Towards a New Paradigm?

Posted on November 27, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Assessing if we are about to see a paradigm shift is twice crucial. First, and foremost, as human beings living within societies, if such a change happens, then we need to be ready for the upheavals that precede and accompany such deep revolutions, as stakes, both ideological and material, are at work to try blocking change. We also need to understand what is happening to take the right decisions in our lives, hopefully with the right timing, to mitigate adverse impacts and favour positive ones.

Second, in terms of strategic foresight and warning analysis, the deepest layers of ideas organizing societies and their interactions are fundamental frameworks, within which any understanding must be located. If changes are in the making, then they will forcibly alter the future, while the present is most probably already being affected, giving rise to a feeling of unpredictability. Actually, it is not so much that there is a novel unpredictability settling in, but that the lenses through which the world is analysed and then acted upon are inadequate.

Paradigm: Modernity

Paradigms are encompassing thought patterns and related sets of practices, which “for a time provide model problems and solutions” (Kuhn, viii). The contemporary use of the word comes from Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (.pdf version), and thus hard science. We use here its application to history (and social science). From a European (and Western) point of view, for example, we would thus have the Middle Age, Modernity, something new still unnamed. Through the process of modernization, Modernity has reached most of the globe with varying timing, success, depth of impact and finally versions, and is thus a paradigm that is relevant globally.

Modernity is defined by sociologist Anthony Giddens as

“associated with

(1) a certain set of attitudes towards the world, the idea of the world as an open transformation by human intervention;

(2) a complex of economic institutions, especially industrial production and a market economy;

(3) a certain range of political institutions, including the nation-state and mass democracy.

Largely as a result of these characteristics, modernity is vastly more dynamic than any previous type of social order. It is a society – more technically, a complex of institutions – which unlike any preceding cultures lives in the future rather than the past” Conversations with Anthony Giddens: Making Sense of Modernity 1998, p.94.

This is what a large part of the world has known for the last centuries, to the least for the main part of the twentieth century, and which may be about to disappear (Lavoix, 2005: 20).

Some examples of previous paradigm changes are, in Europe, the shift from pre-modern to modern time (the end of the Middle–age and the Renaissance), a similar shift taking place in the whole of Eurasia, as shown by Lieberman’s work, the Meiji Transformation in Japan, Iconoclasm in the May Fourth Era in China, to borrow Yü-sheng Lin’s title.

Signals of paradigm shift: Crisis

According to Kuhn, the paradigm switch itself is relatively sudden and unstructured. Before it happens, a crisis occurs, that is “brought about by the accumulation of anomalies under the previous paradigm.” (Curd and Cover, 218). In science this means debates. In historical life, this is most likely to mean struggles and conflicts, while problems cannot find solutions anymore.

In our tentative application of Kuhn’s theory to history, we may either have the old and the new paradigms cohabitating with struggles between the two (and their “proponents”), or the old inefficient paradigm trying to survive attacks by those who see and understand it is not adequate anymore. The crisis would continue until a new efficient paradigm emerges and the shift (the complete adoption of the new paradigm) takes place. Upheavals are most likely to continue for a while as related human institutions are created and work at stabilising the situation.

As pointed out by Ertman in the case of the search for new adequate models of socio-political organisations, ideological and material stakes in the old paradigm, and in all institutions and layers of beliefs that are derived from the paradigm, block the full emergence of the new paradigm or the search for new solutions. The dynamics that are most likely to be at work have been presented in the Chronicles of Everstate, in a fictionalized way to ease understanding: Ideological Stakes in an Outdated Worldview and Material Stakes in an Outdated Worldview.

A paradigmatic crisis is probably progressive, with peaks but also accumulation of tension. Consciousness of the needed change probably occurs only slowly. When sufficient awareness has dawned, which, for us, may be now, then the emergence of the new paradigm, the shift itself, may not be far away; yet efforts at understanding and adapting are more than ever necessary, while the struggle to maintain the old paradigm and its advantages continues unabated and is even likely to strengthen.

The multiple crises (the environmental cliff to use the words of Jeremy Grantham, the sovereign debt crisis, the financial crisis, the global economic crisis, global water insecurity, resources depletion or insufficiency, international tensions, etc.) through which we are currently living could actually be much more than “just” the juxtaposition of unrelated crises. They could signal that we are in the midst of a paradigm crisis.

Leaving Modernity?

We would thus be living close to a paradigm shift, which would see us leaving modernity. Such a transition would mean that our perceptions, world-views, understanding but also consequent sets of practices, change. They need to do so as they do not provide anymore for solutions, as shifts are demanded by the incapacity of the previous paradigm to help human societies making sense of the world and thus surviving. This does not imply that all previous beliefs and practices disappear, but that they may be perceived, used, interpreted otherwise, although some will also totally vanish.

Considering the huge potential impact a paradigm crisis and a shift would have, it is necessary to try monitoring if it is really happening and what is happening, to fully include the possibility of this paradigmatic change in our analyses and to be on the look out for elements of the new paradigm.

Using Giddens initial definition, we should be ready to see disappearing or considerably changing:

The idea of the world as an open transformation by human intervention. For example, this questions the whole geo-engineering approach to climate change: Is geo-engineering an ultra modern approach, grounded fully in modernity and thus bound to disappear or is it, on the contrary, part of a new paradigm, besides human augmentation (the singularity approach), where the very definition of the living and its creation changes?
A complex of economic institutions, especially industrial production and a market economy: Could approaches such as “do less be more” as suggested by Chris Thomson & Mike Jackson (p.20) as micro-level answer to the paradigm crisis, focusing on values and quality rather than quantity be part of the solution? Will the institutions of the Washington Consensus disappear? Will the liberal order leave place to something else that can handle the crisis?
A certain range of political institutions, including the nation-state and mass democracy: Trying to make sense of the crisis in the domain of political authority and to foresee what could happen is the focus of the Chronicles of Everstate.

Before to close, I would like to quote Richard Tarnas, as he wrote a beautiful description of what a paradigm crisis and shift entailed, in the past:

“Yet it would be a deep misjudgment to perceive the emergence of the Renaissance as all light and splendor, for it arrived in the wake of a series of unmitigated disasters and thrived in the midst of continuous upheaval. Beginning in the mid-fourteenth century, the black plague swept through Europe and destroyed a third of the continent’s population, fatally undermining the balance of economic and cultural elements that had sustained the high medieval civilization. Many believed that the wrath of God had come upon the world. The Hundred Years’ War between England and France was an interminable ruinous conflict, while Italy was ravaged by repeated invasions and internecine struggles. Pirates, bandits and mercenaries were ubiquitous. Religious strife grew to international proportions. Severe economic depression was nearly universal for decades. The universities were sclerotic. New diseases entered Europe through its ports and took their toll. Black magic and devil worship flourished, as did group flagellation, the dance of death in cemeteries the black mass, the Inquisition, tortures and burnings at the stake. Ecclesiastical conspiracies were routine, and included such events as a papally backed assassination in front of the Florentine cathedral altar at High Mass on Easter Sunday. Murder, rape, and pillage were often daily realities, famine and pestilence annual perils. The Turkish hordes threatened to overwhelm Europe at any moment. Apocalyptic expectations abounded. And the Church itself, the West’s fundamental cultural institution, seemed to many the very center of decadent corruption, its structure and purpose devoid of spiritual integrity. It was against this backdrop of massive cultural decay, violence, and death that the “rebirth” of the Renaissance took place.” The Passion of the Western Mind, (Pimlico, 1996 [1991]), p.225.

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Curd, Martin and Cover, J.A., “Commentary on Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolution” in Philosophy of Science: The Central Issues, ed. Curd and Cover, (New York : W.W. Norton & Company, 1998).

Ertman, Thomas. Birth of the Leviathan : Building States and Regimes in Medieval and Early Modern Europe. Cambridge, UK ; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997.

Giddens, Anthony and Christopher Pierson, Conversations with Anthony Giddens: Making Sense of Modernity, (Stanford University Press, 1998).

Grantham, Jeremy, “Be persuasive. Be brave. Be arrested (if necessary),” Nature 491, 303, 15 November 201, doi:10.1038/491303a.

