their way of life. Instead of being made completely by gods, there was increasing room for the idea that people themselves made their own society—and not only that, as Giambattista Vico argued, because people made their own society, they could also fully comprehend it. This gave rise to new sciences, or proto-sciences, which claimed to provide new scientific knowledge about what society was like, and how one may change it for the better.[18]

In turn, this gave rise to progressive opinion, in contrast with conservational opinion. The social conservationists were skeptical about panaceas for social ills. According to conservatives, attempts to radically remake society normally make things worse. Edmund Burke was the leading exponent of this, although later-day liberals like Friedrich Hayek have espoused similar views. They argue that society changes organically and naturally, and that grand plans for the remaking of society, like the French Revolution, National Socialism and Communism hurt society by removing the traditional constraints on the exercise of power.

The scientific advances of the 16th and 17th centuries provided a basis for Francis Bacon's book the New Atlantis. In the 17th century, Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle described progress with respect to arts and the sciences, saying that each age has the advantage of not having to rediscover what was accomplished in preceding ages. The epistemology of John Locke provided further support and was popularized by the Encyclopedists Diderot, Holbach, and Condorcet. Locke had a powerful influence on the American Founding Fathers.[19] The first complete statement of progress is that of Turgot, in his "A Philosophical Review of the Successive Advances of the Human Mind" (1750). For Turgot, progress covers not only the arts and sciences but, on their base, the whole of culture—manner, mores, institutions, legal codes, economy, and society. Condorcet predicted the disappearance of slavery, the rise of literacy, the lessening of inequalities between the sexes, reforms of harsh prisons and the decline of poverty.[10]

John Stuart Mill's (1806–1873) ethical and political thought demonstrated faith in the power of ideas and of intellectual education for improving human nature or behavior. For those who do not share this faith the idea of progress becomes questionable.[20]

Alfred Marshall (1842–1924), a British economist of the early 20th century, was a proponent of classical liberalism. In his highly influential Principles of Economics (1890), he was deeply interested in human progress and in what is now called sustainable development. For Marshall, the importance of wealth lay in its ability to promote the physical, mental, and moral health of the general population.[21] After World War II, the modernization and development programs undertaken in the Third World were typically based on the idea of progress.[22]

In Russia the notion of progress was first imported from the West by Peter the Great (1672–1725). An absolute ruler, he used the concept to modernize Russia and to legitimize his monarchy (unlike its usage in Western Europe, where it was primarily associated with political opposition). By the early 19th century, the notion of progress was being taken up by Russian intellectuals and was no longer accepted as legitimate by the tsars. Four schools of thought on progress emerged in 19th-century Russia: conservative (reactionary), religious, liberal, and socialist—the latter winning out in the form of Bolshevist materialism.[23]

The intellectual leaders of the American Revolution, such as Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, were immersed in Enlightenment thought and believed the idea of progress meant that they could reorganize the political system to the benefit of the human condition; both for Americans and also, as Jefferson put it, for an "Empire of Liberty" that would benefit all mankind.[24] In particular, Adams wrote “I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. Our sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain.”[citation needed]

Juan Bautista Alberdi (1810–1884) was one of the most influential political theorists in Argentina. Economic liberalism was the key to his idea of progress. He promoted faith in progress, while chiding fellow Latin Americans for blind copying of United States and Europe models. He hoped for progress through promotion of immigration, education, and a moderate type of federalism and republicanism that might serve as a transition in Argentina to true democracy.[25]

In Mexico, José María Luis Mora (1794–1850) was a leader of classical liberalism in the first generation after independence, leading the battle against the conservative trinity of the army, the church, and the hacendados. He envisioned progress as both a process of human development by the search for philosophical truth and as the introduction of an era of material prosperity by technological advancement. His plan for Mexican reform demanded a republican government bolstered by widespread popular education free of clerical control, confiscation and sale of ecclesiastical lands as a means of redistributing income and clearing government debts, and effective control of a reduced military force by the government. Mora also demanded the establishment of legal equality between native Mexicans and foreign residents. His program, untried in his lifetime, became the key element in the Mexican Constitution of 1857.[26]

In Italy, the idea that progress in science and technology would lead to solutions for human ills was connected to the nationalism that united the country in 1860. The Piedmontese Prime Minister Camillo Cavour envisaged the railways as a major factor in the modernization and unification of the Italian peninsula. The new Kingdom of Italy, formed in 1861, worked to speed up the processes of modernization and industrialization that had begun in the north, but were slow to arrive in the Papal States and central Italy, and were nowhere in sight in the "Mezzogiorno" (that is, Southern Italy and Sicily). The government sought to combat the backwardness of the poorer regions in the south and work towards augmenting the size and quality of the newly created Italian army so that it could compete on an equal footing with the powerful nations of Europe. In the same period, the government was legislating in favour of public education to fight the great problem of illiteracy, upgrade the teaching classes, improve existing schools, and procure the funds needed for social hygiene and care of the body as factors in the physical and moral regeneration of the race.[27]

In China, in the 20th century the Kuomintang or Nationalist party, which ruled from the 1920s to the 1940s, advocated progress. The Communists under Mao Zedong adopted different models and their ruinous projects caused mass famines. After Mao's death, however, the new regime led by Deng Xiaoping (1904–1997) and his successors aggressively promoted modernization of the economy using capitalist models and imported western technology.[28] This was termed the "Opening of China" in the West, and more broadly encompasses Chinese economic reform.

Among environmentalists, there is a continuum between two opposing poles. The one pole is optimistic, progressive, and business-oriented, and endorses the classic idea of progress. For example, bright green environmentalism endorses the idea that new designs, social innovations and green technologies can solve critical environmental challenges. The other is pessimistic in respect of technological solutions,[29] warning of impending global crisis (through climate change or peak oil, for example) and tends to reject the very idea of modernity and the myth of progress that is so central to modernization thinking.[30] Similarly, Kirkpatrick Sale, wrote about progress as a myth benefiting the few, and a pending environmental doomsday for everyone.[31] An example is the philosophy of Deep Ecology.

Philosophy

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Sociologist Robert Nisbet said that "No single idea has been more important than ... the Idea of Progress in Western civilization for three thousand years",[32] and defines five "crucial premises" of the idea of progress:

  1. value of the past
  2. nobility of Western civilization
  3. worth of economic/technological growth
  4. faith in reason and scientific/scholarly knowledge obtained through reason
  5. intrinsic importance and worth of life on earth

Sociologist P. A. Sorokin said, "The ancient Chinese, Babylonian, Hindu, Greek, Roman, and most of the medieval thinkers supporting theories of rhythmical, cyclical or trendless movements of social processes were much nearer to reality than the present proponents of the linear view."[33] Unlike Confucianism and to a certain extent Taoism, that both search for an ideal past, the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition believes in the fulfillment of history, which was translated into the idea of progress in the modern age. Therefore, Chinese proponents of modernization have looked to western models. According to Thompson, the late Qing dynasty reformer, Kang Youwei, believed he had found a model for reform and "modernisation" in the Ancient Chinese Classics.[34]

Philosopher Karl Popper said that progress was not fully adequate as a scientific explanation of social phenomena.[35] More recently, Kirkpatrick Sale, a self-proclaimed neo-luddite author, wrote exclusively about progress as a myth, in an essay entitled "Five Facets of a Myth".[36]

Iggers (1965) says that proponents of progress underestimated the extent of man's destructiveness and irrationality, while critics misunderstand the role of rationality and morality in human behavior.[37]

In 1946, psychoanalyst Charles Baudouin claimed modernity has retained the "corollary" of the progress myth, the idea that the present is superior to the past, while at the same time insisting that it is free of the myth:

The last two centuries were familiar with the myth of progress. Our own century has adopted the myth of modernity. The one myth has replaced the other.

