I went to a resilience workshop yesterday and think I was supposed to come away feeling all inspired. To the same end, I watch TED talks and go to quite a few workshops and goodness knows, I've even run workshops that are focused on creating social change.
However, the more I listen or watch, the more I'm starting to get get depressed and feel pretty inadequate, hearing all these inspiring stories of resilience and community and super human people doing amazing things with no difficulty at all! I find myself wondering if I'm the only person to have found building social change so hard.
My experiences working to build up a greater sense of community in my part of the world seem to involve a lot of work and need a great deal of patience. Not only that, they very often involve personal risk, frustration, negotiation, disappointment and grind - things that really are difficult and that wear me down. Given that so many others find it easy (apparently) should I give up now and go and do something that would be a bit more rewarding? What am I doing wrong, I find myself asking.
I've been watching a few videos on storytelling and I"m starting to realise that these sweetness and light stories aren't really even good stories! The structure of a good story involves having a hook, a hold and a payoff. The hook in my world is the desire to see things changing/ happening/ building. The hold is the bit that shows some struggle and that mean the outcome is uncertain - situations that help the story recipient feel how the main character really wanted to give up but they kept going through thick and thin in the face of all that and finally achieved what they set out to do or not (the payoff (which might also be a loss).
So now I'm really starting to want some stories that don't just tell me about the finished, shiny new result - I want to them to show the difficulties that people faced and how they got through them. If it was all easy then frankly it is quite a boring story and I guess the inspiration is in the idea of what has been done or the idea rather than in the process of doing it.
It would make for a much more engaging story if it has some of the hard stuff in it too - so I guess that might be my mission - composing a story that does involve struggle and does inspire through the achievement of the vision even though it was hard. I still wonder though - are I and the people I talk with day to day the only ones who finds making change difficult?
My long term interest is in environmental issues and in learning about how we can change to address those issues.
Sunday, 3 November 2013
Tuesday, 13 August 2013
All those people and all that work behind Rosa Parks...
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Rosa Parks |
Understanding that helps to give me hope because frankly a lot of activism is pretty unrewarding and tiring.You do things and nothing happens or perhaps, very little happens. Many give up and decide they've done their dash, perhaps because they've burnt out or got sick or become too cynical.
It helps me enormously to know that every little bit does actually count and that we can't all be Rosa Parks. Most of us will be the nameless people in the background who set the situation up. In Parks' case, there were those who convinced her to join the cause, trained her up, worked with white communities to sow seeds that sprouted and grew strong when Parks did her thing. There were the groups who raised money for the cause, the lawyers who moved in to defend Rosa and so on. There were countless hours, months and years of activism going on before the change happened. Who knew when or how or even if the change would happen, but those involved kept on trying to change things because they simply believed that it was the right thing to do and that it needed doing.
So, while it seems that we (ie all human beings on this planet) keep on walking into an environmental crisis of rather alarming proportions, it is also clear that we have to keep working with hope. No matter what we do to help raise awareness or make a difference - even in very small ways - it is helping change the system so that one day an environmental Rosa Parks incident might just create the change we are working for.
I only hope that this happens soon (although I have to accept that perhaps it won't). In the meantime though I'm just going to take whatever (small and insignificant) steps I can in the knowledge that it all counts! It's important to do it even when it seems hopeless - just as the civil rights cause must have felt back in Rosa Parks' time.
Organised activisim is more effective!
I've just been talking with some people about being an activist, and I realised as I did that that perhaps my take home message is it pays dividends to be organised when you are an activist - at least the kind of activist taking part in political processes.
I reflected a bit on this in a previous post, but realise now that there is a bit more to it.
As I've mentioned it is good to get many submissions into something that you want to see change. This has worked for cycling advocates at local government level in Christchurch, However it has made no difference whatsoever at national government level over the last couple of years, whether that be around the GCSB bill, the Government Policy Statement on Transport or changes to the RMA and even things associated with CERA.
