People will rarely acknowledge that an accustomed way of life is unsustainable except in the face of prolonged devastating failure. - Joseph Tainter
We are in a perfect storm of five emerging and interacting crises: a viral pandemic; an economic collapse; accelerating climate change; an increasing socio-political divide driven by racism, inequality, and identity; and a crisis of leadership. And of course, a few more minor problems such as our deteriorating infrastructure (e.g., housing, roads, bridges, dams, airports, train stations, and railroads). And inadequate education for preparing our students to compete in a post-industrial globalized advanced technological world on one side and poverty, homelessness, and helplessness on the other. This is a world where approximately the top 85 people have as much wealth as the bottom 3,500,000,000 people. Yet, we need solutions and sooner is better than later. Are we up to solving problems of this magnitude? Can we mitigate, adapt, and innovate fast enough? Are we sufficiently resilient? Time will tell and time will be measured in months and years, not decades or centuries.
Coronavirus emerged as a viral pandemic in early 2020. As of September 2020, it infected over 27 million people worldwide, over 6.5 million in the U.S. and killed about 200,000 people in the U.S. Given a death rate of approximately 1,000 people a day, there may be around 250,000 U.S. deaths by the November 3, 2020 election. This number, 250,000, is vastly larger than the number of U.S. deaths in the Korean War, Vietnam, 911, and the Gulf Wars combined. Another perspective is that this number is about 66 times the number of deaths in 9/11, or about 8 such 9/11s each month beginning in March through September 2020. Time goes on. As of November 2021, the covid death count in the U.S. approaches 800,000 and still climbing. Fortunately vaccinations became available beginning in February 2021 and by fall of 2021, most adults who want to be vaccinated were. Yet, and still, millions more anti-vaxxers refused a life-saving vaccination. Amazing!
Looking at the U.S. economy, while the stock market is doing well, the number of unemployed people is around 40 million (Forbes, July 2020) and potentially millions more if the economy cannot be restarted soon. What might the effect be on homelessness if people cannot afford rent, food, healthcare, and transportation? What will happen to the kids if school is closed for the remainder of the year or longer? What effect does isolation have on senior citizens, working adults, and kids? Will see an increase of homeless people and families on the streets? We cannot even take care of the those already there.
The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (July 2020) reported about 52.8% of the population that can work has a job right now. The Labor Department (July 2020) estimated Americans have filed 47 million unemployment claims in the last 14 weeks March through June, surpassing the number of claims filed during the Great Recession. For now, and the foreseeable future, jobs do not exist for those who want them as of late 2020. Yet things change. As we gradually come out of covid, thanks to vaccinations, we see a 180 change wherein lot of jobs cannot find people to fill them as of fall 2021.
Climate change is real, whether one believes in science or not. We have known about the greenhouse effect caused by CO2 or carbon dioxide for over 150 years. This is not a new dreamed up idea for scientists to request research grants. The IPPC (2020) predicts we have about 12 years to make serious progress on reducing CO2 emissions. In simple terms, this means reducing the burning of fossil fuels and on the flip side, moving to clean energy sources such as solar, wind, geothermal, hydro, and nuclear. Currently we are making progress toward clean energy, but not fast enough. The IPCC estimates that we need to reduce global carbon emissions by 40% by 2030. If not, we will face a global climate catastrophe, which will come in the form of rising sea levels, ocean acidification, extreme weather (e.g., storms, floods, heat, droughts, and wildfires), biodiversity loss, the loss of fresh water, and so on. We need to innovate, mitigate, and adapt much faster than we are. Can we do this in 10 years? 12 years? 20 years? Ever? If not, then what?
According to a recent report in the New York Times Magazine on climate change, about 1% of the world is barely livable today. By 2070 or within 50 years, about 19% of the world will be barely livable, resulting in human global migrations north well before then. What would millions of climate refugees migrating from Mexico, Central, and South America to the U.S. look like? What would millions of climate refugees migrating from Africa to Europe look like?
Klein (2020) noted that the U.S. polarization is driven by three factors: racism, inequality, and identity. Pew Research (2020) noted that the U.S. is more polarized than at any time since the Civil War. We have seen protests and marches for the months of June and July and globally, not just in the U.S. Are we making real progress on unifying and closing these divisions? As Bishop (2008) noted America may be more diverse than ever coast to coast, but the places where we live are becoming increasingly crowded with people who live, think, and vote like we do
. That is, we sort ourselves out by people like us. We live in the same country, but inhabit different worlds. There is a phrase for this and it is voluntary segregation. Consider whether for forces for unification or inclusion are stronger than the forces for division. Thus, far division is winning in the U.S.
