Big government: refers to a political system in which the state plays an extensive role in managing the economy, regulating society, and intervening in citizens' daily lives, often characterized by high public spending and large bureaucracies.

Big Tech: in a societal contextrefers to dominant technology firms that wield substantial influence over digital infrastructure, information flow, and public behavior. The term often signals concerns about data privacy, market power, ethical practices, and their impact on society and governance.

Cycles: in history are patterns of rise, dominance, decline, and renewal seen in societies, empires, and ideologies. They suggest that historical events often follow repetitive trajectories rather than progressing in a straight line.

Extractive power: refers to the ability of states, institutions, or elites to concentrate wealth and control by systematically removing resources - whether economic, human, or natural- - from one group or region for the benefit of another. It often involves coercion, inequality, and long-term suppression of development in the exploited populations.

Social control: examines how institutions, governments, and cultural forces influence behavior, limit dissent, and maintain order. It encompasses tools such as surveillance, censorship, propaganda, legal systems, and social norms to shape public conduct and preserve authority. Wars may be waged between states, within nations, or across digital and economic realms.

Systemic failures: in the context of cycles in world order, refer to the breakdown of key institutions, norms, or structures that sustain global stability. These failures often occur during transitional phases of hegemonic decline or geopolitical realignment, exposing vulnerabilities in financial systems, governance frameworks, or international cooperation.

War: organized conflict shapes societies, shifts power, and reflects deeper struggles over ideology, resources, or control. Wars may be waged between states, within nations, or across digital and economic realms.Wars can be categorized into various types, including conventional, civil, guerrilla, proxy, total, cold, nuclear, asymmetric, trade, currency, cyber, information, culture, religious, revolutionary, colonial, resource, economic, ideological, psychological, and hybrid wars.