Timing probably also matters: Possibly the government will be more tractable next year when they are facing an election (although I"m also sure that they won't put up anything contentious as they have in years 1 and 2 of this election cycle). Likewise, getting the CCC to change its mind may be easier in an election year, if you can prove that a lot of people feel this way, for example!
There is also the small problem of the enormous amount of work that has to go into a submission, particularly if you have to do the whole thing yourself - read the appropriate documents (and often to write an effective submission it is helpful to know quite a lot of background (like how transport planning works in the case of supporting cycling or walking), think about the implications and then gather evidence to support your comments. Being linked to a group of people with similar interests can help to spread the load and can also mean you can collect lots of ideas to support your viewpoint and indeed the ideas might help you form your viewpoint.
Of course, those of us who are activists also know that there is way more that we could be doing but of course we simply can't do it. I often see a call for me to write submission on topics that I do care about and I know matter, but I have to just think "hopefully someone else out there is looking out for that because right now I just can't." In this latter case, if I do have a bit of time and I have access to some background information, then I might put something together in my own words or send in something to say I support that submission. But I won't if that information is not there because I simply don't have time. So this says something about how useful I find it being networked with people who have different interests and who can keep me up with the play on what his happening.
These days, social media and the internet can help with this kind of organisation, although it is also clear that these need to be treated with an awareness that they may not be entirely private!
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What every political activist needs! |
As I've mentioned it is good to get many submissions into something that you want to see change. This has worked for cycling advocates at local government level in Christchurch, However it has made no difference whatsoever at national government level over the last couple of years, whether that be around the GCSB bill, the Government Policy Statement on Transport or changes to the RMA and even things associated with CERA.
Timing probably also matters: Possibly the government will be more tractable next year when they are facing an election (although I"m also sure that they won't put up anything contentious as they have in years 1 and 2 of this election cycle). Likewise, getting the CCC to change its mind may be easier in an election year, if you can prove that a lot of people feel this way, for example!
There is also the small problem of the enormous amount of work that has to go into a submission, particularly if you have to do the whole thing yourself - read the appropriate documents (and often to write an effective submission it is helpful to know quite a lot of background (like how transport planning works in the case of supporting cycling or walking), think about the implications and then gather evidence to support your comments. Being linked to a group of people with similar interests can help to spread the load and can also mean you can collect lots of ideas to support your viewpoint and indeed the ideas might help you form your viewpoint.
Of course, those of us who are activists also know that there is way more that we could be doing but of course we simply can't do it. I often see a call for me to write submission on topics that I do care about and I know matter, but I have to just think "hopefully someone else out there is looking out for that because right now I just can't." In this latter case, if I do have a bit of time and I have access to some background information, then I might put something together in my own words or send in something to say I support that submission. But I won't if that information is not there because I simply don't have time. So this says something about how useful I find it being networked with people who have different interests and who can keep me up with the play on what his happening.
These days, social media and the internet can help with this kind of organisation, although it is also clear that these need to be treated with an awareness that they may not be entirely private!
Tuesday, 6 August 2013
This is not the time to get depressed and give up!
I read this, this morning and couldn't actually read it right through (and I"m not recommending you attempt it either. You can the gist by looking at it very quickly. The unashamed stupidity of the world amazed, me ... in a bad way.
The trouble is that increasingly I'm aware that all this scary information doesn't change things. .. on its own, that is. Also, pretty much anyone reading this blog is likely to be aware of the environmental issues facing us and this post and this post, outline something of how the social structures that we live in help keep it that way.
Sometimes when I look at all this, I'm sad. I've had quite a few conversations with other people who are also sad and scared about what they see happening. I find that many of us are feeling lost and little, and paralysed by the enormity of the issues, and it's a heavy burden to carry. But at the same time, our environmental crisis is NOT and never will be a spectator sport, as this interesting website puts it and our unpleasant feelings actually won't go away if we just do nothing. In short, they are not a reason to avoid engaging with the issues as they unfold or avoiding doing something to It is not going to help anyone (even ourselves) to keep burying our head in the sand and hoping that the crisis will pass if we stop looking at it. It won't!
