Generations

As many of us have realised over the years, and is also backed up by scientific studies, people with conservative oriented personalities prefer the status-quo whereas people with a more liberal disposition tend to embrace the new a little more readily. Studies have shown that liberals tend to make better entrepreneurs but aren't so good at running a steady-state business, for conservative types it tends to be the other way around, conservatives are generally better at being managers. The bottom line though is that to have a successful society you need both personality traits, you need people that defend the status-quo and who manage things in an orderly fashion, however, you also need people who are outward looking, seeking new ideas and trying new things, without this, a culture eventually withers and dies. Unfortunately the more mature we get as individuals and the more mature our culture becomes the conservative traits seem to dominate, it's particularly visible in the UK and the USA at the moment, we seem to be much more inward looking than ever before in my life-time. I do wonder if this has something to do with people living longer or if it's just one of those natural cycles that invisibly doom all empires, political systems, cultures and religions eventually to the scrap heap. Anyway regardless of the psychology, it's a worrying trend for us liberals, lets hope the next generation are able to address the imbalance somehow.