Jackson, Mike, “Global Change of Paradigm,” Shaping Tomorrow, 20 June 2012.

Kuhn, Thomas S., The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, International Encyclopedia of Unified Science, Volume 2, Number 2, (Chicago: The University of Chicago, 1970 [1962]).

Lavoix, Helene, Indicateurs et méthodologies de prévision des crises et conflits: Evaluation, (Paris : AFD, December 2005).

Lieberman, Victor, B. “Local Integration and Eurasian Analogies: Structuring Southeast Asian History, c.1350-c.1830;” Modern Asian Studies 27, 3 (1993), pp 475 -572

Lieberman, Victor, B., Strange Parallels, Southeast Asia in Global Context, c.800-1830 Vol.1 Integration on the Mainland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003).

Lin Yü-Sheng, The Crisis of Chinese Consciousness: Radical Antitraditionalism in the May Fourth Era, (Wisconsin: The University of Wisconsin press, 1979).

Tarnas, Richard, The Passion of the Western Mind: Understanding the Ideas That Have Shaped Our World View, (London: Pimlico, 1996 [1991]).

Thomson, Chris, & Jackson,Mike New Purpose, May 2012, Shaping Tomorrow.

2013 – 2018 EVT – Learning from Water Privatization? (Panglossy)

Posted on July 15, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

This post, as many others in the Chronicles of Everstate, can be read both as part of the scenarios on the future of the nation-state, as explained below, or as part of the section on Global Water Security. This shows how all issues are intertwined, and that the multiple existing feedbacks should not be ignored.

Previously: In 2012 EVT, Everstate (the ideal-type corresponding to our very real countries created to foresee the future of governance and of the modern nation-state) knows a rising dissatisfaction of its population. Alarmed by the rising difficulties and widespread discontent, the governing authorities decide to do something when new elections start, which begins the second scenario, Panglossy. The new Everstatan government, dependent upon past thinking, decides that a return to economic efficiency through growth is the key to the crisis. The first years fail to bring back growth; the power of the lenders’ nexus and induced appropriation of public power continue unabated as the regulation of the international financial system does not progress. The initial efforts to fund Green Growth through infrastructure investments show minimal and disappointing impacts. Worse still, the initial implementation of air commodification under the ISSIGE flagship project by the consortium Novair triggers a nationwide wave of outrage because the beliefs of Everstatans are denied at all levels, while the elite is surprised.

(The reader can click on each picture to see a larger version in a new tab – a navigating map of posts is available to ease reading)

The Everstatan elite, surprised by the new Air Revolt, continues applying to the situation a superficial analogy with water to estimate the severity of the outrage in the country and its potential evolution. Yet, analogy is not comparison and is often insufficient to inform proper understanding and thus decisions.

Margaret Thatcher with Ronald Reagan at Camp David (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

First, the commodification of water, in its second wave, is still a very recent phenomenon. It started at the end of the 20th century with the privatization of water utilities in the United Kingdom of Margaret Thatcher, and is far from being completed, assuming it is meant to follow an ineluctable path towards completion, which has still to be proven. Everstatan elite cannot thus easily draw any clear conclusion.

Second, some voices exist, even if they are not so numerous and have so far not mobilised masses, that underline the ethical problems linked to the privatization of water (e.g. 2008 Symposium) or criticise the whole commodification endeavour.

Third, the current and future various issues and problems surrounding global water security will most probably keep the matter of water services privatization and water commodification on the agenda, seen in an even larger perspective, where security questions and geopolitics will be underlined.* This is likely to lead to stronger stance taken by all actors, and open the door to any strategy including manipulation and irredentism. As a result, a complete and smooth commodification of water that would not generate rebellions cannot be taken for granted.

Sbocco della Cloaca Massima in Rome, sewer system started in 735 B.C by Ettore Roesler Franz, 1880 via Wikimedia Commons

Fourth, in countries such as Everstate, when water was privatized at the end of the twentieth century, it was done in a way that is very different from the way Novstate-Air intends to monetize air. Then, a public service dealing with water-related issues was handed over or sold from the state to private companies. This was only one episode in the millennia-long struggle of human societies to manage wastewater, sewage and obtain clean water (Jungclaus, 1998). Everstatans never went from free clean water, or free apparently clean water, free sewage, etc. to becoming suddenly aware of the extent and danger of polluted water and having to pay for being able to drink and eat safely.

1865 – New York City Sanitary Commission, via Wikimedia Commons

Furthermore, throughout the millennia old struggle for safe water, they have, at least dimly, become conscious of direct links between living beings concentrations and water pollution, thus of their own responsibility. This long process and history does not exist in the case of air. With water, there was thus no effect of shock, no sudden awareness triggering a feeling of injustice and moral outrage, when there is with air. This implies that the absence of initial reaction in the case of water cannot be used to deduce that Everstate’s air revolt is unimportant and will be short-lived.

Finally, timing matters, twice. The privatisation of water utilities itself is not always done nationally but according to the administrative organisation underlying the public service, most of the time municipalities. This implies that changes happen according to the timing of each town. This stops the creation of any nationwide reaction. The impossibility of such large reaction is strengthened by the diverse situations existing for each administrative division. However, here, had separatists feelings and right conditions existed, water privatization in Everstate would then have strengthened those sentiments (see the last posts of the Mamominarch scenario for an example of such dynamics). Those underlying processes could and should have been considered by Novstate-Air and the Everstatan government, as those lessons were applicable to air. Considering the current conditions in Everstate, Novstate-Air had thus the “choice” between triggering a nationwide protest and sowing the seeds for separatism.

Then, water privatisation has mainly been done before the crisis, before the rise of inequalities and decline of purchasing power became obvious, before the rise of tension, before the legitimacy of governments and actors and of the whole socio-political model started being questioned.

Walker, DEFRA, 2009

In the past, if water prices increased with privatization (Barlow, 2001), the share of the water bill in a household expenses (e.g. averaged to 335$ a year in the U.S. in 2012 by the American Water Works Association, CNN February 28, 2012, 339£ a year in England and Wales in 2009 according to DEFRA, with many local and individual variations) and the added cost were not such that a collective feeling of relative deprivation could be born. The unequal weight of water bills according to household income inequalities must however be noted (Smets, 2002). Then, water privatization has been done while respecting, to a point, and with (large) variations according to countries and actors, the human right not to die of thirst or because of polluted water. For example, the existence of public fountains, access to clean public utilities, etc. has been maintained, while in many OECD countries one scheme or another used to exist or was created to help the poorest face their water bills. There was thus little that could have triggered a nationwide outrage and related escalation.

The commodification of air is happening in completely different circumstances and with no such safeguards as those that were implemented for water. Actually, Everstate’s Air revolt should suggest to the government and concerned actors that they should actively revisit water related policies, be they public, private, or mixed, as circumstances have changed. True enough, the privatization of water has been done and thus it cannot be a trigger for a new rebellion. If matters continue to be handled carefully by all actors involved, if the impacts of the various global and local evolutions are properly foreseen, while adapted and timely preventive measures are implemented, then the risk to see water riots added to the air revolt will be minimized. On the contrary, lack of foresight and of caution, which, considering the overall level of tension and ideological polarization becomes everyday more plausible in Everstate, will most probably mean that water issues will soon be added to the escalating number of grievances.

Alas, neither Novstate-Air nor the Everstatan governing bodies even attempt to move beyond the analogy with a water privatization of the past. They thus decide that the air revolt is nothing more than the passing fit of a population that does not truly understand problems, and that an emphasis on communication and advertisement while local meetings with the population are organised by Novstate-Air and the local authorities will be enough to defuse the anger. Meanwhile Novstate-Air does not change the schedule according to which Air contributions will be collected.

To be continued…. after the Summer.

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References

* For more references, see, notably U.S. Intelligence Community Assessment, Global Water Security, 2 February 2012, and two previous posts as well as their bibliography: Water security: a strategic foresight and warning issue for national security? (1 February 2012) and Building upon the 2012 “Global Water Security” IC Assessment (27 March 2012).