For me at the moment there is hope at the end of this talk by Jared Diamond and in this talk by Johan Rockstom. As Diamond puts it, just about ANYTHING that we take action on could make a difference in the long term and might help 'bend the lines' as Rockstrom puts it.
It's is also good to recognise that sadness arises because the world is actually also a source of joy and love, as well as worry and fear. Recognising the joy and love, and the goodness in people is a good reason for looking the issues directly in the eye and to keep trying to make a difference.
These things can give meaning to the actions that we choose to take whether that is leaving the car at home wherever possible, minimising our consumption, learning how to garden, helping out a neighbour, finding ways to build and join collective actions working to improve the cohesion and resilience of our communities or helping people understand the power of collective action - whatever that action might be, life is not a spectator sport, and right now, this is life in the early 21st century. Go for it and learn how to enjoy the action.
The trouble is that increasingly I'm aware that all this scary information doesn't change things. .. on its own, that is. Also, pretty much anyone reading this blog is likely to be aware of the environmental issues facing us and this post and this post, outline something of how the social structures that we live in help keep it that way.
Sometimes when I look at all this, I'm sad. I've had quite a few conversations with other people who are also sad and scared about what they see happening. I find that many of us are feeling lost and little, and paralysed by the enormity of the issues, and it's a heavy burden to carry. But at the same time, our environmental crisis is NOT and never will be a spectator sport, as this interesting website puts it and our unpleasant feelings actually won't go away if we just do nothing. In short, they are not a reason to avoid engaging with the issues as they unfold or avoiding doing something to It is not going to help anyone (even ourselves) to keep burying our head in the sand and hoping that the crisis will pass if we stop looking at it. It won't!
For me at the moment there is hope at the end of this talk by Jared Diamond and in this talk by Johan Rockstom. As Diamond puts it, just about ANYTHING that we take action on could make a difference in the long term and might help 'bend the lines' as Rockstrom puts it.
It's is also good to recognise that sadness arises because the world is actually also a source of joy and love, as well as worry and fear. Recognising the joy and love, and the goodness in people is a good reason for looking the issues directly in the eye and to keep trying to make a difference.
These things can give meaning to the actions that we choose to take whether that is leaving the car at home wherever possible, minimising our consumption, learning how to garden, helping out a neighbour, finding ways to build and join collective actions working to improve the cohesion and resilience of our communities or helping people understand the power of collective action - whatever that action might be, life is not a spectator sport, and right now, this is life in the early 21st century. Go for it and learn how to enjoy the action.
Tuesday, 23 July 2013
Echoes of inequality and its effects through the ages
I've just read a fascinating article in New Scientist (18th August 2012
P46-49) about a mathematical ecologist by the name of Peter Turchin who has
turned his hand to developing models based on history. Turchin notes that there are cycles inequalityand civil unrest and that their length is approximately two generations. This two generation idea captured my attention because I'd read about Kondratieff,a Russian economist, who noted economic cycles of approximately 50-60 years. I had always thought that this was about two generations: i.e. enough time for people to forget and, once again,
allow the conditions that caused the problems to reoccur.
As a modeller, Turchin is essentially looking for patterns across different
histories and societies around the world. All models simplify reality and his model leaves
out the effects
of climate change, or of remarkable individuals (for example), both of
which have had significant effects on past societies. However, the model provides a way to take lessons from the past and project them into the future, to
make predictions. Turchin predicts major
civil unrest in the US and Europe around 2020 - not that far away (he adds that
he hopes that he is wrong about this). As part of his reasoning, he points to problems
with the distribution of resources across the population - something that he
argues is destabilising the social order.
Why does this excite me? As a
social scientist I am aware that civil unrest is very likely to be the outcome of overpopulation and us hitting resource limits. In these, I also include climate change and its predicted effects. When resources
become scarce, and the uneven distribution of these resources makes it difficult for much of the
population to provide for their children, you have a system "primed with people who feel that they have very little to lose. However, Turchin notes that it is not the poor who
usually rise up. Generally
the rich and powerful are the ones who incite unrest because they want to
increase their status and power. As we saw in Rwanda, the unrest can be triggered by people who incite violence by scapegoating a section of the community, but the underlying instability comes from the lack of resources.