Men ceased to believe in progress; but only to pin their faith to more tangible realities, whose sole original significance had been that they were the instruments of progress.

This exaltation of the present ... is a corollary of that very faith in progress which people claim to have discarded. The present is superior to the past, by definition, only in a mythology of progress. Thus one retains the corollary while rejecting the principle. There is only one way of retaining a position of whose instability one is conscious. One must simply refrain from thinking.[38]

A cyclical theory of history was adopted by Oswald Spengler (1880–1936), a German historian who wrote The Decline of the West in 1920. World War I, World War II, and the rise of totalitarianism demonstrated that progress was not automatic and that technological improvement did not necessarily guarantee democracy and moral advancement. British historian Arnold J. Toynbee (1889–1975) felt that Christianity would help modern civilization overcome its challenges.[39]

See also: Reactionary modernism

The Jeffersonians said that history is not exhausted but that man may begin again in a new world. Besides rejecting the lessons of the past, they Americanized the idea of progress by democratizing and vulgarizing it to include the welfare of the common man as a form of republicanism. As Romantics deeply concerned with the past, collecting source materials and founding historical societies, the Founding Fathers were animated by clear principles. They saw man in control of his destiny, saw virtue as a distinguishing characteristic of a republic, and were concerned with happiness, progress, and prosperity. Thomas Paine, combining the spirit of rationalism and romanticism, pictured a time when America's innocence would sound like a romance, and concluded that the fall of America could mark the end of "the noblest work of human wisdom".[24]

Historian J. B. Bury wrote in 1920:[40]

To the minds of most people the desirable outcome of human development would be a condition of society in which all the inhabitants of the planet would enjoy a perfectly happy existence. ... It cannot be proved that the unknown destination towards which man is advancing is desirable. The movement may be Progress, or it may be in an undesirable direction and therefore not Progress. ... The Progress of humanity belongs to the same order of ideas as Providence or personal immortality. It is true or it is false, and like them it cannot be proved either true or false. Belief in it is an act of faith.

In the postmodernist thought steadily gaining ground from the 1980s, the grandiose claims of the modernizers are steadily eroded, and the very concept of social progress is again questioned and scrutinized. In the new vision, radical modernizers like Joseph Stalin and Mao Zedong appear as totalitarian despots, whose vision of social progress is held to be totally deformed. Postmodernists question the validity of 19th-century and 20th-century notions of progress—both on the capitalist and the Marxist side of the spectrum. They argue that both capitalism and Marxism overemphasize technological achievements and material prosperity while ignoring the value of inner happiness and peace of mind. Postmodernism posits that both dystopia and utopia are one and the same, overarching grand narratives with impossible conclusions.

See also: Progress trap

Some 20th-century authors refer to the "Myth of Progress" to refer to the idea that the human condition will inevitably improve. In 1932, English physician Montague David Eder wrote: "The myth of progress states that civilization has moved, is moving, and will move in a desirable direction. Progress is inevitable... Philosophers, men of science and politicians have accepted the idea of the inevitability of progress."[41] Eder argues that the advancement of civilization is leading to greater unhappiness and loss of control in the environment. The strongest critics of the idea of progress complain that it remains a dominant idea in the 21st century, and shows no sign of diminished influence. As one fierce critic, British historian John Gray (b. 1948), concludes:[42]

Faith in the liberating power of knowledge is encrypted into modern life. Drawing on some of Europe's most ancient traditions, and daily reinforced by the quickening advance of science, it cannot be given up by an act of will. The interaction of quickening scientific advance with unchanging human needs is a fate that we may perhaps temper, but cannot overcome... Those who hold to the possibility of progress need not fear. The illusion that through science humans can remake the world is an integral part of the modern condition. Renewing the eschatological hopes of the past, progress is an illusion with a future.

Recently the idea of progress has been generalized to psychology, being related with the concept of a goal, that is, progress is understood as "what counts as a means of advancing towards the end result of a given defined goal."[citation needed]

Antiquity

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Main article: Classical antiquity

Historian J. B. Bury said that thought in ancient Greece was dominated by the theory of world-cycles or the doctrine of eternal return, and was steeped in a belief parallel to the Judaic "fall of man," but rather from a preceding "Golden Age" of innocence and simplicity. Time was generally regarded as the enemy of humanity which depreciates the value of the world. He credits the Epicureans with having had a potential for leading to the foundation of a theory of progress through their materialistic acceptance of the atomism of Democritus as the explanation for a world without an intervening deity.

For them, the earliest condition of men resembled that of the beasts, and from this primitive and miserable condition they laboriously reached the existing state of civilisation, not by external guidance or as a consequence of some initial design, but simply by the exercise of human intelligence throughout a long period.[citation needed]

Robert Nisbet and Gertrude Himmelfarb have attributed a notion of progress to other Greeks. Xenophanes said "The gods did not reveal to men all things in the beginning, but men through their own search find in the course of time that which is better."

Islamic era

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Main article: Islamic Golden Age

With the rise of the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates and later Ottoman Empire, progress in the Islamic civilizations was characterized by a system of translating books (particularly Greek philosophy books in the Abbasid era) of various cultures into local languages (often Arabic and Persian), testing and refining their scientific or philosophical theories and claims, and then building upon them with their own Islamic ideas, theologies, ontologies, and scientific experimental results.[43][44] The Round city of Baghdad was characterized as a model and example of progress for the region, where peoples of every religion and race sent their top students to study at its famous international academy called the House of Wisdom.[45] Islamic Spain was also famed as a center of learning in Europe, where Jews and Christians flocked to Muslim halaqas, eager to bring the latest knowledge back to their countries in Europe, which later sparked the European Renaissance due the Muslim scholars' finesse in adapting classical knowledge (such as Greek philosophy) to Abrahamic contexts.[46] Muslim rulers viewed knowledge, including both scientific and philosophical knowledge, as a key to power, and promoted learning, scientific inquiry, and patronization of scholars.[46]

Renaissance

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Main article: Renaissance

During the Medieval period, science was to a large extent based on Scholastic (a method of thinking and learning from the Middle Ages) interpretations of Aristotle's work. The Renaissance changed the mindset in Europe, which induced a revolution in curiosity about nature in general and scientific advance, which opened the gates for technical and economic advance. Furthermore, the individual potential was seen as a never-ending quest for being God-like, paving the way for a view of man based on unlimited perfection and progress.[47]

Age of Enlightenment (1650–1800)

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Main article: Age of Enlightenment

In the Enlightenment, French historian and philosopher Voltaire (1694–1778) was a major proponent of progress.[citation needed] At first Voltaire's thought was informed by the idea of progress coupled with rationalism. His subsequent notion of the historical idea of progress saw science and reason as the driving forces behind societal advancement.

