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Humanity is undergoing a second Axial Age. The first, as described by Karl Jaspers, brought transcendence into the vision and self-understanding of humans and the world. The rise of secularism and "Death of God" is dissolving and fragmenting that transcendence -- a vital subsystem of the civilization system. Economy, knowledge and government comprise three additional subsystems and have coalesced to form the modern sovereign state, diminishing the traditional place of religion, art and philosophy in civilizations. An example of a state lacking common institutions of transcendence was the Mongol empire. Ruling Russia for a quarter millennium, its state form was a template for the Bolshevik regime. The relative success of the Communist state became a template for the Chinese Communists. While the U.S. was excluded from eastern Eurasian politics until the late nineteenth century, secularization and the growth of three material subsystems are signs of movement towards a dominant state system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Civilization is one of several stages of human evolution and forms a system of interaction. Its past dominance is now challenged by growth of three subsystems -- state, economy, and science/technology. These three subsystems have matured through application of rational knowledge. The vertically integrated state now dominates society and demarcated territory. The horizontally integrated global economy and global science/technology society have become worldwide in scope. State domination is reinforced by autonomous global science and international capital. The remaining subsystem of Moral Knowledge occupies present non-material civilization and is characterized by organic knowledge and embracing the unprovable, which includes religion, art, morality, literature, and philosophy. Reflecting this bifurcation, two global political persuasions are emerging -- Statism includes communists, socialists, and progressives; Civism (Civilizationists) embraces non-material humanism and regards the three rational autonomous systems as helpful tools but not ends in themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]