American Water Works Association

Barlow, Maude, “The Water Privateers,” Blue Gold: The global water crisis and the commodification of the world’s water supply (International Forum on Globalization (IFG), 2001).

Ellis, Blake, “Water bills expected to triple in some parts of U.S.,” CNNMoney, February 28, 2012.

Jungclaus, Joyce Everhart, “1998 Congress Recap” published in the APWA Reporter, excerpt republished as “History of sewage management” on Bloomington Minnesota Cityweb.

Smets, Henri, Le Droit à l’Eau, Conseil européen du droit de l’environnement., 2002.

Symposium Proceedings: Common Grounds, Common Waters: Toward a Water Ethic, Panel I: Water Ethics and Commodification of Freshwater Resources, Diamond, Stephen (Moderator), 6 Santa Clara J. Int’l Law 15 (2008).

U.S. Intelligence Community Assessment, Global Water Security, 2 February 2012.

Walker, Anna, CB, Independent Review of Charging for Household Water and Sewerage Services, DEFRA, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (UK), December 2009.

Wikipedia, Criticisms of the commodification of water.

Wikipedia, History of Water Privatization.

2013 – 2018 EVT – Unforeseen Outrage: Privatising the Commons (Panglossy)

Posted on July 8, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Last weeks’ summary: In 2012 EVT, Everstate (the ideal-type corresponding to our very real countries created to foresee the future of governance and of the modern nation-state) knows a rising dissatisfaction of its population. Alarmed by the rising difficulties and widespread discontent, the governing authorities decide to do something when new elections start, which begins the second scenario, Panglossy. The new Everstatan government, dependent upon past thinking, decides that a return to economic efficiency through growth is the key to the crisis. The first years, however, fail to bring back growth; the power of the lenders’ nexus and induced appropriation of public power continue unabated as the regulation of the international financial system does not progress. The initial efforts to fund growth through infrastructure investments show minimal and disappointing impacts. Worse still, the implementation of the ISSIGE flagship project on air quality by the consortium Novair triggers a nationwide wave of outrage as the struggle against air pollution is monetized.

(The reader can click on each picture to see a larger version in a new tab – a navigating map of posts is available to ease reading – Research/methodological note at the bottom of the post – see credits for the images in the references)

The monetization of the struggle against air pollution is perceived by Everstatans as nothing else than the privatization of air. It generates such a strong reaction and mobilization because it creates a feeling of injustice, actually moral outrage, as it impacts and upsets all layers of beliefs of Everstate’s population (see Ideological Stakes in an Outdated Worldview).

by Tim Evanson

Most fundamentally, monetizing air is at once an appropriation of an essential element that has so far belonged by right to each living being by the simple fact of it being alive, and a desecration, both going against the deepest human beliefs as shown by symbolism, as air is an image often found in many cosmological, religious and philosophical myths, books and systems. Air is one of the four (or five if we include aether) elements of classical thought. It can be found in Hinduism, Buddhism, Bon (Tibetan philosophy), in the Japanese traditions, and more recently in medieval Western alchemy. If it is not present per se in the Chinese elements, breathing, notably in Qi Gong, is seen as fundamental. In the Bible, the “breath of life” is God’s power to create and give life to man (Genesis 2:7). Air and breath go thus beyond one religion to reach something that can be seen as archetypal, following Jung. It is the very relation to the Mystery of life (Mystery meaning “a religious truth that one can know only by revelation and cannot fully understand”), life’s origin, beauty, and continuation or termination, that is being upset by Novstate-Air.

At the normative level, more superficial although also crucial, the monetization of air is one more attempt at privatizing the commons, at transforming the public good into public goods that can then be transferred to the private, sold and bought in the name of any ideology, as recently denounced again, among others by Reich. This process is also known as commodification, for example the commodification of water or the commodification of nature. Indeed, in the real world, the latest failure of the 2012 Rio+20 summit (Montbiot, June 2012) is not lost on the private sector and, among other impacts, open the door even more widely to an all-out commodification, as underlined by a recent article in MarketWatch:

“So while it is a sad time for the planet from a policy perspective, the private sector has just been handed a golden opportunity.” Kostigen, 29 June 2012

The privatisation of the commons started in England, as early as the 12th and 13th century, then accelerated with the rise of capitalism – and modernization – through the centuries-long struggle over the right to use common land to graze livestock, which ended up with generalised enclosure and the disappearance of the commons. History shows that privatization leads to protests and revolts (e.g. Hardin 1968, Moore, 1966).

“In the case of the enclosure of the common lands, which was going on from about 1600 to 1850, the land-grabbers did not even have the excuse of being foreign conquerors; they were quite frankly taking the heritage of their own countrymen, upon no sort of pretext except that they had the power to do so.” Orwell, 1944

If, as underlined by Hardin, we must also be conscious of “The Tragedy of the Commons,” with air pollution as a perfect example, and one that he singles out, commodification and monetization of the air, paid only by consumers, may not be the best solution, even if this solution has worked beforehand for other commons. Indeed, the ideological battle that is actually taking place questions now this approach, and could very well emphasize that as, modernity, it is part of an outdated order.

One could also argue that Everstatans felt directly threatened too, as air, actually oxygen, is one of the most basic, fundamental elements for living beings on earth since the Great Oxidation Event, because cellular respiration depends on it. Being deprived of air means death within a few minutes for the strongest. However, historical facts and research, including the direst political phenomenon that is genocide, have shown that direct threat to life alone does not lead to rebellion or even to escalation, whilst feeling of injustice and moral outrage, in specific conditions, do.*

The Everstatan government and elite are surprised by the moral outrage that spreads because of their position within the ideological battle that is taking place. Moreover, during the last decades of economic, materialistic, technocratic, politician supremacy, they have forgotten the most fundamental political dynamics, or, if they know and understand, they do not care because they believe that those who will have to deal with the most violent side of political processes are not them but future generations. The analogy they used to create Novstate-Air and the monetization of air, the commodification of water, also plays into their inability to foresee Everstatans’ reaction. Privatizing water has so far not created such a moral outrage. Thus why should air be any different? Does the acquiescence to water’s monetization show that the air revolt will be short-lived and soon forgotten if Novstate-Air, backed up by the government, remains firm?

To be continued…

Research and methodological note

This post (and the next one) and the way the scenario narrative unfolds suggest that what the elite does, more precisely the way public power is appropriated matters. Here, however detailed our model (see Creating the model part 1 & 2) may appear, especially when it is described in number of variables used (compare with the 2 to 8/10 variables that are most often suggested as ideal for foresight), the means and processes of appropriation are not detailed.

The question is: should we translate those processes in terms of our model and add them to it, to the price of complicating the model even further, or should we, as I have done here, add further understanding only through the narrative, keeping the model as guidance?

The answer depends upon the degree of automation of the system and of the composition of the foresight team. The more automated the foresight system (let’s imagine it is computer run and can generate automated foresight scenarios through text-generation) , the more important to continuously expand the model, when some processes appear to have been underdeveloped as here. This begs the question of detecting such underdevelopments. The more diverse, knowledgeable and well-educated the team of foresight analysts, the more the model can be kept as such, being used as guidance.

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References

* Among others, Sambanis, Nicholas, “Using Case Studies to Expand the Theory of Civil War,” (World Bank, CPR Working Papers, Social Development Department Environmentally and Socially Sustainable Development Network, Paper No. 5, May 2003); James C. Scott and Benedict J. Tria Kerkviliet, Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance in South-East Asia, ed. (London: Frank Cass & Co.; 1986); Scott, James C., Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts, (New haven: Yale University Press, 1990) and Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985); Moore, Barrington, Injustice: Social bases of Obedience and Revolt, (London: Macmillan, 1978); Jeff Goodwin, James M. Jasper, Francesca Polletta, Passionate Politics: Emotions and Social Movements, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001).

Hardin, Garrett, “The Tragedy of the Commons,” Science 13 December 1968: Vol. 162 no. 3859 pp. 1243-1248 DOI: 10.1126/science.162.3859.124.

Kostigen, Thomas, “Rio+20 was a win for social investors,” MarketWatch, June 29, 2012.

Merriam-Webster Dictionary, Mystery.