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) argued that progress is neither automatic nor continuous and does not measure knowledge or wealth, but is a painful and largely inadvertent passage from barbarism through civilization toward enlightened culture and the abolition of war. Kant called for education, with the education of humankind seen as a slow process whereby world history propels mankind toward peace through war, international commerce, and enlightened self-interest.[48]

Scottish theorist Adam Ferguson (1723–1816) defined human progress as the working out of a divine plan, though he rejected predestination. The difficulties and dangers of life provided the necessary stimuli for human development, while the uniquely human ability to evaluate led to ambition and the conscious striving for excellence. But he never adequately analyzed the competitive and aggressive consequences stemming from his emphasis on ambition even though he envisioned man's lot as a perpetual striving with no earthly culmination. Man found his happiness only in effort.[49]

Some scholars consider the idea of progress that was affirmed with the Enlightenment, as a secularization of ideas from early Christianity, and a reworking of ideas from ancient Greece.[50][51][52]

Romanticism and 19th century

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In the 19th century, Romantic critics charged that progress did not automatically better the human condition, and in some ways could make it worse.[53] Thomas Malthus (1766–1834) reacted against the concept of progress as set forth by William Godwin and Condorcet because he believed that inequality of conditions is "the best (state) calculated to develop the energies and faculties of man". He said, "Had population and food increased in the same ratio, it is probable that man might never have emerged from the savage state." He argued that man's capacity for improvement has been demonstrated by the growth of his intellect, a form of progress which offsets the distresses engendered by the law of population.[54]

German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) criticized the idea of progress as the 'weakling's doctrines of optimism,' and advocated undermining concepts such as faith in progress, to allow the strong individual to stand above the plebeian masses. An important part of his thinking consists of the attempt to use the classical model of 'eternal recurrence of the same' to dislodge the idea of progress.[55]

Iggers (1965) argues there was general agreement in the late 19th century that the steady accumulation of knowledge and the progressive replacement of conjectural, that is, theological or metaphysical, notions by scientific ones was what created progress. Most scholars concluded this growth of scientific knowledge and methods led to the growth of industry and the transformation of warlike societies into industrial and pacific ones. They agreed as well that there had been a systematic decline of coercion in government, and an increasing role of liberty and of rule by consent. There was more emphasis on impersonal social and historical forces; progress was increasingly seen as the result of an inner logic of society.[56]

Marxist theory (late 19th century)

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Marx developed a theory of historical materialism. He describes the mid-19th-century condition in The Communist Manifesto as follows:

The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionizing the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionizing of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty, and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all which is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real condition of life and his relations with his kind.[57]

Furthermore, Marx described the process of social progress, which in his opinion is based on the interaction between the productive forces and the relations of production:

No social order is ever destroyed before all the productive forces for which it is sufficient have been developed, and new superior relations of production never replace older ones before the material conditions for their existence have matured within the framework of the old society.[58]

Capitalism is thought by Marx as a process of continual change, in which the growth of markets dissolve all fixities in human life, and Marx argues that capitalism is progressive and non-reactionary.[citation needed] Marxism further states that capitalism, in its quest for higher profits and new markets, will inevitably sow the seeds of its own destruction. Marxists believe that, in the future, capitalism will be replaced by socialism and eventually communism.

Many advocates of capitalism such as Schumpeter agreed with Marx's analysis of capitalism as a process of continual change through creative destruction, but, unlike Marx, believed and hoped that capitalism could essentially go on forever.

Thus, by the beginning of the 20th century, two opposing schools of thought—Marxism and liberalism—believed in the possibility and the desirability of continual change and improvement. Marxists strongly opposed capitalism and the liberals strongly supported it, but the one concept they could both agree on was progress, which affirms the power of human beings to make, improve and reshape their society, with the aid of scientific knowledge, technology and practical experimentation. Modernity denotes cultures that embrace that concept of progress. (This is not the same as modernism, which was the artistic and philosophical response to modernity, some of which embraced technology while rejecting individualism, but more of which rejected modernity entirely.)

See also

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References

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Further reading

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Progress

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Progress refers to the sustained improvement in human living conditions through the accumulation of , , and institutional adaptations that enhance , , and capabilities. Empirical records indicate profound advancements since the , including a decline in global from approximately 80% of the in 1820 to under 10% by 2019, alongside rates dropping from 43% before age five in 1800 to 4% in 2021. Literacy rates have similarly surged from 10% in 1820 to 87% today, reflecting expanded access to and information. The intellectual foundations of progress trace to Enlightenment thinkers who envisioned history as a trajectory of rational advancement rather than inevitable cycles of decline, a view validated by subsequent economic and scientific developments. Key drivers include market exchange, property rights, and scientific inquiry, which have propelled innovations from industrialization to digital networks, yielding exponential gains in productivity and welfare. While debates persist over uneven distribution or potential environmental trade-offs, the aggregate trajectory demonstrates causal links between open societies, innovation, and measurable human flourishing, countering declinist interpretations with data-driven realism.

Conceptual Foundations

Definition and Core Concepts

Progress originates from the Latin progressus, denoting "a going forward" or "advance," derived from pro- ("forward") and gradi ("to step" or "walk"), entering English in the 15th century to signify forward movement or advancement to a higher stage of development, growth, or . In philosophical terms, progress constitutes a directional process of and learning through the modification of human intellect and capabilities, resulting in refined states of , societal conditions, or material welfare, though outcomes remain contingent on human agency rather than inevitability. This entails a value-laden assessment of "," typically oriented toward human flourishing—encompassing reduced , expanded opportunities, and enhanced control over —rooted in the empirical observation that cumulative efforts yield non-reversible gains, such as in scientific understanding or institutional efficacy. Core concepts distinguish progress from mere change by emphasizing directionality (movement from inferior to superior states, judged against objective metrics like survival rates or ) and cumulativity (building upon prior achievements, as in technological inheritance across generations). It incorporates agency, wherein deliberate human actions—driven by reason, experimentation, and error-correction—propel advancements, countering deterministic or fatalistic alternatives. Evaluation hinges on alignment with ultimate values, such as individual dignity and mutual benefit, while causation identifies mechanisms like open inquiry and as accelerators, underscoring that progress demands prescriptive strategies to sustain momentum amid potential regressions.

Etymology and Evolution of the Term

The term "progress" derives from the Latin progressus, the past participle of progredi, meaning "to go forward" or "advance," composed of pro- ("forward") and gradi ("to step" or "walk"). This root emphasized literal forward movement, initially connoting physical advancement or journey in classical usage. In English, the word entered via Anglo-French progrés in the late 15th century, with the earliest recorded uses around 1400–1450 referring to a "state journey" or ceremonial procession, such as a royal progress through territories, symbolizing movement from one place to another rather than improvement. By the 16th century, it began to extend metaphorically to denote any forward motion or course of action, as in the progress of events or a project. The semantic shift toward implying beneficial development or improvement accelerated in the 17th and 18th centuries, aligning with Enlightenment thinkers who applied it to historical and societal advancement, viewing human knowledge and conditions as cumulatively advancing toward better states. This evolution culminated in the , where "progress" became central to social theories positing directional improvement in civilization, as articulated by figures like in his 1830–1842 , framing it as a of historical succession from theological to metaphysical to scientific stages. Despite this optimistic , the term retained its neutral sense of mere change or sequence in some contexts, underscoring that progress does not inherently guarantee enhancement without empirical validation.

Measurement and Evidence of Progress

Empirical Metrics: Health, Longevity, and Poverty Reduction

Global life expectancy at birth has risen substantially over the past two centuries, from approximately 31 years around 1800 to 73 years by 2023. This more than twofold increase stems primarily from reductions in mortality rates across all age groups, particularly among infants and children, driven by improvements in , , , and medical interventions. In 1900, the global average stood at 32 years, reflecting high rates of infectious diseases and poor infrastructure; by 1950, it had climbed to about 48 years amid post-World War II advancements in antibiotics and efforts. A core indicator of health progress is the decline in and . Historically, around 27% of newborns died in their first year, and roughly half of all children perished before age 15. By 2021, global under-five mortality had fallen to approximately 3.7%, with rates dropping from over 10% in 1974 to less than 3% today, largely attributable to widespread programs, which accounted for 40% of the reduction in over the last 50 years, alongside better access to clean and . These gains have been most pronounced in developing regions, where rates have decreased from 1 in 4 in 1950 to under 1 in 20 by 2020. Extreme poverty, measured as living on less than $2.15 per day (2017 PPP), has also diminished markedly. In 1990, about 38% of the world's —roughly 2 billion people—lived in ; by 2019, this share had declined to around 8.5%, affecting approximately 660 million individuals despite global to 7.7 billion. Earlier estimates indicate that in 1981, the rate was about 44%, reflecting a steady downward trend accelerated by in and gains. Although the caused a temporary uptick to 9.7% in 2020, projections show a return to pre-pandemic levels by 2025 at around 9.9%, underscoring the resilience of long-term reductions. These metrics, derived from household surveys and national accounts by institutions like the World Bank, highlight empirical progress, though measurement challenges such as purchasing power adjustments and data gaps in conflict zones warrant caution in interpreting absolute figures.

