> am I just becoming more aware of how the world has always been
Bit of both really. I'm a decade older and therefore able to remember both the sense of imminent doom that hung over the Cold War - the risk that the two world powers might just obliterate each other with an hour's notice and billions dead - and also the "end of history" period in the 90s. The optimism after the Soviet Union collapsed ...
... and then the gradual back-filling of everywhere east of the Iron Curtain with capitalist corrupt states. 9/11 happened, and the world went mad with vengeance in ways that it hasn't really recovered from.
Even in the past decade we've gone from "social media and the internet enables revolutions and democracy" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_revolution_of_2011 , almost exactly a decade ago), to "you get a revolution whether you want it or not, and revolutionaries are often terrifyingly illiberal".
The big one is of course China, which has seen a complete transformation in material conditions without transitioning to even the slightest bit of liberal democracy.
Bit of both really. I'm a decade older and therefore able to remember both the sense of imminent doom that hung over the Cold War - the risk that the two world powers might just obliterate each other with an hour's notice and billions dead - and also the "end of history" period in the 90s. The optimism after the Soviet Union collapsed ...
... and then the gradual back-filling of everywhere east of the Iron Curtain with capitalist corrupt states. 9/11 happened, and the world went mad with vengeance in ways that it hasn't really recovered from.
Even in the past decade we've gone from "social media and the internet enables revolutions and democracy" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_revolution_of_2011 , almost exactly a decade ago), to "you get a revolution whether you want it or not, and revolutionaries are often terrifyingly illiberal".
The big one is of course China, which has seen a complete transformation in material conditions without transitioning to even the slightest bit of liberal democracy.