Annual reading · dated permalink
State of the Cycles 2026
In 2026, 3 of the 10 constructions read at peak, and 8 of 10 sit above their midline.
For each of the ten constructions — a theory's stated period, pinned to one documented reference peak — this page records where the curve sits in 2026 and the next turning points it implies. Every number is computed from the same cosine the chart draws; the phase labels bucket those numbers using stated editorial cutoffs (within ±3% of a period counts as peaking or troughing, within ±1.5% of a zero crossing as crossing).
What this does not meanThis is not a forecast, and the headline count is not evidence that history is cyclical. Each “next peak” is what a fixed sinusoid implies, written down so it can be checked when the year arrives. The theories are contested in different ways, and most of them peak near the present for reasons that say more about theorists than about history — anchors chosen by writers living now cluster near now. See the selection-effect note.
The reading
| Cycle | Period | Ref. peak | cos in 2026 | Phase | Next peak | Next trough |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Schlesinger Jr. | 30y | 1970 | +0.67 | rising | 2030 | 2045 |
| Turchin (50y) | 50y | 1970 | +0.73 | falling | 2070 | 2045 |
| Kondratiev wave | 54y | 1973 | +0.99 | peaking | 2027 | 2054 |
| Carlota Perez | 55y | 2000 | −0.99 | troughing | 2055 | 2028 |
| Huntington | 60y | 1968 | +0.98 | rising | 2028 | 2058 |
| Ray Dalio | 75y | 1950 | +1.00 | peaking | 2100 | 2063 |
| Strauss-Howe | 84y | 1955 | +0.56 | rising | 2039 | 2081 |
| Modelski | 110y | 1945 | −0.09 | crossing | 2055 | 2110 |
| Ibn Khaldun | 120y | 1789 | +0.99 | peaking | 2029 | 2089 |
| Peter Turchin | 150y | 2020 | +0.97 | falling | 2170 | 2095 |
cos values run from +1.00 (at a peak of the construction) to −1.00 (at a trough), from cos(2π · (year − reference peak) / period). Phase labels use the same narrow bands as the chart — ±3% of a period around an extremum, which is ±0.9 years for the 30-year cycle but ±4.5 years for the 150-year one — so “peaking” means near the peak, not somewhere in the top third. Next peak and trough are model extrema of the fixed construction, rounded to whole years. See methods for the caveats that apply to everything on this site.
Citing this page
This page is a dated permalink: the 2026 reading stays at this URL as later years are added. The live table recomputes from the current cycle definitions — if a period or anchor is ever corrected, it updates too, and the correction is recorded in the project's changelog. The edition CSV below is frozen as published and never recomputed. Suggested citation:
Kooi, D. (2026). “State of the Cycles 2026.” Sinusoidal History, Skylark Creations. https://sinusoidalhistory.com/state/2026
Archived releases of the whole project carry a DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.21998618 (resolves to the latest archived version).
Frozen edition: /data/state-2026.csv — this table as published, CC-BY-attributable, never recomputed.
Machine-readable: /api/v1/state?year=2026 returns this table as JSON, CORS-open. Cycle and series definitions are at /api/v1/cycles and /api/v1/series.