Monbiot, George, “After Rio, we know. Governments have given up on the planet: The post-summit pledge was an admission of defeat against consumer capitalism. But we can still salvage the natural world,” Guardian.co.uk, Monday 25 June 2012.

Moore, Barrington, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World, (Beacon Press, 1993, 1966).

Orwell, George, “As I Please” column, Tribune, 18 August 1944. in Alex Peak blog.

Reich, Robert, “The Decline of Public Good,” 4, January 2012.

Images

Clerestory window – North Nave – National Cathedral – DC by Tim Evanson [CC-BY-SA-2.0 via Wikimedia Commons: The center pane depicts God (upper portion) breathing the breath of life into man (bottom portion). It is the breath of God which leads to creative inspiration (center portion).

A group of dissenters in Norfolk during Robert Kett’s rebellion of 1549 in Samuel Wale engraving of Robert Kett beneath the oak of reformation – 1785, via Wikimedia Commons.

2013 – 2018 EVT – Novstate-Air: Fighting Air Pollution for Profit (Panglossy)

Posted on July 1, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Last weeks’ summary: In 2012 EVT, Everstate (the ideal-type corresponding to our very real countries created to foresee the future of governance and of the modern nation-state) knows a rising dissatisfaction of its population. Alarmed by the rising difficulties and widespread discontent, the governing authorities decide to do something when new elections start, which begins the second scenario, Panglossy. The new Everstatan government, dependent upon past thinking, decides that a return to economic efficiency through growth is the key to the crisis. Its first measure, to raise the minimum wage, fails to boost growth through consumption. As the new international meeting group for the resilience of the financial system IRESFIS does not show any progress, the ISSIGE, the international fund to promote green growth through infrastructure investment contributes to reinforce the power of the lenders’ nexus and appropriation of public power. Moreover, its results are disappointing: selected projects are insufficient to catch up on late investments, and their impact is too small to bring back growth, to show a change towards sustainability, and to alleviate unemployment. Remains one hope, now vested in the ISSIGE flagship project on air quality.

(The reader can click on each picture to see a larger version in a new tab – a navigating map of posts is available to ease reading.)

Global but unequal fight against air pollution

Air quality is crucial in terms of health and related costs, and a complex challenge as its pollution involves many chemical elements.

Despite efforts, notably within many OECD countries, to struggle against air pollution, air quality remains a severe global problem, all the more so that pollutants travel. Furthermore, much still needs to be done to fully understand the problem and to devise solutions, as detailed by the EPA for black carbon in its chapter on research needs. For example, synthesised global data are still difficult to gather. The array of means used to improve the collection of information, from sensors to satellite image, as exemplified on the US Air Quality: The Smog Blog, and to provide citizens with adequate daily measures and warning on all types of pollutants, as shown for example by the Daily Air Quality Index in the UK, exists, most of the time, only in OECD countries.

In Everstate, as in its neighbouring countries, the fight for air quality must continue and even be reinforced if more and better results are to be observed, especially as pollution does not diminish in other parts of the world, notably in Asia. This is the overall framework for the ISSIGE flagship programme.

The creation of Novstate-Air

Novstate creates a special structure to answer the proposal, called Novstate-Air. It gathers in a friends network covering Everstate and its neighbours, various industries, universities, research laboratories and health institutions, which are all involved at one stage or another in air pollution and air quality, either because their activity and products are potential sources of emissions, because they participate in the design, implementation or monitoring of sensors and models, or because their research or practice is linked to air pollution or to its impact on health.

In early 2014 EVT, Novstate-Air is awarded the ISSIGE contract and the funds. Besides the breadth of the answer, allowed by the variety and number of stakeholders, which thus fits perfectly well the framework programme, the originality of the financial proposal is what determines the ISSIGE to grant the contract to Novstate through Novstate-Air.

Financial boldness rewarded

Novstate-Air underlines first that what stops companies’ efforts towards air quality are the added costs to their products that changes and investments would create, when benefits would not only be delayed but also spread throughout a population that may or may not belong to their clients. Then, it stresses that if the overall effort were to be supported by the state, then the public deficit would increase in the short-term, while benefits, notably in terms of heightened health security and diminished related visible and hidden costs, would only appear in the longer term. Furthermore, it would be difficult to establish a direct link between investments and benefits, which may be unfavourable in terms of promotion and communication.

Novstate-Air thus suggests, to overcome this conundrum, to ask citizens, who are the final beneficiaries, to become directly involved in the effort by paying regularly a small contribution towards air quality. Looking for an analogy, Novstate-Air decides to mimic the way water is delivered and sold to citizens, but adapted to the specificity of air. The alternative was the creation of an indirect air tax, as indirect taxes are a perfect way to collect taxes without creating resentment. The air contribution is chosen over the tax because it allows for the monetization of the service as well as for profits, thus to the involvement of the private sector, which should contribute to growth and economic sustainability, two specific requirements of the ISSIGE.

Monetizing air quality

by William Adams, How Much Air Do We Breathe?

Novstate-Air, working hand in hand with local administrations will make sure the contribution is calculated fairly, while the data gathered to establish the amount owed by each citizen can be used for research purpose. To mimic at best the water system, Novstate-Air decides to estimate the amount of air breathed by each citizens, according to a specific survey of their activities. This quantity will be revised every trimester. Further research in this field will be conducted to confirm previous findings according to age and gender. Finally, the air contribution will be calculated according to the liters of air used by each family during one trimester. The contributions will be used to finance research, update sensors and all monitoring activities and to help private companies improve their emissions. In the name of transparency, activities and achievements will be given to each family, emphasising notably the improvement of air quality in their environment and the impact on their health.

Thou shalt be surprised…

By 2015, Novstate-Air is able to provide citizens with a preliminary factsheet on the status of their air quality, to start gathering data and, thanks to the use of internet-based facilities, to almost immediately collect contributions nationwide.

Novstate-Air and its network of associated bodies, the ISSIGE and Everstate’s government expect a strong positive reaction. They are thus extremely surprised when, on the contrary, a wave of outrage sweeps over the country, supported by Occupy Everstate, Anonymous, and various unions.

To be continued…

References

Adams, William C., Research Note 94-11: Topic = How Much Air Do We Breathe? California Environmental Protection Agency, 1994.

Dupré, Franck, “Pollution : le diesel, un danger mortel ?” Autonews.fr, 29 Mars 2012.

Durden, Tyler, The Benefits Of A College Education, Zerohedge, 05/21/2012, from Jed Graham, New Normal: Majority Of Unemployed Attended College, IBD, 05/17/2012.

EPA, Black Carbon Report to Congress, March 2012.

European Environment Agency, Chapter 4. Nitrogen emissions and threats to biodiversity , Environmental indicator report 2012 – Ecosystem resilience and resource efficiency in a green economy in Europe, Part 2. 2012.

Janssen, Nicole AH, Miriam E Gerlofs-Nijland, Timo Lanki, Raimo O Salonen, Flemming Cassee, Gerard Hoek, Paul Fischer, Bert Brunekreef, Michal Krzyzanowski, Health effects of black carbon, WHO, 2012.

Lehner, Peter, of the NRDC, Diesel Exhaust Does Cause Cancer, CleanTechnica.com, June 12, 2012.

The Guardian, Global air pollution: what is the most polluted country and city in the world? (WHO data), 26 Septembre 2011.

US Air Quality: The Smog Blog.

WHO, Air quality and health, Fact sheet N°313, Updated September 2011.

2013 – 2018 EVT – Green Growth in Action (Panglossy)

Posted on June 24, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Last weeks’ summary: In 2012 EVT, Everstate (the ideal-type corresponding to our very real countries created to foresee the future of governance and of the modern nation-state) knows a rising dissatisfaction of its population. Alarmed by the rising difficulties and widespread discontent, the governing authorities decide to do something when new elections start, which begins the second scenario, Panglossy. The new Everstatan government, dependent upon past thinking, decides that a return to economic efficiency through growth is the key to the crisis. Its first measure, to raise the minimum wage, fails to boost growth through consumption. The first high level conference of the ISSIGE, the international fund to promote green growth through infrastructure investment, is hailed as a success. However, as the new international meeting group for the resilience of the financial system IRESFIS does not show any progress, the ISSIGE, in such conditions, also contributes to reinforce the power of the lenders’ nexus and appropriation of public power.

