Does History Repeat Itself?

Not exactly.

First of all, let's get the fine print out of the way; every moment in time itself is unique and forever lost. You never obtain the exact same conditions (unless you happen to own a rather expensive real life Sim game). So technically history cannot literally repeat itself, unless you're a fervent believe in radical physics theories.

And now to the actual discussion. Does history in fact repeat itself? There are common themes throughout the history of human civilisations. Let's take the example of religion. All cultures, from the huts of the Mongolian steppes to the rainforests of Central America have a religion of sorts; Animism, Shamanism, Christianity, Islam and so on. The absence of a so-called 'Atheist civilisation' may be a simple coincidence. It could be a by-product of human curiosity; What is the warm life-giving Sun? Why does the Sun set and so on... It has to be a superior being (which is probably why religions from Germanic paganism to Roman mythology feature it so prominently). But I'll leave you to ponder on that.

But I digress with all this philosophy. Time for actual history. You'd be forgiven if you looked at certain events in the past and thought "huh, this is familiar? Didn't this happen before?", especially as the current media scramble over the Iran deal in the US Congress. Advocating for the invasion of a country which is allegedly constructing a nuclear stockpile without sufficient evidence (and whose aftermath would trigger a power vacuum that would cause the region to spiral into a chaotic darkness of perpetuity) sounds incredibly familiar, you may be thinking. 

History has a habit of striking similarities. Invasions of Russia in the winter (or ever) have never succeeded (see Napoleon's invasion in 1812 and Hitler's invasion in 1941)  unless you discount the Mongols who wisely invaded from the other side. The same could be said to Afghanistan, earning the title of Graveyard of Empires due to the exceptional difficulty of pacifying the region throughout history (Alexander the Great, the Mughal Khans, the British, the Soviets and currently, the American coalition).

A nation under financial turmoil breeds the rise of radical xenophobic nationalists of the far right; the rise of Hitler & the Nazi Party in a 1930s depression-hit Germany is the most noted of examples. Not too long ago in 2012 did the Greek far right party Golden Dawn win 21 seats (its first ever representation in Greek parliament). The good news is that in subsequent elections, that figure is now down to 17 and with even more elections around the corner, we can be hopeful that number slides down.

Allow me to bring the 5th century Byzantine historian Zosimus into the framework. Zosimus highlighted that great empires fell due to internal conflicts and disunity. Citing the fallen empires of the Greeks and Alexander's Macedon, he brought attention to the need for an external enemy. The rapid growth of the Roman Republic in 53 years, he credited, was due to the devastating Punic Wars fought against Rome's bitter rival, Carthage. Roman themes were embraced and thus championed in the the face of Carthaginian foes. The defeat of Carthage (and the Gauls) set the scene for internal quarrels and civil war, culminating in the replacement of Roman aristocracy with monarchy, which eventually decayed into tyranny.

The eventual fall of all empires was a notion brought up earlier by Dionysius of Halicarnassus who had anticipated Rome's eventual collapse after the defeat of her rivals  (Assyria, Macedonia, Persia). The iconic Italian historian Machiavelli commented on the recurrent themes between "order" and "disorder" within contemporary Italian states between 1434-1494:

..when states have arrived at their greatest perfection, they soon begin to decline. In the same manner, having been reduced by disorder and sunk to their utmost state of depression, unable to descend lower, they, of necessity, reascend, and thus from good they gradually decline to evil and from evil mount up to good.

Machiavelli accounts for this oscillation by arguing that virtù (valor and political effectiveness) produces peace, peace brings idleness (ozio), idleness disorder, and disorder rovina (ruin). In turn, from rovina springs order, from order virtù, and from this, glory and good fortune.

This post can go on forever. To paraphrase Mark Twain; history does not repeat itself. Not exactly, anyways. But it does rhyme. I'll conclude by sharing one of my favourite cartoons on the topic. Let me know what you think in the comment section below!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year !

Can you believe it ? We've managed to come through 2011 and now we're just less than a week away from 2012. All I can say is : What a year !

It has been incredible. Both on a personal note and on an overall note. We'd be stupid to say that 2011 was a just a normal year.

Nope. It was special. What year would you ever see loads of revolutions, earthquakes, the Royal Wedding ?

Cairo was rocked. Christchurch was crushed, Japan was faced with earthquakes and a tsunami, a fairytale-like Royal Wedding in Westminister, a Bin Laden-live tweeted-assassination, a new Sudan was born (and now Algeria is the largest country in Africa!), a divided Libya was reunited, the world has officially reached 7 billion and counting, and to top it off, the Iraq war is over.