Demographically, the U.S. is becoming browner and over the next 20 to 25 years, white Caucasians will become the new minority. Given the extent of racism in the U.S. today, 150 or so years after the Civil War, how is the leadership in the U.S. going to come to terms with this change? How will conservative religion come to terms with this change? How will American citizens come to terms with this change?
Politically, by 2040, about 50% of the U.S. population (8 states) will elect 16 U.S. Senators while the other 50% of the U.S. population (42 states) will elect 84 U.S. Senators. Taxation without representation? Policies without input? Decision making without representation? Elections without representation?
Leadership is about making things happen and getting things done
as Scholtes noted in his book on leadership with this subtitle. We can and should ask ourselves, what has happened, what is happening, and what might happen to address these crises and problems? What has our government and corporate leadership done lately? Has it been sufficient? Will it be sufficient? Or is there any significant leadership at all? Thus far, as we can observe, leadership has done little to nothing to work on these crises.
Given the volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous or (VUCA) world we now live in and the five crises described, we might ask how we are doing regarding solving them? A good question and worth asking. It turns out, not well, that is we are not doing much as a country to do anything. There is no coordinated leadership at the federal level bringing together the resources we need to begin to solve these problems. The White House has so far walked away from addressing the Covid19 crisis, climate change, the economic collapse, and the socio-political collapse. This is a failure of leadership. These problems are far too complex to be solved by the free market, even if it wanted to. While some state governments and nonprofits are doing a few things, they are too small to make a significant and timely difference. Finally, these crises are global in scope and will require a coordinated effort by governments, business, universities, and nonprofits along with a public that will accept recommendations for action.
Each of these crises individually is more than sufficient to tax the ability of the national and global community to solve it. Collectively; however, the pairwise interactions, three-way interactions, and such make the problems even more serious. For example, climate change and coronavirus crises are coming together in several ways. For example, during the summer months as we have warmer to very hot weather and as millions of middle and low income people live in housing without air conditioning, many will not be able to stay indoors and thus may become another host for Covid19. And older people may simply die of heat related problems. During the winter, people stay indoors more and social distancing may be more of a problem in small spaces. Consider the unemployed, with kids, and/or elderly parents struggling with trying to eat, pay the rent, virtually educate, stay warm, stay healthy, while coping with isolation. During the hurricane season, we can expect potentially more billions of dollars of damage in addition to human suffering and let’s add in coronavirus as people struggle to survive in close quarters without adequate sanitation, masks, and distance.
The first steps in problem solving are of course, to recognize there is a problem and have some desire to solve it. New and enlightened leadership that recognizes problems is needed at all levels of government: federal, state, county, and city. Understanding what the problem or problems are comes next, followed by a plan and the resources to execute the plan. Communications are critical, both to elicit help from those who can contribute and to keep everyone informed regarding progress.
I like the four-point approach Bridges (2016) described as 4-P approach to change or purpose, picture, plan, and part. The purpose describes the outcome of a change being proposed, the picture describes how the outcome will look and feel to everyone, the plan provides the step-by-step approach to achieving the change, and the part gives everyone a part to play in the plan and the outcome. What is holding the U.S. back from planning for solving these interacting crises and the changes that will come?
There is little time to confront and make progress in solving these problems and the longer we postpone, the worse things will become. Typically, the sooner a problem is solved, the less expensive it is to solve. Thus, early detection and correction save time, money, and effort.
No one person can solve these crises; they are global in scope and require global talent and cooperation. This is an all hands-on deck moment if there ever was one. We need to define and agree on a common purpose, to create a positive picture of our future, articulate a realistic plan, and find a part for everyone to participate, to contribute, and to add their value to creating the solutions for our common future. The future will be created by those who are educated and can think abstractly, critically, persuasively, scientifically, and systemically.
In conclusion, with some appropriate comments by Joshua Epstein, Education in its truest sense is not about a saleable skill set. It is about freedom from inherited prejudice and argument by authority.
We need this level of education now. Let us hope we start creating it.
Bishop, B. (2008). The big sort: Why the clustering of like-minded America is tearing us apart. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Bridges, W., & Bridges, S. (2016). Managing transitions: Making the most of change (4th ed.). Da Capo.
Epstein, J. (2008). Why model. Retrieved from http://jasss.soc.surrey.ac.uk/11/4/12.html
IPPC. (2020). The Intergovernmental panel on climate change. Retrieved from https://www.ipcc.ch
Klein, E. (2020). Why we’re polarized. Simon & Schuster.
New York Times. (July 23, 2020). The great climate change migration has begun.
Pew Research. (2020). Retrieved from https://www.pewresearch.org
Scholtes, P. (1997). The leader’s handbook: Making things happen, getting things done. McGraw-Hill.