(The reader can click on each picture to see a larger version in a new tab – a navigating map of posts is available to ease reading.)

The Everstatan delegates and members of the ISSIGE are conscious that its success is crucial. The highly unstable situation demands it. They thus start immediately working on the various framework projects’ proposals and their selection. Three more months, which is considered as a very short time-frame in a multinational governmental setting, are needed before the selected projects are publicised to allow companies to bid for them. The project themselves are due to start at the beginning of 2014 EVT, latest.

Meanwhile, the overall situation of Everstatans continue to degrade slowly. Every month now, one or the other area of Everstate is marred by some unusual climatic event. Those, however, are very localised and damages are relatively small. The overall world growth is minimal while energy and resources prices remain very volatile, contributing to a mood in see-saw. As a result, food prices continue to soar. Everstate’s public deficit remains as high as previously, and even rises as interests grow and as more borrowing is needed. The lenders’ nexus profits skyrocket. Many small companies that constitute the productive fabric of Everstate suffer from this environment and either stagnate or are forced to close down. On the contrary, a few well-connected companies, such as Novstate and its friends businesses, continue to be highly profitable, even though they complain that their rate of growth starts to be slow compared with the past. It is very high time that the overall boost expected from the ISSIGE takes place.

Considering the number of countries that are part of the ISSIGE and the relatively small amount of the overall bonds issued to fund them, the infrastructure investments that will take place on Everstate’s territory are few and far between. The very caution used, as this first year of funding must be considered as a test-case, tends to be self-defeating because of the considerable needs faced. The selected projects are not only insufficient in terms of catching up on late investments, but also their impact is too small to bring back growth, as well as to alleviate unemployment.*

Compared with the past, infrastructure projects are not anymore labour intensive. They are, however, knowledge intensive. Thus, considering the deficit of proper and fair treatment to the Everstatan educated population (see inequality statistics; Zerohedge, 05/21/2012 using Graham, IBD, 2012), the idea of promoting green growth investment, if set and re-imagined within a new socio-political model, might well be a way forward. Here, unfortunately, Everstate tries getting past-style results, when those cannot anymore be delivered.

Nevertheless, one of the infrastructure projects selected for Everstate is elected as ISSIGE flagship infrastructure programme for its deeply innovative character, the breadth of its environmental scope and its crucial character: Air Quality. Could this, at least, herald something really new and forward looking that could continue fostering hope among Everstatans, if overall general results are insufficient?

Starting most probably with the industrial revolution, air quality has degraded globally, notably in cities, but not only. Since its first report warning about those risks in 1987, the World Health Organisation has published its Air quality guidelines – global update 2005. In 2011, it underlines that

“Air pollution is a major environmental risk to health. By reducing air pollution levels, we can help countries reduce the global burden of disease from respiratory infections, heart disease, and lung cancer… Urban outdoor air pollution is estimated to cause 1.3 million deaths worldwide per year. Those living in middle-income countries disproportionately experience this burden…. The mortality in cities with high levels of pollution exceeds that observed in relatively cleaner cities by 15–20%. Even in the EU, average life expectancy is 8.6 months lower due to exposure to PM_2.5 produced by human activities. ” (WHO, Air quality and health, Fact sheet N°313).

Among the pollutants singled out by the WHO, one finds notably: particulate matter (PM), ozone (O3), nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and sulfur dioxide (SO2). PM, includes PM_2.5, also known as black carbon, which comes, among others, from diesel engines and vehicles, and contributes to both diseases – including cancer for diesel – and climate change (Janssen, et al. 2012, EPA, 2012). NOx contributes to various diseases and acid rain, which impacts negatively freshwater, forests and crops, and, more generally, biodiversity (EEA, 2012). The screenshot below of the excellent interactive and explanatory display done for the French ADEME (Agence de l’Environnement et de la Maîtrise de l’Energie) summarizes the complexity of the challenge Everstate as all countries face (click on the image to access the interactive application – in French but the visual part can be understood in any language – PM are included in “aerosols“):

To be continued…

* Read on investment and more generally on growth in current conditions the excellent article by Michael Spence, Nobel laureate in economics, “Why Do Economies Stop Growing?” Project Syndicate, May 23, 2012.

—–

References

Dupré, Franck, “Pollution : le diesel, un danger mortel ?” Autonews.fr, 29 Mars 2012.

Durden, Tyler, The Benefits Of A College Education, Zerohedge, 05/21/2012, from Jed Graham, New Normal: Majority Of Unemployed Attended College, IBD, 05/17/2012.

EPA, Black Carbon Report to Congress, March 2012.

Janssen, Nicole AH, Miriam E Gerlofs-Nijland, Timo Lanki, Raimo O Salonen, Flemming Cassee, Gerard Hoek, Paul Fischer, Bert Brunekreef, Michal Krzyzanowski, Health effects of black carbon, WHO, 2012.

Lehner, Peter, of the NRDC, Diesel Exhaust Does Cause Cancer, CleanTechnica.com, June 12, 2012.

The Guardian, Global air pollution: what is the most polluted country and city in the world? (WHO data), 26 Septembre 2011.

WHO, Air quality and health, Fact sheet N°313, Updated September 2011.

Images

WPA road project, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum, via Wikimedia Commons.

CNES-CNRS/INSU-MEN, Les polluants de l’air extérieur, Agence de l’Environnement et de la Maîtrise de l’Energie, 2009.

2013 – 2018 EVT – Investing for Green Growth without Liquidity (2) (Panglossy)

Posted on June 17, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Last weeks’ summary: In 2012 EVT, Everstate (the ideal-type corresponding to our very real countries created to foresee the future of governance and of the modern nation-state) knows a rising dissatisfaction of its population. Alarmed by the rising difficulties and widespread discontent, the governing authorities decide to do something when new elections start, which starts the second scenario, Panglossy. The new Everstatan government, dependent upon past thinking, decides that a return to economic efficiency through growth is the key to the crisis. Its first measure, to raise the minimum wage, fails to boost growth through consumption. The second, longer term, policy, which promotes green growth through infrastructure investment, starts with the preparation of the first high level conference of ISSIGE. Notably, funding through the emission of bonds, which should promote a lever effect by involvement of the private sector, is decided. The new international meeting group for the resilience of the financial system IRESFIS also convenes, but with no progress as the lenders’ nexus is as strong as ever.

(The reader can click on each picture to see a larger version in a new tab – a navigating map of posts is available to ease reading.)

Actually, the lenders’ nexus has even seen its position reinforced. The ISSIGE, by deciding to issue bonds, which go through the private banking system, and by hoping for leverage, has reinforced the dependency of the nation-states and its governing bodies upon the lenders’ nexus as well as upon any private actor with liquidity. The political weight that is put on the ISSIGE success, notably because it has been framed in terms of growth, which is crucial according to the past worldview, on the one hand, and, on the other, because of the global increasingly urgent need for investment, further strengthens the immediate power of the lenders’ nexus.

However, a large part of the investment deficit has been and is created by companies and lenders that have been seeing more (short-term) profit in not investing than in investing for years. This perception of the profits private companies and lenders could get – the return on investment – affects the perception of risks. It thus, most probably, contributes to lead private actors to ask the public (i.e. the nation-state) to bear the cost of all risks attached to green growth investment, from “where returns cannot be monetized or appropriated by the investor” to “risks that are more perceived than real, e.g. demonstration of a proven technology” (Global Green Growth Forum, March 2012, p.2). Actually, considering the overall investment deficit, it seems that it is not only green growth investments that are concerned.

Furthermore, all actors evolve within a paradigm that enounces that the private sector is best and knows best how to run everything and to provide for any goods and services. This favours the idea (even if it is never couched in such crude terms) that, if the private sector must contribute to invest, then it can do so only by obtaining the same high profit rates it could get by placing its cash surplus – the liquidity – elsewhere, i.e. notably in the bubbles of the financial market. It is thus up to nation-states to pay for the difference. Again, this leads to a blatant appropriation of public wealth and power.