Economic and Technological Indicators

Global (GDP) per capita has risen substantially over the long term, reflecting sustained economic expansion driven by industrialization, trade, and innovation. According to the Database, the world's average GDP per capita in terms increased from approximately $667 in 1820 to $6,670 by 2010, a tenfold rise, with further growth to around $17,000 by 2022 when adjusted for and . This trajectory accelerated post-1950, with annual global growth rates averaging over 2% in recent decades, attributable to factors such as , technological diffusion, and market liberalization rather than mere population effects. Extreme poverty, defined by the World Bank as living on less than $2.15 per day in 2017 , has declined markedly since the late . The global share fell from about 38% in 1990 to 8.5% by 2024, lifting over 1.1 billion people out of between 1990 and 2019, primarily through in Asia, particularly and , where market reforms enabled rapid income gains. Recent slowdowns, including a temporary rise during the , highlight vulnerabilities, yet the long-term trend underscores causal links between sustained per capita income increases and alleviation. Technological progress manifests in surging innovation metrics, such as applications, which serve as proxies for inventive activity. Worldwide patent filings grew from roughly 1 million in 1995 to 3.6 million in 2023, with acceleration in digital and sectors, reflecting denser protections and R&D investments in jurisdictions like , the , and . In computing, has empirically held, with density on integrated circuits doubling approximately every two years since 1970, enabling exponential gains: from about 2,300 transistors in Intel's 4004 (1971) to over 100 billion in advanced chips by 2023, fueling efficiency in electronics, AI, and . Digital connectivity has expanded rapidly, with global penetration rising from under 1% in 1990 to 63% by 2023, connecting over 5 billion users and democratizing access to information, markets, and services. This growth, driven by investments and , correlates with productivity boosts, as evidenced by correlations between adoption and GDP increments in developing regions. production has similarly scaled, with global supply increasing from 20,000 terawatt-hours equivalent in 1800 to over 600,000 by 2023, predominantly via fuels but with rising shares from nuclear and renewables, underpinning industrial and living standard advancements. These indicators collectively demonstrate returns from technological and economic , though uneven distribution persists across regions.

Challenges and Biases in Quantification

The quantification of progress is inherently challenging owing to its multidimensional scope, which spans economic, social, health, and environmental domains, yet relies on imperfect proxies that aggregate disparate indicators. Gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, a cornerstone economic metric, measures market-based production but excludes non-market activities like household labor, leisure, and voluntary work, while failing to deduct negative externalities such as pollution or resource depletion. This omission can inflate perceived advancements in nations prioritizing short-term output over long-term sustainability, as GDP rises with defensive expenditures like disaster remediation without reflecting underlying welfare gains. Alternative indices like the (HDI) incorporate life expectancy, education, and income to broaden assessment, but introduce methodological flaws including the aggregation, which nonlinearly penalizes imbalances across dimensions and exacerbates normalization biases against low-performing countries. High between components—such as education attainment and —results in redundant weighting that skews rankings, while the index caps values at upper bounds, understating incremental improvements in already advanced economies. Moreover, HDI averages obscure intra-country inequalities, disparities, and non-quantified factors like political freedoms or , potentially masking persistent vulnerabilities in high-scoring nations. Biases in data collection and indicator selection further complicate reliable measurement; for instance, the (MPI) aggregates heterogeneous deprivations (e.g., nutrition, sanitation, assets) without commensurate units, relying on household surveys often not tailored for such analysis, which introduces subjective weighting and comparability issues across contexts. Poverty reduction statistics suffer from uncertainties in international poverty line derivation—typically $2.15 per day in 2017 terms—and survey misreporting, yielding wide confidence intervals that question the precision of global declines reported by organizations like the World Bank. Systemic tendencies in academic and multilateral sources to prioritize aggregate trends over disaggregated failures may stem from institutional incentives favoring positive narratives, though self-acknowledged limitations in reports highlight the need for robust error correction in progress evaluations.

Historical Philosophical Perspectives

Ancient and Classical Views

In mythology, Hesiod's Works and Days (c. 700 BCE) outlined the Five Ages of Man, portraying human history as a process of degeneration rather than advancement: a Golden Age of ease and divine favor under gave way to successively inferior Silver, , Heroic, and s marked by increasing toil, violence, and moral decay, with the current foretold to end in catastrophe. This framework reflected a pessimistic where humanity's distance from primordial harmony signified decline, not cumulative improvement, influencing later cyclical interpretations. Greek philosophers of the Classical period reinforced cyclical conceptions of time and history, eschewing linear progress. Plato, in works like the Statesman and Republic (c. 380–360 BCE), described cosmic cycles driven by periodic reversals in the earth's rotation, alternating between eras of spontaneous order and deterioration, with political constitutions devolving from aristocracy through timocracy, oligarchy, democracy, to tyranny before renewal. Aristotle echoed this in Politics (c. 350 BCE), positing natural cycles in governance forms and biological analogies for societal rise and fall, while acknowledging episodic advancements in knowledge—such as in geometry or medicine—but viewing them as precarious amid inevitable entropy, not as harbingers of perpetual societal betterment. Stoics like Zeno and later Cicero extended eternal recurrence, where events repeat infinitely, precluding unique historical directionality. Roman thinkers inherited and adapted these Greek ideas, often applying them to imperial fortunes without envisioning indefinite progress. (c. 150 BCE) in Histories theorized anacyclosis, a cycle of constitutions mirroring Aristotle's, where Rome's delayed but could not avert decline into ochlocracy and tyranny. While (c. 40–30 BCE) evoked a returning under , symbolizing temporary renewal through virtuous rule rather than technological or moral ascent, and praised architectural and engineering refinements as building on Greek precedents, such views emphasized emulation and stability over transformative historical momentum. Overall, lacked a doctrine of sustained, directional progress, prioritizing cosmic recurrence, heroic exemplars, and institutional prudence against hubris-induced fall.

Medieval and Early Modern Developments

In , the concept of progress was inextricably linked to , portraying history as a linear divine plan advancing toward salvation rather than human-directed improvement. Augustine of Hippo's De Civitate Dei (413–426 CE) depicted the progression of through epochs from the Fall to the , with earthly events reflecting providential order and occasional material advancements serving spiritual ends. This view subordinated secular achievements to heavenly fulfillment, viewing human society as transient and prone to cyclical declines amid divine purpose. (c. 1135–1202) extended this with a trinitarian of historical ages—Father, Son, and Spirit—prophesying a future era of evangelical liberty and millennial peace, which infused medieval thought with anticipatory optimism but remained theologically bounded. Scholasticism, exemplified by Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274), reconciled Aristotelian notions of natural teleology with faith, allowing for incremental knowledge gains through reason as harmonious with revelation, yet framing any "progress" as finite and God-oriented rather than open-ended. Technological and institutional developments, such as the widespread adoption of water mills by the 12th century or the founding of universities like (1088) and (c. 1150), occurred amid this worldview but were interpreted providentially, not as evidence of inherent societal advancement. The witnessed a transition toward secularized progress, catalyzed by and the , which emphasized human agency and methodical inquiry over deference to antiquity or scripture. Francis Bacon's (1605) critiqued scholastic obstacles to knowledge—termed "idols" of the mind—and promoted inductive to accumulate discoveries, enabling dominion over and indefinite intellectual expansion. René Descartes, in (1637), outlined rules for doubt and deduction to attain indubitable truths, positing the human mind's capacity for systematic mastery of the physical world and ongoing rational progress independent of tradition. These methodologies shifted focus from theological consummation to empirical and rational trajectories, seeding Enlightenment confidence in human-directed improvement while retaining medieval .

