Samo Burja - The Great Founder Theory of History

**Patrick O'Shaughnessy** (0:00)
If you're a regular listener of my podcast, I have another recommendation for you. The podcast is called Founders, and it's hosted by David Senra, who has devoted his life to learning from history's greatest entrepreneurs. Each week, David distills the lessons of a different founder, from Henry Ford to Coco Chanel to Edwin Land. His recent episode on James Cameron is particularly excellent if you're looking for somewhere to start. I guarantee if you listen to Founders, you'll feel inspired to level up whatever you're working on. You can find a link to Founders in the show notes of this conversation, and because Founders is part of the Colossus Network, you can search all the past transcripts on our website at joincolossus.com.
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Hello and welcome everyone. I'm Patrick O'Shaughnessy and this is Invest Like the Best. This show is an open-ended exploration of markets, ideas, stories and strategies that will help you better invest both your time and your money.
Invest Like the Best is part of the Colossus family of podcasts and you can access all our podcasts including edited transcripts, show notes and other resources to keep learning at joincolossus.com.

**SPEAKER_2** (1:48)
Patrick O'Shaughnessy is the CEO and founding partner of PositiveSum and the CEO of O'Shaughnessy Asset Management. All opinions expressed by Patrick and podcast guests are solely their own opinions and do not reflect the opinion of PositiveSum or O'Shaughnessy Asset Management. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a basis for investment decisions.
Clients of PositiveSum or O'Shaughnessy Asset Management may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this podcast.

**Patrick O'Shaughnessy** (2:20)
My guest today is Samo Burja. Samo is the founder of consulting firm Bismark Analysis and has dedicated his life's work to understanding why there has never been an immortal society. His research focuses on the institutions, the founders behind them, how they rise and why they always fall in the end.
As you'll hear, Samo has an encyclopedic grasp of history and his work has led him to some fascinating theories about human progress, the nature of exceptional founders, and the future of different societies across the world. Please enjoy my conversation with Samo Burja.
Samo, your writing has been amongst the most interesting that I've encountered in the last couple of years. Just a tremendous variety of ideas and ways of looking at the world and history. One of the overarching things that you're best known for is this lens on history, that you call Great Founder Theory. I'd love you to just begin by laying out the core idea, hear how you came upon the idea and maybe what it opposes, the alternative view of history from the one that you've developed. I'd love to start there and then we'll dive into lots of nooks and crannies together.

**Samo Burja** (3:24)
To me, it seems that most of social science for the last hundred years has been focused on trying to find these macro deep patterns of human behavior, human history, sometimes being as hubristic to try to find immutable laws of history. Such was the case in the early, in the middle of the 20th century. And while it certainly is the case that there are deep patterns that are worth studying in the nature of all civilization from the advent of agriculture to today. And while it certainly is true again, that there is a deep current that's changing our society that started with the industrial revolution 200 years ago. None of these patterns were set in stone. None of these patterns are fixed. So I think none of them really rise to the level of sociological laws. And the reason why we can't just predict future history for the next few hundred years is that people observe society and they come to alter it. The exceptional individuals, great man's theory of history sense, perhaps don't determine everything to how things transpire. But I think almost all of the exceptional institutions that have shaped human civilization, anything you can think of, be it organized religion, technological companies, political systems, they usually have an individual or a small group of people who who deviate from the previous social norm, create a new type of organization, a new type of institution, or honestly just a new way of doing things as the old society fails. And we see this over and over again. Again, to give historical examples, it might take a very religious and legible form, such as creating, founding a new organized religion.