Considering the existing public deficit, the private ownership of the related debts, the prevalent worldview and the various ideological and material stakes to keep it, there is, however, no other solution. To find another way would demand that at least one of the prevalent conditions change, so as to rebalance the negotiating power of actors (see, for a detailed explanation, “The powerful Everstatan elite under threat?” in Everstate, setting the stage (2) and 2012 EVT: Public Resources and Lenders).

Once the ISSIGE funding process is set up, the ISSIGE summit may take place. In a nutshell, the criteria the framework projects’ proposals will have to meet are as follows:

Arbutus menziesii immature fruit by Jina Lee GFDL or CC-BY-SA-3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

transboundary projects involving at least two countries,
fostering economic growth,
innovative,
green projects that are environmentally and economically sustainable,
improving or creating infrastructures that provide a service and/or allow overcoming identified and felt environmental threats.

Once the framework projects are selected, then a usual legal bid system to compete for and be awarded public markets will be used. Legally, the system of the countries where the project will be implemented can be used indifferently. The delegates, once the summit ends, have six months to define framework projects proposals. Some of those proposals will then be chosen by the network of delegates and become the ISSIGE framework projects for the year. The network will make sure that each member country receives the same value in terms of funding of projects.

The summit is considered a success by the various member states. The very identification and presence of the delegates, on the one hand, having been able to agree upon and set up the process, on the other, are seen as the very first achievement of ISSIGE. A strong communication campaign is organised around this theme.

Yet, in terms of everyday life, for Everstate citizens, there is no improvement whatsoever, besides the efforts of the various administrations they witness. On the contrary, the situation appears to grow worse, slowly and inexorably. The administrative time, notably when it involves the coordination linked to multinational governance, seems to be increasingly disconnected from and ill-suited to a real world where problems follow their own dynamics.

Because of the transparency surrounding the process that allows for proper information, because citizens know that green investments are crucial, while being aware of the complexity of the task and finally because Everstatans hope for a direct improvement in their lives once the projects start, as has been promised, they bear with their rising hardship and fear.

To be continued…

———-

References

For real life discussions on green growth investment & financing, as well as on investment deficit:

3GF, Global Green Growth Forum, FINANCING Preparatory Strategy Meeting, 26-27 March 2012.

Caranci, Beata & Chris Jones, “Milking America’s Cash Cow: The Case For Stronger Investment Growth,” Special Report, TD Economics, May 25, 2012.

Climate Policy Initiative and the World Bank Group in collaboration with China Light & Power and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, Inaugural Meeting of the San Giorgio Group: Expanding Green, Low-Emissions Finance, October 2011.

Euractiv.com, “‘Project bonds’ launched as an experiment,” 23 May 2012.

European Commission, Europe 2020 Project Bond Initiative, Investment needs, last updated 19/10/2011.

Hutton, Will Companies must stop hoarding cash and start investing instead, The Observer The Guardian, 19 February 2012.

Klein, Ezra, America’s capital investment deficit, Washington Post, December 31, 2010.

Pan European Networks, “‘Project bond’ plan approved by diplomats,” 22 May 2012.

World Economic Forum, Financing Green Growth in a Resource-constrained World Partnerships for Triggering Private Finance at Scale, 2012.

Zarroli, Jim, Companies Sit On Cash; Reluctant To Invest, Hire, August 17, 2011, NPR.

Zenghelis, Dimitri, “Restoring growth and confidence through green innovation,” E!Sharp, June 2012.

2013 – 2018 EVT – Investing for Green Growth without Liquidity (I) (Panglossy)

Posted on June 10, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Last weeks’ summary: In 2012 EVT, Everstate (the ideal-type corresponding to our very real countries created to foresee the future of governance and of the modern nation-state) knows a rising dissatisfaction of its population. Alarmed by the rising difficulties and widespread discontent, the governing authorities decide to do something when new elections start, which starts the second scenario, Panglossy. Dependent upon programmes created to face efficiently past challenges, prisoners of entrenched political groupings, the major parties campaign to come back to the order ante. Meanwhile, the polarisation and rise of a new opposition that took place during the election is temporarily frozen by the last hope thus created. The new Everstatan government, dependent upon past thinking, decides that a return to economic efficiency through growth is the key to the crisis. Its first measure, to raise the minimum wage, fails to bring back the expected result, to boost growth through consumption and thus to restart the engine.

(The reader can click on each picture to see a larger version in a new tab – a navigating map of posts is available to ease reading.)

As the first measure fails to boost growth, then the income of Everstate remains in the pitiful state into which it was before the elections. It even continues degrading as pressures and related costs do not relent. Meanwhile, as the need for liquidity does not stop, power remains in the hand of the lenders’ nexus. Yet, the failure of the government is only about the first measure. Two longer term policies are meant to address those very problems that have contributed to derail the whole system: the pressures related to the increasing complexity of resources, including looming scarcity, relative and absolute, through ISSIGE, and the problem of liquidity through the new international meeting group for the resilience of the financial system (IRESFIS).

Those two policies show that, even if they are included under a label, “restoring economic growth,” that is still part of the outmoded worldview, some awareness of the real problems besetting Everstate has started to take place.

ISSIGE will convene its first high level meeting in Everstate’s capital, six months after the elections, to allow for the organisation, for the presentation of first recommendations and to make sure that it will be able to announce the amount of the overall fund. It is imperative that firm and consensually accepted recommendations follow from this conference, considering the urgency of the situation. Heads of governments of the various member-states will be present to show the high level commitment given to the project. Several hundreds delegates of all the countries involved will be present. They will constitute the ISSIGE network, backbone of the effort.

Each delegation prepares a draft determining the criteria for the framework projects they will have to propose in the years to come, the process according to which those framework projects will be selected and, finally, how those projects will be implemented, by whom, with which supervision, etc. Those drafts are, of course, widely shared, read, and amended among delegates over the six months preceding the conference. In this way, no surprise and no intractable dispute will occur during the conference. Considering the administrative work load those exchanges require, and considering the high level profile of the delegates, substantial emoluments are paid to those delegates who are not civil servants, while those civil servants who are now working full-time for ISSIGE within their mother administration are promoted to the rank of Director with corresponding salary increase.

In a wish to promote transparency and show Everstatan citizens the real and genuine efforts and progress of the new government, drafts, exchanges and discussions are precisely documented and uploaded on a dedicated ISSIGE website. Furthermore, a special platform opened to citizens is created, where Everstatans can give their input. This effort is quickly followed by other countries.

More difficult, ISSIGE must also find a way to fund the projects themselves, and decide upon a global amount. Considering the public deficit existing in most countries, the ISSIGE network, the governments and administrations behind them decide that the various members and the Regional Union will issue bonds to fund the projects, which should also, hopefully, promote private investment. The overall amount for the first year is set at EVC (Everstate Currency) 250 millions. ISSIGE hopes that a lever effect will apply and that the overall value of the projects thus funded will be much higher.*

This is a very small amount considering the global current needs existing in terms of investments. According to the Global Green Growth Forum using 2010 IEA estimates, “by 2050 US$ 1.2 billion additional annual investments just in energy supply and use are needed to avoid a temperature increase beyond 2°C.” Meanwhile, the economy needs in terms of investments “for transport, energy and information and communication technologies (ICT) infrastructure projects in Europe are estimated at €1.5 trillion for 2010-2020″ (Euractiv.com, 23 May 2012). According to the European Commission, “infrastructure investment needs” “are estimated to be of EUR 1.5 trillion to EUR 2 trillion to meet the policy goals of the Europe 2020 Strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth.” However, this first ISSIGE funding is a start.

Meanwhile, the IRESFIS meets a couple of times, but each player camps on its position, and no progress is made. Those, which include Everstate’s government, who want more regulation, are immediately countered by most financial actors, who oppose it, as well as by some governments, who believe that more regulations will hamper financial transactions and thus diminish the power of their countries as financial centres.

As the income of the nation-state continues to be insufficient, the bargaining position of the lenders’ nexus is as strong as ever. It is even stronger because of the ISSIGE needs… to be continued.