Enlightenment Optimism and Industrial Era

The Enlightenment era, extending from the late 17th century through the early 19th century, marked a pivotal shift toward regarding human progress, rooted in the belief that rational , , and could systematically improve society and eradicate ignorance. Thinkers emphasized the perfectibility of humanity through and knowledge accumulation, viewing history as a of advancement rather than cyclical decline. This perspective contrasted with earlier fatalistic or theological interpretations, privileging human agency and reason as drivers of moral, intellectual, and material elevation. Immanuel Kant articulated this in his 1784 essay "Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose," proposing that societal conflicts and institutional developments propel humanity toward perpetual peace and rational governance, with nature's "unsocial sociability" fostering progress. Similarly, , in works like the Philosophical Dictionary (1764), advocated empirical reason over religious to advance civility and , influencing widespread faith in enlightenment as a cumulative process. The advanced the most explicit doctrine in his Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind (1795), outlining ten epochs of intellectual —from primitive hunter-gatherers to future egalitarian societies—and forecasting indefinite perfectibility through inventions, via reason, and global scientific collaboration, unmarred by deterministic setbacks. Condorcet's vision, written amid the , integrated probabilistic mathematics to quantify progress, asserting that errors in governance or diminish over time. This optimism transitioned into the Industrial Era, beginning in Britain around 1760, where philosophical ideals manifested in technological and economic transformations, reinforcing beliefs in inexorable advancement. Innovations such as James Watt's improved (patented 1769) enabled mechanized factories and railroads, symbolizing reason's triumph over manual limits and spurring unprecedented productivity. , bridging Enlightenment moral philosophy with emerging industrial realities in An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of (1776), theorized that self-interested pursuits under division of labor and free exchange generate societal wealth via an "invisible hand," predicting sustained growth from trade liberalization and . Smith's framework, grounded in observations of pin factories and Scottish manufactories, portrayed markets as mechanisms for diffusing and raising living standards, aligning with Condorcetian perfectibility by tying moral sentiments to economic incentives. Empirical outcomes during the late 18th and early 19th centuries validated this industrial optimism, with Britain's GDP increasing by roughly 0.4% annually from 1760 to 1830—doubling overall—and real wages for unskilled laborers rising 20-30% by 1820 despite initial strains. at birth in edged from 36.5 years in 1750 to 39.2 by 1800, with declining post-1780 due to and precursors, portending broader health gains from . Philosophers like Smith anticipated such trends, attributing progress to institutional enablers like property rights and , though early conditions highlighted tensions between short-term disruptions and long-term in wealth creation. This era's thinkers, unburdened by later environmental critiques, saw mechanization as liberating labor from subsistence, fostering a causal chain from to .

Key Domains of Progress

Scientific and Technological Advancements


Scientific and technological advancements have fundamentally expanded human capacity to manipulate the environment, extending lifespans and enabling unprecedented productivity. The , spanning roughly 1543 to 1687, introduced empirical methodologies that shifted from speculative philosophy to testable hypotheses, exemplified by Nicolaus Copernicus's heliocentric model in 1543 and Isaac Newton's in 1687, which formalized laws of motion and gravity. These developments fostered systematic inquiry, laying groundwork for subsequent innovations by prioritizing and over authority. The , accelerating from the late 18th century, mechanized production through inventions like James Watt's improved in 1775, which powered factories and transportation, dramatically boosting output and . In the , key breakthroughs included the ' powered flight in 1903, the 's invention in 1947 enabling compact electronics, and Gordon Moore's 1965 observation—later termed —that counts on chips double approximately every two years, driving exponential computing power growth at declining costs. This progression correlated with global R&D spending tripling since 2000 to support innovation amid economic challenges. Post-2000 advancements, such as the 2012 development of CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing and technologies deployed in 2020 for , have revolutionized biology and medicine, allowing precise genetic interventions and rapid pandemic response. models, advancing through large-scale training since 2022, now process complex data at scales unimaginable decades prior, augmenting fields from to . U.S. R&D expenditure reached $892 billion in 2022, reflecting sustained investment yielding patents and applications that underpin economic expansion. These cumulative gains, tracked via metrics like patent filings and computational capacity, demonstrate causal links to broader progress in efficiency and knowledge accumulation, though diffusion varies by institutional support.

Economic Growth and Prosperity

Economic growth refers to the increase in the production of goods and services within an economy over time, typically measured by rises in (GDP) per capita adjusted for inflation and . Since the , global GDP per capita has risen from approximately $1,000 in 1820 (in 2011 international dollars) to over $17,000 by 2022, reflecting sustained acceleration driven by and expanded . This long-term trajectory marks a departure from millennia of stagnation, where per capita incomes remained largely flat, enabling broader access to resources and higher living standards. A primary outcome of this growth has been the reduction of , defined by the World Bank as living below $2.15 per day in 2017 terms. In 1990, nearly 38% of the global population—about 2 billion people—lived in , but by 2019, this share had fallen to around 8.7%, lifting over 1 billion individuals out of that condition through expanded economic opportunities. Empirical analyses confirm a strong inverse correlation: a 10% increase in national typically reduces rates by 20-30% on average, as growth generates , raises wages, and lowers consumer prices via gains. While inequality persists within nations, absolute prosperity has advanced, with even lower-income quintiles experiencing gains in growing economies. Market-oriented systems, characterized by rights, free enterprise, and minimal barriers to trade, have empirically underpinned this prosperity by incentivizing investment and innovation. Countries embracing greater —such as post-reform and since the 1980s and 1990s—have seen GDP multiply several-fold, correlating with improved human development indicators independent of redistribution alone. Historical evidence from the 19th and 20th centuries further shows that frameworks sustained growth rates of 1-2% annually, to transform subsistence economies into affluent ones, unlike pre-capitalist eras dominated by zero-sum extraction. Challenges like financial crises exist, but indicate that open markets recover faster and distribute gains more widely than centrally planned alternatives.

Social Improvements and Living Standards

Global has risen dramatically over the past century, more than doubling from an average of 32 years in 1900 to 73 years in 2023, driven by advances in , , and . This improvement reflects reduced , with the under-5 mortality rate falling 59% from 93 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1990 to 37 in 2023, averting millions of deaths annually through vaccinations, antibiotics, and better maternal care. Access to basic and clean has expanded significantly, enabling healthier living conditions; by , 73% of the global population—about 6 billion people—used safely managed services, up from lower coverage in prior decades due to investments in developing regions. Similarly, safely managed reached portions of the population previously exposed to and waterborne diseases, contributing to declines in diarrheal illnesses that once claimed substantial lives. Educational attainment has surged, with global adult rates climbing from under 20% in the early to 87% by recent estimates, encompassing over 5 billion literate individuals compared to fewer than 100 million in 1820. This progress stems from compulsory schooling laws, expanded access in low-income countries, and literacy campaigns, correlating with higher enrollment and reduced gaps in . Violence has declined markedly in many societies, with historical homicide rates dropping steeply—for instance, from 24 per 100,000 in 14th-century to 0.6 per 100,000 by the —attributable to state monopolies on force, , and cultural shifts toward . While from Steven Pinker's analysis draws on European records, similar long-term trends appear in other regions, underscoring broader pacification processes despite episodic rises. These metrics collectively indicate elevated living standards, though disparities persist between developed and developing nations, with lagging in several indicators.

