Death Match between Continuity and Change

That compressed tension between continuity and change is the mainspring of History. Societies characteristically work to balance continuity with change. This is the heart of the normal political dynamic. Equipoise is maintained by a natural, if informal understanding that some measure of compromise and accommodation is necessary — and desirable — in constitutional order.

Thus political competition is refereed by a collective expectation that things will likely “change enough to stay the same.”