———-

References

For real life discussions on green growth investment & financing, as well as on investment deficit:

3GF, Global Green Growth Forum, FINANCING Preparatory Strategy Meeting, 26-27 March 2012;

Caranci, Beata & Chris Jones, “Milking America’s Cash Cow: The Case For Stronger Investment Growth,” Special Report, TD Economics, May 25, 2012.

Euractiv.com, “‘Project bonds’ launched as an experiment,” 23 May 2012,

European Commission, Europe 2020 Project Bond Initiative, Investment needs, last updated 19/10/2011.

Hutton, Will Companies must stop hoarding cash and start investing instead, The Observer The Guardian, 19 February 2012.

Klein, Ezra, America’s capital investment deficit, Washington Post, December 31, 2010.

OECD, Infrastructure to 2030, Vol.2, 2007.

Pan European Networks, “‘Project bond’ plan approved by diplomats,” 22 May 2012;

World Economic Forum, Financing Green Growth in a Resource-constrained World Partnerships for Triggering Private Finance at Scale, 2012;

Zarroli, Jim, Companies Sit On Cash; Reluctant To Invest, Hire, August 17, 2011, NPR.

Zenghelis, Dimitri, “Restoring growth and confidence through green innovation,” E!Sharp, June 2012.

The Power of Maps

Gallery

Posted on May 23, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Kong-Pissey, Srok, Cambodia - Administrative Region - Google maps

This gallery contains 8 photos.

Maps are both necessary tools for analysis and crucial delivery visuals for foresight and warning products. They constitute a very powerful type of delivery form, as they change both the world and the mind. The pivotal importance of maps and … Continue reading →

2012 EVT: Material Stakes in an Outdated Worldview (The Chronicles of Everstate)

Posted on February 26, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Last week’s summary: In 2012 EVT, Everstate (the ideal-type corresponding to our very real countries created to foresee the future of the modern nation-state) knows a rising dissatisfaction of its population as authorities cannot anymore deliver security. The last phenomenon driving Everstatan governing bodies’ rising inefficiency in ensuring their mission is an outdated worldview that leads to misunderstanding and disconnect, which is first upheld by ideological stakes.

(The reader can click on each picture to see a larger version in a new tab - a navigating map of posts is available to ease reading).

The knowledge institutions and related people, which are guardians of norms and thus have ideological stakes in upholding an outdated worldview, are also motivated by material stakes in seeing norms respected, upheld and continuing. Indeed, their institutional survival depends on the continuation of those models, for example, through funding and employment.

Even if some or most within those institutions (again with variations according to their exact normative function) are increasingly aware that models have to be revised – but how far and how deep – being the first to do so could mean being cast away and thus losing both status and income. Individuals within institutions are caught in a system similar to traders on the stock exchange in the period preceding the burst of a bubble.

Furthermore, as the lender nexus and other elite groups benefit from the new means to appropriate public power, as those appropriations are permitted by the current model and underlying norms and thrive from the lack of real understanding, then those elite groups also have a material stake in seeing the current model and norms remaining in power. This is even more the case that some of those elite groups gained status as well as income only because of the absence of adequate models. If another model of socio-political organisation existed that allowed Everstate to face the new pressures, ensure security and thus bring back the satisfaction of the population then those elite groups would lose power. They are thus most unlikely to willingly abandon their new found or reinforced privileges.

If or when new understanding and new models, possibly with the slower creation of new norms and beliefs emerge, this will create new elite groups while the discarded model will imply the disappearance of existing elite group. Those new and disappearing elite groups will not only be related to understanding and knowledge as well as needed skills but also to the disappearing and emerging needed resources, that will then be fully integrated within the new model.

Any attempt at proposing something new or different is thus, for now, either muted or remoulded in agreement with the existing paradigm. Its authors, if they are too weak institutionally, are either marginalised or bought in to the price of the novelty of their ideas. In one way or another, new ideas are not heard.

Thus beliefs outlast the situation. As beliefs constrain understanding, which in itself conditions actions, a growing disconnect takes place between reality and actions. As actions disregard reality, they may only imply further dissatisfaction and become essentially increasingly escalating in terms of tension and scope of grievances.

For example, in other countries, protests then violence had followed an escalating pattern. For the initial phases, that looks very much like what is happening in Everstate. There, the trigger had been, surprisingly for the government and the elite, an increase in food prices. Yet, such increases had been constant over the past three years. This new price rise had not even been major. People had been thought to be used to those increases that were, anyway, expected. Furthermore, people had been repeatedly told that such inflation was not that important because the prices of so many other items, including wages, were not increasing, which showed, from the economy and monetary experts’ point of view that there was no real generalised inflation. Obviously, the monetary and economy gurus had forgotten to consider that seeing constant increase in food prices while wages were remaining stable would soon become a major problem in real life for real people. They had also forgotten that despite beliefs in the law of the market, the demand for some vital goods was inelastic, and that related shortage was not an option. Those would be translated in political terms rather than nicely remain within the sole economic field. Thus, the analytical tools set up by experts were congruent with the model and the norms, but so far away from reality that escalation and tension could not only rise unnoticed, but also be dismissed. When violence exploded, it took everyone by surprise. The strength of the norm is such that quickly an explanation fitting the model and avoiding possibly questioning it surfaces: the revolutions that took place could be explained by the need to embrace the democratic model, not by any other need.* Thus, from the normative point of view, Everstate, being a democracy and having been for quite a while, can learn no lessons from those other protests and their escalation, as they bear no resemblance whatsoever with what is happening in Everstate… or so the model says.

The situation into which Everstate and the normative world to which it belongs find themselves is blocked.

The people and the nation, composed actually of the same people, are twice discontented: first, as people, they have to pay for the elite, adjust to new less than pleasant working and living conditions; second, as ruler, they are seeing their power dwindling. Furthermore, fear and anxiety starts spreading as understanding either lacks or appears by bursts, soon to be muted while meaninglessness settles.

The situation is increasingly unsustainable and leads Everstate to its loss.

As the people and the nation start taking actions to express their discontent and see their goals met, their representatives begin considering changing the situation as continuing delivering security to citizens is the only way for them to still govern thus to remain in power.

But what can be done? And by whom?

To be continued…

——–

* The inspiration for this paragraph comes from the 2008 food riots, as well as from the winter and spring protests and rebellions that occurred in the Middle East and North Africa. For a very interesting article on Egypt suggesting very early a different interpretation, read, for example, Walter Armbrust: “A revolution against neoliberalism? If rebellion results in a retrenchment of neoliberalism, millions will feel cheated,” Al Jazeera English, 24 Feb 2011, This article first appeared on Jadaliyya.

2012 EVT: Ideological Stakes in an Outdated Worldview (The Chronicles of Everstate)

Posted on February 19, 2012 by Helene Lavoix

Last week’s summary: In 2012 EVT, Everstate (the ideal-type corresponding to our very real countries created to foresee the future of the modern nation-state) knows a rising dissatisfaction of its population. The increasing incapacity of the political authorities to deliver the security citizens seek increases the risks to the legitimacy of the whole system. The first two phenomena driving Everstatan political authorities’ incapacity to deliver security are a deepening budget deficit and an increasing need for liquidity, and a related creeping appropriation of resources while the strength of central public power weakens to the profit of various elite groups. The first of this group is the lenders’ nexus. The second type of elite groups is developing strongholds focused on those resources needed by Everstate and is exemplified by an extreme form of outsourcing, crystallized by the company Novstate.

(The reader can click on each picture to see a larger version in a new tab).

An outdated worlview leads to misunderstanding and disconnect

As discontent settles in Everstate, with its corollary of slowly rising tension, widening scope of grievances, and creeping feeling of injustice, while people continue, in vain, to seek security, Everstatans try to give meaning to their hardship, to understand what is happening to them and why. Meanwhile, Everstate’s governing bodies also look for ways to solve the various problems they face, which demand understanding the situation.

