The global recession and the banking crisis that precipitated it has had a massive impact worldwide and caused considerable economic hardship in many countries. Will the recession come to an end, if so when and what will the economic landscape be like afterwards ?

In order to understand the major global themes astrologically we have to look at the slower moving planets and the aspects that they make to each other. Pluto is particularly important, it is the slowest of all the planets and can stay in one sign for 20 or more years. For individuals the sign Pluto’s in is irrelevant, everyone in the same generation would share it, but for mankind as a whole its movement by sign makes interesting reading. Pluto, because of its association with revolution and hidden underground issues that make a sudden dramatic impact on the surface, is often seen as the global enemy and it’s sign placing can indicate where society sees its adversaries. Pluto’s transit through a sign is often ignited by a sudden development that certainly would not have been seen when it first moved into that sign.

From 1983 to 1995 with Pluto in Scorpio the enemy was the Aids epidemic but also this placing presaged the end of the Cold War with the fall of the Berlin Wall coming in 1989. Every country has a birthchart and Pluto was conjunct the Russian Sun in 1989. From 1995 to 2007, Pluto was in Sagittarius and with no cold war and the world’s apparent need for a hate figure the enemy was found in a Sagittarian area of religion. Religious fundamentalism and terrorism increased significantly and the main event was 9 / 11 in 2001, when Pluto was in conjuntion with the US Ascendant. In 2008 Pluto moved into Capricorn to remain there until 2024, it may yet be too early to tell but within a year of Pluto’s change of sign many people felt the enemy had shifted to that Capricorn institution, the banking industry.

Powerful global events are usually triggered by difficult aspects of other slow moving planets to Pluto, for example 9 / 11 occurred with Saturn in opposition. Almost as soon as Pluto moved into Capricorn, Uranus made a square aspect with it beginning in 2009 although there was a little nibble in 2008. As both of these planets move slowly the aspect stays for some time so the banking crisis that began as soon as Pluto moved into Capricorn caused a recession which is still with us. There have been developments, however, and Uranus finally caught up with and passed Pluto in May 2013. Planetary transits are always felt most intensely when the faster moving planet is moving towards the slower one ( called applying in Astrology ). Once the faster planet has past the slower ( called separating ), the impact of the aspect begins to tail off and recedes as the planet moves away. So May 2013 could be felt as an important stage where people began to feel a slight lifting of the pressure.

With Astrology we are looking at patterns of planets and because all the planets have different orbits every combination is unique so the planetary alignment we have now has never happened before. Despite this we can learn about what’s going on by looking at similar transits in the past and viewing the impact that they had at the time. Uranus takes 80 odd years to go through the Zodiac and bizarrely the last time it was in Aries it also made a square aspect to Pluto, which at the time was in Cancer, the opposite sign to Capricorn. Uranus started its square aspect with Pluto in 1929 the year of the Great Wall St. Crash in the USA when many banks that had previously been overextended went to the wall and took the savings of millions of people with them. The Crash precipitated the Great Depression which although started in the US, quickly spread throughout the world. The similarity to the current situation is clear although the impact for most of us is not as severe as in the Thirties.

Uranus caught up with Pluto in the Spring of 1933, which was the time economic historians believe the effects of the Depression began to lift, and although Uranus went backwards later that year by 1935 the aspect had finished. Many people believe the Great Depression had an impact on global society that was traumatic and long lasting and there is a narrative that it was a major cause of the 2nd World War because it created the economic conditions that facilitated the rise of fascism. This may be the case but the Depression itself was over by 1935 and certainly was lifting from 1933 onwards.

The connection of the 1929 aspect between Uranus and Pluto and the current one is so extraordinarily powerful that we should use it as a guiding experience for current conditions. It might seem that May 2013 is our 1933 moment, but this one could be deceptive. Uranus started to go backwards in July 2013 and it goes back over Pluto in November returning to pass it again going forwards in April 2014. This happens again in December 2014 to March 2015, but from this point the aspect is gradually separating although we don’t reach the 1935 stage until Uranus changes signs to Taurus in 2018. So by the look of it we should see gradual improvement and a moving away from recession but this could be delayed by a couple of winters of discontent.

One reason why the current transit has had such a strong impact is Pluto’s position at around 10 degrees of Capricorn. The birth chart for a nation or an enterprise is cast for the moment that it begins, in some cases this is fairly straightforward as in the signing of the Declaration of Independence for the US chart but there is some argument as to what time the actual signing took place. One astrological side effect of 9 / 11 was to render this argument pointless as most astrologers now stick with the 12 degrees Sagittarius rising chart as Pluto was exactly conjunct that point in September 2001. For England there is a similar disagreement, some say the relevant chart is the crowning of William 1st on Christmas Day, 1066 as this was the last time the country was conquered, others say the United Kingdom chart from January 1st 1801. Both of these charts give a Sun position of 10 degrees Capricorn and as Pluto is actually at this point throughout 2013 it’s a relief to have got through it as well as we have so far.

Many nations and institutions have a set up time for midnight on January 1st, which would give them a Sun position of around 10 degrees Capricorn, and because its midnight the Sun would be at the bottom of the chart, so Pluto at this point which shake things up to the very core of its being. A clear example is Europe as the EEC has the Sun at this position from its setup date in 1958 and the Euro has the same position for 1999. Pluto’s transit to the Euro’s Sun which has been active for 2012 and 13 has created severe problems and even brought up questions around its entire existence and future. Capricorn Research does not have a time available for Greece but the Spanish chart has the Moon at 11 degrees Cancer so Pluto is opposite that Moon now showing the problems that the country is going through.

Its hard to know what the economic landscape will be after the Uranus / Pluto transit, many are predicting that the days of boom are gone forever and the best we can hope for is holding our own and gradual growth. Of course very few people predicted the banking crisis in the first place and prediction on a global level is very difficult. Capricorn Research believes that we are not meant to know most of these things in advance but it is profoundly helpful to have Astrology to help us come to an understanding of the themes in action.