Drivers and Enablers

Market Mechanisms and

Market mechanisms, through the , enable efficient by signaling and consumer preferences, directing production toward goods and services that maximize value without central directive. Rising prices for scarce resources incentivize suppliers to increase output or seek substitutes, while falling prices signal overproduction, prompting reallocation; this decentralized process, as articulated by economists like , outperforms planned allocation by aggregating dispersed knowledge and adapting rapidly to changes. In capitalist systems characterized by rights and voluntary exchange, amplifies these signals, compelling firms to innovate or face obsolescence, thereby fostering productivity gains essential to sustained progress. Empirical data links capitalist adoption to accelerated economic growth. According to the Maddison Project Database, GDP per capita in Western Europe, where capitalist institutions solidified during the 19th century, rose from approximately $1,200 (in 1990 international dollars) in 1820 to over $20,000 by 1950, a trajectory far exceeding pre-industrial stagnation. Similarly, post-World War II market-oriented reforms in Japan and West Germany yielded average annual GDP growth rates of 9-10% in the 1950s-1960s, contrasting with slower recoveries in more interventionist economies. Cross-country analyses confirm that higher economic freedom indices—measuring property rights, trade openness, and regulatory lightness—correlate with superior outcomes; nations in the top quartile of the Heritage Foundation's Index of Economic Freedom averaged 3.5% annual GDP growth from 1995-2020, versus 1.2% for the bottom quartile. Capitalism has driven profound , with global (under $2.15 daily, adjusted) plummeting from 94% of the world population in 1820—prior to widespread market liberalization—to 10% by 2015, as capitalist expansion enabled and trade. This decline accelerated after 1980, coinciding with deregulations in (post-1978 reforms lifting 800 million from ) and (1991 liberalization spurring 7-8% annual growth), where market incentives unlocked agricultural and industrial efficiencies. Critics attributing reductions solely to welfare expansions overlook that such programs relied on prior capitalist wealth creation; for instance, Nordic social democracies maintained high growth through underlying market dynamism, not redistribution alone. Innovation thrives under market mechanisms due to profit-driven experimentation and rapid failure correction, absent in planned systems. Studies of Soviet-era patents reveal that centrally planned economies generated ideas but implemented fewer than market peers, with productivity 30-50% lower owing to misaligned incentives and information bottlenecks. Free-market economies host 80% of global R&D spending and dominate breakthroughs; the U.S., with robust property rights, accounted for 40% of worldwide patents in 2022, fueling sectors like semiconductors where competition halved costs every two years since 1970. indices predict innovation capacity, with top-ranked nations like and registering 2-3 times more patents per capita than lower-freedom peers. While state funding aids , market commercialization—evident in private ventures like mRNA vaccines developed amid competitive pressures—translates discoveries into progress at scale.

Institutional and Cultural Factors

Secure property rights and the form foundational institutional mechanisms that incentivize , , and long-term by reducing expropriation risks and enforcing contracts. Empirical analyses demonstrate that stronger enforcement of these institutions correlates with higher rates of technological adoption and productivity gains, as seen in cross-country comparisons where nations with robust legal frameworks exhibit greater and . For instance, improvements in have been linked to enhanced firm-level efficiency through better and reduced uncertainty. Economic freedom indices, which aggregate measures of property rights, judicial effectiveness, and regulatory restraint, show a consistent positive association with GDP growth. Countries transitioning to higher levels between 1995 and 2023 experienced average annual GDP growth rates exceeding those in less free economies by 1-2 percentage points, enabling sustained progress in living standards and technological output. This relationship holds across diverse samples, including developed and emerging markets, underscoring how institutional constraints on overreach foster market-driven . Cultural factors, including values emphasizing , long-term orientation, and tolerance for uncertainty, empirically predict higher national rates by encouraging risk-taking and knowledge dissemination. Studies using Hofstede's cultural dimensions framework find that societies scoring high on and low on generate more patents , as these traits promote decentralized decision-making and merit-based rewards over hierarchical conformity. Historical shifts, such as the rise of empirical in post-Enlightenment , further illustrate how cultural norms favoring evidence-based inquiry accelerated scientific progress, with persistent effects observable in modern global disparities. Intellectual property protections, as an institutional extension intertwined with cultural attitudes toward , stimulate R&D investment by allowing innovators to capture returns, though overly stringent regimes can occasionally stifle cumulative advancements. Cross-national from 2000-2020 indicate that balanced IP enforcement correlates with 15-20% higher outputs in sectors like pharmaceuticals and software, yet requires complementary cultural openness to collaboration to avoid monopolistic inertia.

Innovation Ecosystems

Innovation ecosystems consist of interconnected networks of actors—including entrepreneurs, firms, institutions, investors, and talent pools—that facilitate exchange, , and of novel ideas, thereby driving technological progress. These systems emerge geographically in clusters where proximity enables serendipitous interactions, labor mobility, and spillovers, as evidenced by the concentration of high-tech firms in regions like , which accounts for a disproportionate share of U.S. venture-backed . Empirical analyses highlight that successful ecosystems rely on bidirectional knowledge flows among universities, startups, and corporations, rather than isolated silos, with studies showing that such integration correlates with higher outputs and firm productivity. Venture capital plays a pivotal role by funding high-risk, high-reward projects that traditional financing avoids, enabling the scaling of innovations from prototypes to market leaders; for instance, venture-backed firms have driven breakthroughs in and software, contributing to outsized economic impacts through job creation and productivity gains. In , deep venture capital markets, combined with a culture of rapid experimentation and failure tolerance, have sustained cluster dominance, with data indicating that VC availability explains much of the region's edge over less-funded areas. However, ecosystem vitality also hinges on access to skilled labor, where high-skilled via programs like H-1B visas has demonstrably boosted U.S. patenting rates—immigrants file 25-30% of patents despite comprising 13% of the population and invent at double the native rate—countering narratives that prioritize domestic training alone. Regulatory environments critically shape these ecosystems, with indicating that excessive or uncertain regulations suppress by raising compliance costs and deterring entry; for example, firms just below regulatory thresholds exhibit 5.4% higher macro-level rates compared to those above, reflecting reduced R&D and patenting in constrained settings. While some regulations may spur "necessity-driven" innovations in low-uncertainty contexts, aggregate studies across industries like and telecom reveal net negative effects, including delayed product launches and stifled startups, underscoring the causal primacy of deregulated markets over interventionist policies in fostering sustained progress. Mainstream academic sources, often influenced by institutional preferences for regulatory expansion, may understate these trade-offs, but cross-firm data consistently affirm that lighter-touch frameworks correlate with faster technological .

Criticisms and Counter-Narratives

Skepticism from Romanticism and Marxism

Romanticism emerged in the late 18th and early 19th centuries as a cultural and intellectual reaction against the Enlightenment's emphasis on reason, science, and linear progress, viewing industrialization and urbanization as sources of alienation and spiritual decay. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in his Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality Among Men (1755), contended that human advancement through civilization deviated from a primitive state of natural equality and self-sufficiency, fostering artificial needs, property ownership, and moral corruption that enslaved individuals to societal vices rather than enhancing innate human goodness. William Blake, a key Romantic figure, lambasted the Industrial Revolution in his epic poem Jerusalem (1804–1820), coining the phrase "dark Satanic Mills" to evoke factories as infernal engines of exploitation and environmental despoliation that supplanted England's "green & pleasant land" with mechanized tyranny over workers, particularly child laborers in hazardous conditions. This skepticism privileged intuition, emotion, and harmony with nature over empirical rationalism and technological expansion, arguing that such "progress" eroded authentic human experience and creativity. Thinkers like Blake and Rousseau prioritized subjective imagination and pastoral ideals, critiquing the Enlightenment's mechanistic worldview as reductive and the Industrial Revolution's empirical gains—such as steam power innovations from James Watt's 1769 engine improvements—as masking deeper and ecological harm without verifiable net moral or existential benefits. Marxism, developed by and in the mid-19th century, offered a materialist of progress under , acknowledging its role in advancing through industrialization but portraying it as dialectically self-undermining due to inherent contradictions. In Capital (1867), Marx analyzed how capitalist accumulation drove technological innovations—like machinery displacing labor—expanding output and wealth, yet simultaneously intensified worker alienation by treating labor as a , leading to crises, falling profit rates, and class polarization rather than universal prosperity. He viewed historical progress as propelled by mode-of-production conflicts, with capitalism's empirical successes—such as Britain's 19th-century GDP growth from textile mechanization—serving as a necessary but transient stage that exacerbated exploitation, predicting its supersession by to realize fuller human potential beyond bourgeois limits. Engels echoed this in The Condition of the Working Class in (1845), documenting Manchester's industrial squalor—where factory smoke and overcrowding shortened to 17 years for laborers—as evidence that technological progress under private ownership generated immiseration, not emancipation, challenging liberal narratives of inevitable improvement. Unlike Romanticism's nostalgic individualism, Marxism's skepticism was forward-looking and structural, positing that true progress required abolishing capitalist relations to harness for collective ends, though empirical implementations in 20th-century states often deviated from these dialectical claims.

