The Case Against ‘Polycrisis’

Samanth Subramanian contests the utility of the term “polycrisis” and the novelty of the present situation it is used to capture. Where Adam Tooze argues that the present situation is unique for its lack of single causes and single fixes, Subramanian proposes that many historical episodes featured this condition, including the financial crises of the 1970s and 1980s, World War I, the Great Famine in India, the Thirty Years War, and the Native American genocide. And where Tooze emphasizes our inability to understand the state of the world, Subramanian argues that “we’ve never had more clarity about humanity’s threats and how to respond to them.”