The disintegration of a Civilization is usually a well documented process, and involves the bulk of historical writing so far. Toynbee has the theory that the active part of a civilization's life is quite short, generally, and the rest is not silence but trying to to remember what has happened, and trying to get the process running well again.
In this volume we define the problem of disintegration, and then pass to the nature of such disintegration, and finally come to the process of disintegration. Civilizations and their external proletariats, those who wish they were part of the Civilization are reviewed. the real guts is the description of the relationship between the Dominant Minority of a civilization and its internal proletariat, where the real grinding and damage is done. The circumstances of the arrival of the schism in the soul of the civilization is brought to the fore, and we review the gradual barbarization of the dominant minority. ( )