Environmental Limits and Degrowth Arguments

Arguments positing environmental limits to progress assert that Earth's finite resources and biophysical systems impose hard constraints on sustained economic expansion, potentially leading to collapse if growth continues unchecked. The 1972 report The Limits to Growth, commissioned by the Club of Rome and authored by Donella Meadows and colleagues, modeled interactions between population, industrial output, food production, and resource depletion using the World3 system dynamics model, predicting societal overshoot and decline by the mid-21st century under business-as-usual scenarios of exponential growth outpacing technological adaptation. Similarly, Paul Ehrlich's 1968 book The Population Bomb warned of imminent mass famines due to overpopulation outstripping food supplies, forecasting hundreds of millions of deaths in the 1970s and 1980s absent drastic population controls. These views draw on Malthusian principles, emphasizing carrying capacity limits where population and consumption exceed regenerative rates, rendering indefinite progress impossible without contraction. The framework, introduced by and co-authors in 2009, quantifies nine critical Earth system processes—such as , , and nitrogen/phosphorus cycles—with defined thresholds for safe human operation; a 2023 update assessed that six boundaries have been transgressed, including novel entities like plastics and biochemical flows, signaling heightened risk of abrupt systemic shifts. Proponents argue these limits necessitate prioritizing ecological stability over growth, as continued expansion exacerbates feedbacks like climate tipping points and , undermining long-term human welfare. However, such assessments often originate from academic and environmental advocacy circles, where systemic biases toward alarmism may inflate perceived immediacy, overlooking historical instances of through . Degrowth advocates extend these limits arguments into prescriptive policy, calling for deliberate reduction in production and consumption—particularly in high-income nations—to align with planetary and enhance well-being beyond GDP metrics. Key figures like Giorgos Kallis define as a "planned economic contraction" critiquing capitalism's growth imperative for perpetuating inequality, exploitation, and ecological overshoot, proposing measures such as work-time reduction, income caps, and relocalization of production to foster sufficiency over excess. The movement posits that absolute decoupling of growth from resource use is illusory, as effects and inequality-driven consumption negate efficiency gains, rendering voluntary essential for and . Empirical scrutiny reveals mixed validation of these claims. While Limits to Growth's "standard run" scenario has tracked some trends like stagnating industrial output per capita, core predictions of resource exhaustion and famine collapsed under technological advances, such as the Green Revolution's yield doublings via hybrid seeds and fertilizers, which averted Ehrlich's forecasted crises—global calorie availability per capita rose from 2,200 in 1968 to over 2,900 by 2020 despite population tripling. Resource prices have generally declined in real terms, contradicting scarcity narratives, as Julian Simon's 1980 wager with Ehrlich demonstrated: betted commodities (, tin, etc.) cheapened over a due to substitution and . Counter-evidence includes the environmental (EKC), an inverted-U pattern where pollution like emissions rises with early industrialization but falls after per-capita GDP exceeds ~$8,000 (2011 USD), driven by abatement technologies and regulation in wealthier societies—U.S. SO2 levels dropped 90% from 1970 peaks amid 250% GDP growth. Decoupling has materialized in absolute terms for some pressures: nations reduced CO2 intensity by 40% since 1990 while GDP grew 60%, via efficiency and fuel shifts, though global aggregate impacts persist due to . Forest rebounded globally to 4.1 billion hectares by 2020, surpassing 1990 levels through agricultural intensification freeing land. These patterns suggest growth enables environmental gains via and wealth effects, challenging degrowth's premise that contraction alone resolves limits; instead, causal analysis favors directed progress in dematerialization and renewables over imposed stasis, which risks impoverishing billions reliant on expansion for alleviation.

Cultural and Moral Decline Theses

The cultural and moral decline theses contend that material progress in Western societies has been accompanied by a deterioration in traditional values, social institutions, and ethical frameworks, leading to societal fragility despite economic gains. Proponents argue that the shift toward , , and has eroded communal bonds, family stability, and transcendent moral anchors, fostering and long-term civilizational vulnerability. This perspective traces roots to cyclical theories of history, where high-achieving cultures inevitably transition from vital, creative phases to sterile, mechanistic "civilizations" marked by and loss of purpose. Empirical indicators cited include plummeting rates, diminishing social trust, and stagnant , which suggest that prosperity has not translated into holistic but rather into relational and existential deficits. Oswald Spengler, in The Decline of the West (1918), framed Western civilization as entering a terminal "civilization" stage analogous to late antiquity, where urbanism, rationalism, and imperialism supplant the organic creativity of earlier cultural epochs, culminating in spiritual exhaustion and demographic stagnation. Spengler predicted this phase would manifest in megacities divorced from rural vitality, a cult of money over heroism, and the exhaustion of form-giving energies, drawing parallels to the fall of Rome. Similarly, Patrick J. Buchanan's The Death of the West (2001) attributes contemporary decline to sub-replacement fertility—Europe's total fertility rate dropping below 1.5 by the early 2000s—and mass immigration diluting cultural cohesion, arguing that secular humanism and hedonism have supplanted Christianity as the West's foundational ethos, accelerating self-extinction through voluntary demographic suicide. Buchanan substantiates this with data showing U.S. fertility falling from 3.7 births per woman in 1960 to 2.1 by 2000, correlating with rising secularism and family fragmentation. Robert D. Putnam's Bowling Alone (2000) provides quantitative evidence of eroding social capital, documenting a 58% decline in U.S. club membership from 1920 to 1990s levels, alongside falling voter turnout (from 63% in 1960 to 49% in 1996) and reduced interpersonal trust (from 58% affirming "most people are trustworthy" in 1960 to 40% by 1993). Putnam links this retreat from civic life to factors like television's rise, suburban sprawl, and the 1960s cultural shift toward expressive individualism, which weakened reciprocal community ties essential for moral enforcement and mutual aid. These trends persist: Western fertility rates averaged 1.5 in 2023, well below the 2.1 replacement level, exacerbating aging populations and straining welfare systems. Critics, often from progressive academic circles, dismiss these theses as illusory nostalgia, citing surveys where perceptions of moral decline span generations without objective worsening in behaviors like crime or honesty. However, such counterarguments overlook causal links between institutional decay and measurable harms: U.S. divorce rates tripled post-1960s no-fault laws, correlating with doubled child poverty in single-parent homes; youth suicide rates rose 60% from 2007 to 2021 amid social media's atomization; and the Easterlin paradox reveals U.S. life satisfaction flatlining since 1970 despite GDP per capita tripling, indicating hedonic adaptation and relative deprivation amid inequality. While mainstream narratives in media and academia—prone to optimism bias—downplay these as reversible, the theses emphasize that unchecked material focus risks irreversible civilizational entropy, as evidenced by Europe's projected population halving by 2100 under current fertility trajectories.

