Between 1918 and 1922, Oswald Spengler published the two volumes of his The Decline of the West. The title gnawed at the minds of the intelligentsia and sent them searching for evidence of the imminent failure of the Euro-­American ascendancy. Now, more than ever, it seems pertinent. 

China and India are on the rise and providing support for Putin’s dismal Russia. South American, Asian and African countries are aligning themselves with these giants. To the anti-autocratic West, this may seem like madness, but, having observed the 2008 financial crash, the bloody mess of Middle Eastern wars, European squabbling and the grim fiasco of US politics, non-Westerners can fairly conclude that Western decline is a done deal. What, then, must we do? Jordan Peterson has been wrestling with God and he seems to have come up with an answer. We need a story, a true story, about ourselves. We need to return to the biblical roots of our Judaeo-Christian culture.

Peterson, a Canadian psychologist, is an astonishing figure. His first book, Maps of Meaning (1999), was about how different peoples discovered purpose in life. But he really took the gloves off in 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos (2018) and Beyond Order: 12 More Rules for Life (2021).