As America chooses its next President, a new study suggests that even the most powerful and best-run empires have collapsed under leaders who broke social contracts.

The anthropology study took a deep dive into 30 pre-modern societies and found that even those that had "good" governments were not immune to catastrophic demise. In fact, societies where the government provided goods and services and prevented drastic inequalities of wealth and power, tended to fall apart even more dramatically than those who had despots. One commonality in the destruction of such societies – the failings of leaders who gravely weakened them by tearing apart societal ideals and morals.