We could work to do something about this - tax the rich, prevent them getting
all the economic advantages they currently do, ensuring fair pay for employees
(a decent living wage), work at community level to get people to know each other well and to learn to pool resources. But, as we've
seen, those
in power are acting to prevent the rest of us from learning what is going
on and many of us feel too busy to do much and lack a plan of action or even to get to know our neighbours.
The other thing that Turchin’s work suggests to me is the importance
of respecting all knowledge if we are to build a sustainable society. The learning and ideas of young people give a
society huge adaptive capacity, but it is equally important that this knowledge
sits alongside the knowledge and collective experience of a society’s older
members rather than just discarding it as outdated. It is this that can help us move past repeating
the mistakes of the past.
Check out more about 'cliodynamics'
(the mathematical study of history) here
Friday, 19 July 2013
Economy and Environment intrinsically connected
I know many of you will already know this. It is obvious when one uses a strong sustainability lens that our economy relies on the many ecosystem services and resources that nature provides although I do know some economists who disagree with this. However, recently I've come to understand the interlinking of the two in a slightly different way.
For some years now I've been concerned about climate change and peak oil and in fact peak everything (read the likelihood that the human race has moved into overshoot and has used up many of the resources that we rely on in the present day). I have even spent a bit of time being an activist around this - usually in relation to local transport issues but also keeping my eye on the bigger picture.
I went to a talk the other night at the one of the local universities. It was Robert Wade talking about inequality and may parts of it grabbed me. The guts of his argument was that inequality of wealth is a major issue in today's world, and while many people are working on poverty, it would appear that we need to be thinking at least as much about the problems of too much wealth at the top. Many people don't see that the economic structure that creates a small number of super rich people is what keeps millions if not billions in poverty.
On a worldwide scale, for example the world's richest 300 (yes, three hundred) people control the same wealth as the world's poorest 3 billion people (i.e. more than the populations of India, China, the US and Brazil combined). On top of that the top 1% are also commandeering most of the economic growth where the costs of that are shared amongst us all. Most economic policy in places like the US, the UK, parts of Europe and in New Zealand amongst lead to the rich getting richer and the poor becoming more so.
Prof Wade argued cogently that the rich control governments through funding arrangements and by their close relationships with those in government in some countries and therefore what we think of as a democracy is in fact a plutocracy that works for the advantage of the rich.
Add to this that the richer people get (and any of us are potentially susceptible to this) are less generous, less empathic, more likely to consider the poor are there because of their individual failings and also that they feel insulated from the bad things that happen to other people.
And now you have a recipe for why our environment continues to be degraded, and why all the warnings about the awful effects of climate change continue to be ignored by governments. In other words, it seems very likely to me that until something happens - e.g. people take action, a mighty financial crash happens (both things that have happened in the past, and which look both immanent and very likely), we will make no progress on climate change, transitioning to new forms of energy or even looking squarely at the issues of peak everything!
The rich feel that it won't affect them and that they will have the resources to buffer themselves from any bad weather or loss of energy. Jared Diamond discussed this in his book Collapse noting that more it was egalitarian societies that changed or transitioned rather than collapsing and disasppearing. The greater the inequality, the less adaptable we are, and yes the rich may be able last longer than many of the poor (under some circumstances) but it may not not necessarily be the case.
There is obviously more and I can think of a few questions about this but this is something I suspect that environmentalists may need to consider.
For some years now I've been concerned about climate change and peak oil and in fact peak everything (read the likelihood that the human race has moved into overshoot and has used up many of the resources that we rely on in the present day). I have even spent a bit of time being an activist around this - usually in relation to local transport issues but also keeping my eye on the bigger picture.
I went to a talk the other night at the one of the local universities. It was Robert Wade talking about inequality and may parts of it grabbed me. The guts of his argument was that inequality of wealth is a major issue in today's world, and while many people are working on poverty, it would appear that we need to be thinking at least as much about the problems of too much wealth at the top. Many people don't see that the economic structure that creates a small number of super rich people is what keeps millions if not billions in poverty.
