The Spell Is Breaking: Why Today Feels Like 1974

What Ezra Klein, Ray Dalio, and Nature All Say About the Moment We’re In

I’m finishing the book Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson, and one passage on page 206 stopped me cold:

“The spell of political order began to break.”

That phrase echoed in my head. Because I believe it’s happening again—right now. The authors are referring to the post-depression 1930’s and the Vietnam era 1970’s.

I’ve lived long enough to sense when something fundamental is shifting. I’ve also read enough to know this moment isn’t new. As Klein and Thompson write, this has happened before. In the 1930s, political consensus collapsed during the Great Depression. In the 1970s, stagflation, the Vietnam War, and cultural upheaval tore apart the New Deal coalition. And now—in 2025—we’re here again.

The names and circumstances are different, but the rhythm is familiar.

Parallels Across Time

In Abundance, the authors describe the unraveling of political consensus in the 1970s:

Stagflation challenged the postwar economic model
Vietnam exposed contradictions in U.S. foreign policy and leadership
Protest movements surged
A “change in values” took hold

That phrase—a change in values—caught my attention. Because I don’t think we’re experiencing a change in values today. I think we’re watching our values be exposed and tested. They’re being dragged into daylight—some reinforced, others revealed as hollow.

Today, we hear echoes of the 1970s and even the 1930s:

Economic instability and inflation
Foreign conflict and military entanglement—now in Ukraine, Gaza/Isreal, bombs over Iran
Protest and unrest across college campuses and in our streets
Deep institutional mistrust and a fractured media landscape

I’m not pointing fingers or assigning blame. I’m saying: we’ve been here before.

Ray Dalio and the Decline Before Renewal

I see this moment through another lens as well—Ray Dalio’s “Big Cycle” from The Changing World Order. He describes a pattern that repeats throughout history:

Rise → Peak → Decline → Disorder → New Order

I believe we’re in the decline/disorder phase, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Decline doesn’t mean destruction—it means transition.
I’ve always believed that nature has a way of purging and refreshing. Forests burn so they can grow again. Ecosystems collapse when they’re out of balance—but they don’t disappear. They adapt. They renew.

The Fire Season of Politics

Right now, our political system is under stress—chaotic, bitter, often petty. And while I disagree with much of how the current administration is handling its business (and I’m not even sure what its business is), I believe change was inevitable. Something had to give.

Would a Kamala Harris administration have triggered the same pressure-release? We will never know. But I’m not convinced gentle leadership would have created the necessary conflict to accelerate the structural shift we’re now experiencing.

To me, this doesn’t feel like the end of something. It feels like a clearing.

The Most Striking Line

Another sentence from Abundance lit up in my mind:

“Nurturing the dignity and genius of the individual in the face of regimes that seemed to squelch both became the reigning ethos.”

That line was meant to describe the cultural turn in the 1970s. But it feels just as relevant today. Because that’s what people are asking for again:

Dignity in housing
Opportunity in education
Representation in politics
Autonomy in work and identity

Are our current systems “regimes that squelch both”? For many people—especially the marginalized—the answer is yes. And just like in the past, we’re starting to push back.

Why I’m Hopeful

Here’s what gives me hope:
History shows that after the breakdown, a new consensus forms. Not immediately. Not without struggle. But eventually.

We are in the midst of a great unfreezing. The old spell—the illusion of consensus, of order, of control—is breaking. And that’s a good thing. Spells are for sleepwalkers. Maybe this breakdown is what finally wakes us up.

Let me leave you with this thought (inspired by a passages on pages 205-207 of Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson)

“The spell of political order is breaking. But spells only matter when we’re asleep. This moment—messy, uncertain, disorienting—might just be the wake-up we needed.”