The article presents a structural rethinking of P. Turchin’s theory of passionarity, operating not only with ruling elites, but also with counter-elites, which have all the attributes of elitists, except for access to power. To deepen the understanding of the process of political instability, we propose a graphical scheme of the political cycle, revealing the logic of interaction between elites, counter-elites and masses. This scheme forms the core of the new theory of passionarity and demonstrates the action of the systemic driver of political conflicts. It is complemented by structural balances that take into account the factors concerning cyclical dynamics of political instability: family pattern, migration of counter-elites, and the resonance effect (coercion effect + contagion effect). In the development of the ideas of the theory of elites, a simple macroeconomic model linking the political struggle between elites and economic growth is considered; the research shows that exceeding a certain critical size of counter-elites leads to a slowdown in economic growth and the probability of a production recession. We have revealed the contribution of the new concept of elites to the theories of chaos, passionarity and erosion of institutions; we present the mechanism of complementarity of the theory of inclusive institutions and the theory of counter-elites. The paper presents the typology of sources of power and ruling classes (plutocracy, theocracy, militocracy, and bureaucracy); we make the comparison of these forms of government on the development of statehood. The article considers important additions to the theory of elites. In particular, we formulate the property of political ambivalence of plutocracy, when this form of government is effective in countries that are geopolitical hegemon or in the mode of economic expansion, and extremely ineffective in other cases; we reveal the connection between plutocracy and the phenomenon of supranational elites. The theory of elites and counter-elites is projected onto the entire geopolitical system of the world
Keywords
passionarity theory, P. Turchin, ruling elites, counter-elites, political instability, plutocracy