On a worldwide scale, for example the world's richest 300 (yes, three hundred) people control the same wealth as the world's poorest 3 billion people (i.e. more than the populations of India, China, the US and Brazil combined). On top of that the top 1% are also commandeering most of the economic growth where the costs of that are shared amongst us all. Most economic policy in places like the US, the UK, parts of Europe and in New Zealand amongst lead to the rich getting richer and the poor becoming more so.
Prof Wade argued cogently that the rich control governments through funding arrangements and by their close relationships with those in government in some countries and therefore what we think of as a democracy is in fact a plutocracy that works for the advantage of the rich.
Add to this that the richer people get (and any of us are potentially susceptible to this) are less generous, less empathic, more likely to consider the poor are there because of their individual failings and also that they feel insulated from the bad things that happen to other people.
And now you have a recipe for why our environment continues to be degraded, and why all the warnings about the awful effects of climate change continue to be ignored by governments. In other words, it seems very likely to me that until something happens - e.g. people take action, a mighty financial crash happens (both things that have happened in the past, and which look both immanent and very likely), we will make no progress on climate change, transitioning to new forms of energy or even looking squarely at the issues of peak everything!
The rich feel that it won't affect them and that they will have the resources to buffer themselves from any bad weather or loss of energy. Jared Diamond discussed this in his book Collapse noting that more it was egalitarian societies that changed or transitioned rather than collapsing and disasppearing. The greater the inequality, the less adaptable we are, and yes the rich may be able last longer than many of the poor (under some circumstances) but it may not not necessarily be the case.
There is obviously more and I can think of a few questions about this but this is something I suspect that environmentalists may need to consider.
Monday, 15 July 2013
Cycle Action
This blog continues from my old blog and I've started it mainly as a way of rationalising the many different things I contribute to around the place.
I have the urge to write again. As ever, I have major concerns about the state of our environment, the lack of action on the part of governments to deal with the issues and at the same time I'm keen to stay positive or at least, to face it all with some sense of equanimity.
I've also been reflecting a bit on previous experiences - some of which I wrote about in the other blog. One of these is working on cycling advocacy in Christchurch - something that at times has felt like a thankless task. However, despite being considered slightly mad and not worthy of consideration, for quite some years, those of us who work on this considered it important to keep on doing it, albeit to trying doing some things differently.
One of those differences was to work on getting other people to support our work by putting pressure on the City Council. This seems to have been the ingredient that we were missing because since we began this, there appear to have been some major shifts in policy (although they are yet to be put into action on the ground!).
I think my greatest learning from the work that we have done on this is that many people are not apathetic at all. But they are busy, they do feel disempowered and they are not sure what to do. I guess all we did was highlight some relatively simple ways in which they might help, and many took up that challenge - it appears, to good effect!
We may have to keep up the pressure, though, to ensure that our promised cycle network really does materialise!
I have the urge to write again. As ever, I have major concerns about the state of our environment, the lack of action on the part of governments to deal with the issues and at the same time I'm keen to stay positive or at least, to face it all with some sense of equanimity.
I've also been reflecting a bit on previous experiences - some of which I wrote about in the other blog. One of these is working on cycling advocacy in Christchurch - something that at times has felt like a thankless task. However, despite being considered slightly mad and not worthy of consideration, for quite some years, those of us who work on this considered it important to keep on doing it, albeit to trying doing some things differently.
One of those differences was to work on getting other people to support our work by putting pressure on the City Council. This seems to have been the ingredient that we were missing because since we began this, there appear to have been some major shifts in policy (although they are yet to be put into action on the ground!).
I think my greatest learning from the work that we have done on this is that many people are not apathetic at all. But they are busy, they do feel disempowered and they are not sure what to do. I guess all we did was highlight some relatively simple ways in which they might help, and many took up that challenge - it appears, to good effect!
We may have to keep up the pressure, though, to ensure that our promised cycle network really does materialise!
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