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How Civilizations Lose Their Spark—and How We Might Keep Ours

Golden ages teach us a lot about what makes civilizations rise and fall.

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8-29-25-V3-B (1) | Illustration: Eddie Marshall | Pytyczech | Dreamstime.com | Midjourney
(Illustration: Eddie Marshall | Pytyczech | Dreamstime.com | Midjourney)

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Johan Norberg is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and author of Peak Human: What We Can Learn from the Rise and Fall of Golden Ages, The Capitalist Manifesto: Why the Global Free Market Will Save the World, and Open: The Story of Human Progress.