Modern and Future Orientations

The Progress Studies Movement

The Progress Studies movement is an interdisciplinary intellectual effort dedicated to empirically analyzing the historical drivers of technological, scientific, and economic advancement, with the explicit objective of identifying mechanisms to increase their rates in contemporary societies. Proponents argue that innovation and growth, which propelled dramatic improvements in living standards from the through the mid-20th century, have stagnated since the 1970s, as evidenced by metrics such as declining growth in advanced economies—from an average annual rate of 1.7% in the U.S. from 1947 to 1973, dropping to 0.6% from 2007 to 2019—and slowing breakthroughs in fields like and . The movement draws on , institutional analysis, and policy experimentation to propose interventions, such as reforming regulatory bottlenecks in projects or reallocating R&D funding toward high-risk, high-reward , rather than accepting slowdowns as inevitable. The term "Progress Studies" was coined by economist and entrepreneur in their July 30, 2019, essay in The Atlantic, where they called for establishing it as a formal modeled on fields like or , complete with dedicated journals, conferences, and university programs to rigorously test hypotheses about progress-enabling factors like market incentives, scientific norms, and geopolitical stability. Influential early contributors include Jason Crawford, whose Roots of Progress blog examines case studies of historical innovations such as the development of artificial lighting, attributing accelerated progress to deliberate institutional choices like patent systems and private investment rather than alone. Other figures, such as economist and historian Anton Howes, have contributed analyses linking progress to cultural attitudes favoring and competition, while cautioning against over-reliance on government-directed efforts that historically underperformed private-sector dynamism. Activities within the movement include the publication of Works in Progress, a quarterly founded by Collison in 2020 that features data-driven essays on bottlenecks, such as the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's approval delays averaging 5–10 years for new reactor designs despite safety records superior to fossil fuels. Online forums like the Progress Studies community on platforms such as and independent sites host discussions and reading lists synthesizing works from economic historians like , who in A Culture of Growth (2016) attributes sustained Enlightenment-era progress to evolving social norms rewarding knowledge production over zero-sum status games. Funding initiatives, including grants from the Emergent Ventures program backed by Collison, have supported projects like empirical audits of regulatory impacts on construction timelines, revealing that U.S. permitting processes for energy infrastructure now take 4–5 times longer than in the , adjusted for project scale. While the movement has gained traction among technologists, economists, and policymakers—evidenced by its integration into networks and citations in congressional testimonies on innovation policy—critics from adjacent fields contend it risks overemphasizing quantitative growth metrics at the expense of qualitative risks, such as from rapid technological deployment, though proponents counter that historical data shows progress's net benefits far exceed localized harms when institutions adapt effectively. Its influence remains nascent, with no dedicated university departments as of 2024, but ongoing outputs suggest potential for shaping debates on reversing trends amid global competition in areas like AI and .

Recent Trends (Post-1970s Slowdown and 2020s Data)

Following the post-World War II era of rapid economic expansion, (TFP) growth in the United States decelerated markedly after the early . From 1947 to 1973, nonfarm TFP grew at an average annual rate of approximately 1.9 percent, but this fell to about 0.7 percent from 1973 to 1995, reflecting diminished efficiency in converting inputs like labor and capital into output. Labor productivity growth similarly slowed by roughly 1 in aggregate measures when comparing pre-1973 to post-1973 periods, influenced by factors including oil price shocks, regulatory expansions, and shifts in workforce demographics such as the entry of the generation into management roles. This contributed to broader perceptions of a "great stagnation," where yielded fewer transformative gains in living standards compared to prior decades, as evidenced by stagnant median and slower improvements in non-digital sectors like and . Sectoral data underscores the uneven nature of this slowdown. In , TFP growth declined across many industries post-1970s, with no corresponding drop in to explain it, pointing instead to inefficiencies in or . Public R&D funding as a share of GDP fell from higher levels in the 1960s (peaking amid investments) to around 0.63 percent by 2022, comprising just 18 percent of total domestic R&D, while business R&D rose but focused more on incremental rather than breakthrough innovations. gains also moderated; U.S. life expectancy at birth rose from 70.8 years in 1970 to 78.9 years by 2019 but stagnated or reversed in subsequent years due to opioids and other factors, lagging behind global trends where averages climbed from 64.6 years in 1990 to 73.4 years by 2021. Into the 2020s, indicators suggest persistence or mild exacerbation of stagnation amid the disruptions. Global GDP contracted 3.0 percent in 2020—the sharpest downturn since the —followed by uneven recovery, with U.S. real GDP growth averaging 2.5 percent annually from 2021 to 2023 but facing headwinds from and supply constraints. The Board's Leading Economic Index declined for 17 consecutive months through mid-2024, signaling potential deceleration in activity, while U.S. labor in the nonfarm business sector grew at just 1.3 percent year-over-year in Q2 2024, below historical norms. U.S. dipped to 76.1 years in 2021 before partial rebound to 78.4 years in 2023, still trailing comparable high-income nations by about 4 years, with forecasts projecting only modest gains to 80.4 years by 2050 absent major health breakthroughs. Private-sector R&D intensity offered a counterpoint, reaching 3.43 percent of U.S. GDP in 2022—up from 2.8 percent in 2016—driven largely by business investments in and , though federal contributions remained subdued at under 0.7 percent of GDP. Despite optimism around for productivity boosts, empirical impacts through 2024 remained limited, with TFP growth in the business sector averaging under 1 percent annually post-2019, and no widespread acceleration in physical infrastructure or energy metrics. Overall scientific progress is uneven, not stagnating but accelerating in high-impact areas like AI, medicine, and computing, while slower in legacy physical fields compared to the mid-20th century; the focus has shifted, with digital and biological innovations outpacing physical ones and driving real-world improvements. This aligns with ongoing critiques that digital advances have concentrated benefits in information sectors while broader material progress—such as housing affordability or transportation speeds—has plateaued since the 1970s.

Prospects for Acceleration

Recent advancements in (AI) have demonstrated potential to reverse historical slowdowns in technological progress, with global AI investments reaching $200 billion in 2024 and organizational adoption rising to 78% from 55% the prior year. Scaling laws in compute, algorithms, and data have enabled rapid capability gains, such as in large language models, projecting continued exponential improvements through 2030 if hardware constraints are addressed. Proponents argue that AI's integration into research workflows could automate scientific discovery, accelerating fields like and by factors of 10-100x in targeted applications. Nuclear fusion development has gained momentum, with the U.S. Department of Energy releasing a 2025 roadmap targeting commercial prototypes by the early 2030s through public-private partnerships. China's EAST achieved sustained plasma at over 1,000 seconds in early 2025, while private firms like and Proxima Fusion secured hundreds of millions in funding for magnet-free and high-field approaches. These milestones, coupled with ITER's magnet assembly completion in May 2025, indicate a shift from theoretical barriers to , potentially yielding unlimited clean energy and reducing reliance on intermittent renewables. In , CRISPR-based therapies have advanced to multiple Phase 3 trials by mid-2025, with approvals like CASGEVY for validating editing efficacy. mRNA platforms, proven in vaccines, are expanding to cancer vaccines and personalized medicines, while AI integrations like CRISPR-GPT enhance design precision by up to 40%. The gene editing market is forecasted to exceed $13 billion by year-end, driven by reduced development timelines from 10-15 years to under 5 in optimized pipelines. The Progress Studies movement advocates institutional reforms to sustain acceleration, including funding like the Roots of Progress Fellowship for training innovators and policy pushes for in high-risk R&D. Empirical analyses suggest that reallocating 1% of GDP to directed technological missions could double growth rates, as modeled in historical cases like the . However, realization depends on mitigating regulatory hurdles and talent shortages, with optimistic scenarios projecting 2-3% annual productivity gains if AI-fusion synergies materialize by 2040.

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