This pretty much puts a finish to an eight-month project. Publius, thanks, and thanks to all the Book Club members for their support. ;-)
Thanks, you guys! This has been a work of love! :)
Immediately after society collapses, there will be anarchy. Food and water are emergent needs. The delivery of fresh water and the disposition of waste water are the two things that make civilization possible. Civilization evolved around sources of potable water. Whoever controls the water controls the world. The ancients knew this. They used animal carcasses to poison the wells of conquered villages. Likewise, dumping large amounts of human waste into the water will kill those who drink it. London and Chicago are two large cities that experienced cholera epidemics due to dumping sewage into drinking water.
It is not modern medicine that eliminated this scourge. Modern sanitation did it. We take this for granted. The infrastructure of clean water is a given in this country. Most of us never give it a second thought. Cities will die if they can’t get rid of human waste and provide water to drink. The cities also can't support agriculture until the tar and concrete are removed to expose dirt. They'd be empty. This leaves several opportunities for human survival that can be based upon three known social models. After water, people need food, shelter, clothing, and tools.
Farmers would be the self sufficient. They are the most keenly aware of the need for water, and most attuned to natural processes. They have food and they know how to make more of it. They have the ability to make clothing out of animal skins. They may have the ability to make cloth. They have animal fat that can be used for soap and light. The downside of their lifestyle is that it is time consuming. They have the least available time to pursue outside interests, like reintroducing technology, even though they would profit the most. Farmers would divide into two types. Those who work cooperatively would be agrarian villages. Authoritarian models would be feudal manors.
Peaceful nomads would be people who know enough to support themselves without infrastructure. They would be small groups, probably families, similar to traders in early 1800s America. They could trade their skills and materials they found or made for things they needed. Specialized knowledge and skill in some areas would be valuable. Famer Joe might know how to fix a roof, but if he has a surplus and you can do a better job, he’ll trade with you to do the work. They could spend free time mastering the things they read in books. This would take time. It’s one thing to read about firing clay in a kiln, another thing to actually do it. Farmer Joe is also not stupid. He knows that if you figure out how to smelt iron, he can keep his tools in good order. He might agree to sponsor your work if he thinks he can gain from it. Hunter gatherers would be a subgroup of peaceful nomads. They would avoid other people, perhaps out of fear, perhaps to forget what they had lost.
Warrior nomads would be the last group. These people take what they need by force. They would eventually be destroyed, but it would take time. Many of the nomads would be city dwellers who survived the food riots. They would be tough and willing to use force. The farmers and nomads they encountered would also know the use of force. We saw the farmers riot in Wisconsin when the harvest wasn’t transported. Given the presence of potential attackers, farmers with surplus land would find it in their best interests to offer some land and food to other people in exchange for farm labor and self defense. Those with the most surplus, and the best managers, would expand. Welcome to feudal America. We’ve been there. We called them indentured servants and slaves.
So, the most populous group in post AS America would be . . .
(drum roll)
People who are still pissed off at John Galt for what happened.
Add to this some of Galt’s more noteworthy companions in Galt’s Gulch. These are: Ragnar Danneskjold, a pirate. Hank Rearden was an honest man, but the whole book shows the media turning him into the most reviled industrialist in the world. Francisco D’Anconia is the worthless playboy who “stole” the wealth of the San Sebastian Mines, then destroyed everything of value in D’Anconia Copper before the People’s State of Argentina could seize it. We never learned the fate of James Taggart, Mr. Thompson, Floyd Ferris, Bertram Scudder, Lillian Rearden, and numerous other people who have ample reasons to hate the strikers.
If I was John Galt, the first thing I would do is hunt these people down and kill them. If not, the chance that they would find some group of followers to manipulate and ultimately exact revenge is a certainty. I would do this while there was still anarchy. This would make it easier for me to avoid persons who would be angry with me, and make it easy to find them by pretending to be some poor slob who wants to get revenge for what happened. But it would have to be done. Millions of people would die. Tens of thousands of people would face life after their families were killed and everything they had was destroyed. Even a weenie like Philip Rearden could find success in advocating the death of his brother, and what else does Philip know but destruction? This has to be done.
Next they would have to wait until society was stable enough for them to deal with it. They could not wait until monarchy took over, for they are a small group and they would be unable to fight against a large number of feudal or monarchical bands. First, anarchy would result in wars for food and water. Then, a barter economy establishes itself among the survivors as they reorganize and trade skills to fill needs. The key indicator of a society that will listen to reason and deal is exactly what Rand portrayed as the most important element of civilization: money. Some of the oldest writings that we can interpret are 6,000 year old Sumerian tablets with cuneiform accounting information marked on them. These were used in grain repositories, which were essentially banks. Money does not have to be gold or currency. It is a medium of exchange that allows people to place a value on an intangible, like work or knowledge, and negotiate that value. This is the point of Francisco’s money speech.
So when some system of money appears, it means that society has a surplus and people understand the need of a medium for trade That’s when they can go back. They’ll have to wait until the anger subsides, and they will have to offer things that will convince the others to deal with them. They’re certainly capable of it. They have electrical power. They have copper and iron. They have men who can mine, refine, and smelt metals. They have engineers. They have manufacturers of heavy equipment. They have Galt’s motor.
They can’t manufacture fuel injectors. They can’t make turbines, or even radial tires. So they build what works while they develop the factories and methods to restore the modern world. The obvious need is power. They have the generator and they have the people they need to produce the things that run on electric power. They can make the wire, light bulbs, refrigerators, pumps, stoves, and water purifiers to run on the power. They also understand the wealth of human knowledge, and they would be sure to bring much of it along for future use. Pumps and purifiers would solve peoples’ water problems. Preservation of food, and safe sources of light and heat are obvious advantages.
John Galt observed that, “They’ll lose their airplanes first, then their automobiles, then their trucks, then their horse carts.” They wouldn’t lose their horse carts. They would have to figure out how to build them. Local transportation would return to horse. The obvious advantage is that the drive train reproduces itself. There would be trade among groups of people, and nomads. Horse people would be of particular value. Wheelwrights and carpenters would also be able to work trades and produce excess income for themselves. Eventually, the trade would return to a monetary system. The strikers would have to have observers to look for signs of this.
At some point during the transition, the strikers would need to offer rifles to the masses. You can’t force production from people who can shoot you. Cheap, easily produced rifles like the AK-47 ensure that Lord So and So eschews absolute power. This would give the strikers a way to return to the world. They’re the ones who make the rifles. When society has money, the strikers have had time to establish small factories (they haven’t got a lot of people to employ in the factories) and they could trade power for money. They’ll have to hire people from the outside world, and they’ll have to get resources from there. Whatever they get for the rifles can be returned as money for work and material.
It would take a long time, but it would happen. My bet would be fifteen years.