This was the year of Steve Jobs' passing, of Qadaffi's death, of Bin Laden's end, of Socrates' departure and of many others as well.
We may feel like some deserve it and others do not. But ultimately, death can just come at you in a blink of an eye.

What is remarkable is that 2011 was actually documented from space! Have a look at these wonderful shots 

Now, if you thought 2011 was exciting, something tells me 2012 will be even more eventful (especially with the History-Channel-sponsored 2012 Doomsday thing).

While I'm on the topic (well, I sorta derailed it), I'd like to wish my Christian readers (or to anyone celebrating), a happy Christmas (over here, Christmas is locally known as "Epic Movies Day"!) .

And I'd also like to congratulate you, reader. You have survived and lived through what was possibly the most influential, jaw-dropping, headache causing year! You have lived through history at first hand and all these will be in history books.

One thing is for sure. We have lived in interesting times, indeed.

From myself and the people of Bahrain.

Survey Result: Was 2011 a Good Year?

Over the past 5 days, I have been organizing a survey out of 60 random people, asking them whether or not 2011 was a good year, overall.

The results are in...





53% of all people said that they thought 2011 was a good year. 47% voted that 2011 was a bad year ( I have received a few "2011 WAS THE WORST YEAR OF MY LIFE" comments so take that into account).

I'd put the error margin at around +/- 1, according to my calculator but I'd say the results are fairly accurate.

So chances are, around half of all people you meet will tell you 2011 was a bad year while the other half say the opposite.

What about you ? What do you think ? Was 2011 a good year?

Corruption, Election, Changes - Scandal Hits FIFA

Corruption Scandal: Eyebrows over alleged buying of the WC

Lets admit it, the past week has been a turbulent one. We have seen Bin Hammam, the Qatari President of the AFC (Asian Football Confederation) and also FIFA-Presidential hopeful , drop out of the race amidst a corruption scandal surrounding his (ironic) anti-corruption campaign.

During this time, several allegations and revelations had emerged (particularly, it had started to kick in, last month). A UK parliamentary inquiry into why England failed to secure the 2018 finals is told by member of parliament Damian Collins that there was evidence from the Sunday Times newspaper that Issa Hayatou of Cameroon and Jacques Anouma of the Ivory Coast were paid by Qatar. An ethics investigation was then opened into confederation presidents Mohamed Bin Hammam  and Jack Warner of CONCACAF concerning a meeting of the Caribbean Football Union.

Hmm.. I wonder who I should vote for..(from Daily Mail)

Prior to the committee hearing, Bin Hammam shocked the Football world by announcing his withdrawal from the race. In his latest fightback , Jack Warner had claimed that , in an email, Qatar's Bin Hammam had bought the 2022 World Cup, accusations which the FIFA general secretary denied.

In the run-up to the vote, the FA and SFA of Britain had called upon FIFA to postpone the election, citing that FIFA's reputation was tarnished and in rocky waters. Both Associations also abstained from the voting. Also worth noting during this time, several sponsors of FIFA, including Coca Cola , Adidas, Emirates and Visa, "expressed" their concern over FIFA's situation.

Blatter; successfully reelected.

To say that Blatter had a little scuffle with the Media at the FIFA summit is an understatement. He had a tantrum! His speech included a lash-out at reporters over their manners! (Sounds like a movie but bear with me).

However, during his speech , he also announced new reforms for FIFA including a new revamp of the voting system for future World Cups. Indeed, the 24-man executive committee would be stripped of their voting powers and "power would be given to all its 203 members".

In the end, Blatter was re-elected.

But now, with the FA's efforts to postpone the election at vain, they look to be on their own. At odds with FIFA and in a state of self-imposed isolation with their fellow members.

Perhaps, better articles would describe it, the Economist published an article (appropriately) titled " The British and Corruption: England ponders its isolation in the football world".

Update: Sepp Blatter himself had said that he would not "seek any revenge against the FA" who had earlier wanted to oust him (via calling on him to quit/resign/postpone the election).
He said:

There's no bad feeling with the associations that didn't vote for me. I'm the president of all the associations and will work with all of them - and with 186 votes I'm proud. Don't worry about the English.

The number one national association in Fifa - the FA founded the game in 1863 - have the right to be called the FA, Football Association. They should be an example, so that was a surprise.

I had heard about it, and Uefa made a special meeting trying to convince them. I thought this problem would be solved so was surprised when they tried to change the agenda of the Congress and not make elections.