Such quests mean that the current normative models held in Everstate, and, more broadly, in the liberal order to which Everstate belongs are increasingly dysfunctional and outdated. Indeed, should they be adapted, they would provide the right framework for both efficient and satisfactory actions and meaning. Whilst now, nothing makes sense anymore and the situation worsens almost on a daily basis. The economy is growing inefficient; the political authorities’ actions repeatedly fail to ensure security; discontent increases; the formal bureaucracy of the state apparatus is questioned at many level, including by the bureaucracy itself; the state infrastructure seems to be now unable to fulfill its functions ; appropriation of public resources and power grows. Those are signals or symptoms that something is amiss in the models followed.

But then, if this is the case why has a new model not already emerged? What is happening and why?

Actually, Everstate and its fellow countries have now to face one of the toughest challenges, if not the hardest, that may confront a society. They are facing the intrinsic difficulty that goes with the need to change the various models that frame their lives and related institutions.

Currently, there is only one major model of socio-political order that frames the organisation and behaviour of most countries in the world, including Everstate: the modern nation-state, focused on the sole improvement of citizens’ material well-being, in its liberal democratic version. Other variations, such as Communism, have failed as the Cold War showed, and lessons have been learned from others’ experiences. Nothing else is available. Thus, if there is a need for change, then something new must be created, which is very difficult indeed.

First, ideological stakes are at work. The model of socio-political order is at once grounded in the past and in increasingly deeper systems of beliefs, themselves constructed historically.*

The first layer is a system of norms or beliefs, which can be seen as an ideology (a set of ideas), and quite akin to a religious system of beliefs, with all the sacred connotations and emotional attachment that may go with it. It will also contain the culture and mores of a specific society or country. It evolves slowly with time. From this level are derived, for example, the legal concepts applied in each country.

This layer is then included in and interacting with normative beliefs that act at systemic level and are constructed out of interactions between different systems of beliefs and actors. Here are worked out norms that rule the lives of all actors in the world, such as, for example, the existence of states that are territorial, sovereign, independent, the importance of modernisation (being modern), a norm that was constructed and imposed upon the world starting from the end of the nineteenth century.**

Then, one finds the deepest level of norms that may be called paradigmatic and will contain those values that are most crucial, deepest and most fundamental. For example, at this level may be located fundamental ideas about life and death, about the place of human beings in the universe, about the evolution of the universe, about fundamental ethics, etc.

Each layer of norms results form past evolution and past norms and has emerged out of collective efforts to face past historical situations. Each layer evolves at a different speed and the deeper it is, the more difficult to change it, the more threatening any potential change, and the more chattering the experience of changing it, at both collective and individual level. However, as the more superficial level – the socio-political model in its specific Everstatan guise – is embedded within the others and includes elements of them, then any change similarly involves dread.

Besides the human cognitive difficulty in revising models in front of new evidences***, ideological stakes to keep the model of socio-political order are thus strong considering the difficulties and consequences of altering it. Finally, as those models are normative, questioning them generates a fear to be cast away by the group, with all the internalised dread related to the impossibility to survive alone if one were excluded from the group. Thus, new evidences that could question models are either not seen or consciously and unconsciously dismissed. The likelihood to see this denial happening increases with the depth of the set of beliefs that is touched.

The knowledge and understanding institutions act as guarantor of the ideological and normative system. As such, and according to the norms they uphold and represent, they also provide legitimacy to the governing bodies within society. They tend, at least initially and according to their specific normative position, to further forbid questions and to stop the emergence of new ideas and new models. Meanwhile, prompted by the rising disconnect between reality and the norms and the dysfunction and hardship it generates, a demand for another understanding, one that would be adapted to the current reality, is voiced increasingly loudly, and lends strength to the rise of alternative purveyors of knowledge or to a major renewal within traditional ones.

Considering where Everstate stands historically and normatively, the knowledge and understanding institutions are mainly located within the academia, especially those departments where the latest models of socio-political order have been designed and upheld: economics departments and business schools, with the support of some of the most liberal and economically minded political science studies, as well as some divisions focusing more exclusively on technology and applied science.

Everstate has very good quality universities and those last 60 years they have provided increasingly recognised scientific knowledge and understanding, notably in the areas of main normative concern, such as economics, business and technology. They have educated generations of civil servants and also play the role of think tank. The analyses thus provided are widely recognised throughout the country as being explanatory and providing good advice to the ruling institutions, contributing thus to good governance and sanctifying the legitimacy of the state. Those universities are enmeshed in the global academic network and Everstate scholars travel extensively and can be heard in international workshop, while they contribute to global knowledge.

Interestingly in Everstate, the scientific institution cannot be seen as a single body anymore, that would, as a single actor, protect all norms. The organisation in disciplines that took place over the last centuries, and that played in the hands of those upholding a modernising and materialistic division of the world, giving power to a few, also contains within itself the seeds of a potential renewal. Indeed, as demand for a new adequate understanding increases, if norms must be revised, if some beliefs must be discarded, then the separation in disciplines means that the complete demise of science is not necessary, only part of it will have to be revised or even discarded. This also means that in the near future battles are likely to be played within universities, in Everstate but also at global level.

Some churches, at least those which adapted to the more materialistic part of modern life, can also help upholding norms. However, as Everstatans are relatively uninterested in religion, churches’ influence is so far marginal. One notices, nonetheless, a revival of some religions as citizens look for meaning and understanding, an understanding that mainstream beliefs do not bring anymore. It is thus likely that churches will play an increasingly important role in the years to come, notably if sciences cannot be renewed when needed.

International institutions, such as the IMF, the World Bank or the United Nations agencies, being born of the latest systemic norms and to sustain them, also contribute to enforce their universal, orthodox character. The latest born global institution is private, a powerful global association of companies that influences even heads of states. It upholds all the norms related to business. Efforts towards further or different regional and global governance let expect the appearance of new actors at this level and of coming related normative battles. Any attempt to question or change the norms upheld by those organisations will be fiercely combated.

To complete the structure, we find professionals trained in those institutions and having thus acquired those skills that are so crucial to the functioning of this system created for past conditions also act as guardians of the norm. For example, business consultants or high level executives coming from the corporate world, notably in areas linked to finance, act as unquestioned and unquestionable gurus. Novstate, considering its hybrid character is particularly active in the normative field, from the specific funding of research programs within universities and think tanks to full use of its friend networks, notably within mainstream media.

To be continued…

———-

* The organisation in four layers of norms and beliefs is only sketched here as a hypothesis. Each of them may be constructed as a complex system and more research would be valuable on their interactions, the way they are born and evolve.

** See notably, Bull, H., The Anarchical Society: A Study of Order in World Politics, (London: MacMillan,1979); Bull, H. and A.Watson, The Expansion of International Society, ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984); Gong, G. W., The Standard of ‘Civilization’ in International Society, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984), Lavoix, Helene, ‘Nationalism’ and ‘genocide’ : the construction of nation-ness, authority, and opposition – the case of Cambodia (1861-1979) – PhD Thesis – School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London), 2005; for modernisation, see, among others Giddens, Anthony, The Consequences of Modernity, (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1990).

*** Richard Heuer, Jr., Psychology of Intelligence Analysis, Center for the Study of Intelligence, Central Intelligence Agency, 1999, defines cognitive biases as “mental errors caused by our simplified information processing strategies” stemming “from subconscious mental procedures for processing information. A cognitive bias is a mental error that is consistent and predictable.” Chapter 9. At work here among other biases would be the bias known as the “Persistence of impressions based on discredited evidence (difficulty to discard the initial causal model created). – also called Belief persistence after evidential discrediting” Anderson, Craig A., Mark R. Lepper, and Lee Ross. “Perseverance of Social Theories: The Role of Explanation in the Persistence of Discredited Information.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 1980, Vol. 39, No.6, 1037-1049.

	United States	35 %
	France	23 %
	United Kingdom	7 %
	Canada	6 %
	India	2 %
	Australia	2 %
	Germany	2 %
	Spain	2 %
	Netherlands	1 %
	Italy	1 %
	Romania	1 %
	Sweden	1 %
	Switzerland	1 %
	Ireland	1 %

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Red (team) Analysis

Strategic Foresight & Warning, Anticipatory Intelligence, Political Risk Assessment

Tag Archives: worldview

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