2023 FUTURE OBSERVATORY
2023 FUTURE OBSERVATORY
Some years ago, we made the fundamental observation that - in society - 'forces add in conjunction and subtract in opposition'. We believed that this should be self-evident, and still so believe; nothing has happened since to change our minds - indeed the obvious failures of government policy in the 1990s have reinforced our argument. Despite their failures, however, most politicians still believe exactly the opposite! We leave you to make up your own mind on this score.
With the end of the global ideological conflict the one remaining public confrontation, albeit one which has had to be engineered by those who seek confrontation, is that between those -usually of the right - who believe that the most important thing is to make the economy work as efficiently as possible and those - usually of the left - who prefer to concentrate on looking after the unfortunates who get the least from the economy. The confrontation between left and right is becoming much less relevant to most of the electorate. In any case, whilst competition for scarce resources in this way - by both sides of the debate - might be understandable - indeed it is fundamental to market economics (which is, once more paradoxically, now accepted by both sides - left and right) - it makes little sense when such resources are no longer scarce. Instead, it makes much more sense to co-operate with others to create the better society that you, and they, desire; it should be possible to create wealth efficiently and share it. Unfortunately, this is an unfashionable view in politics; even many of those on the Left have abandoned it, for supposed electoral advantage in a society which they now see as essentially greedy. On the other hand, the classic work of Robert Axelrod, on the outcome of competitive activities (encapsulated in games theory as the 'Prisoner's Dilemma'), shows that - outside of politics - honesty always pays dividends; as does co-operation. Despite the collapse of the Left's egalitarian instincts, this is a fundamental issue for there are now sufficient resources for almost everyone to create their ideal environment and lifestyle; without detracting from those of anyone else. Co-operation should be the way to future prosperity for all.
Fortunately, the linkage between the individual and society is now widely recognised, amongst the electorate at least; if not amongst all politicians. Indeed, it is only the most dogmatic politician, such as Margaret Thatcher, who would consider saying that 'there is no such thing as society! In addition, our own research shows that even amongst those supposedly most committed to competition - private sector business organisations - co-operation is the rule in the wider community. When confronted directly by major competitors, half of all organisations chose the route of co-operation and, in the acid test, only a third said that they priced their products with competition in mind!
Indeed, in the face of such common-sense, it represented a major triumph of some sort for Western politicians to have persuaded so much of the world that the only acceptable political (and economic) process was (still) that of competition! The greatest political coup of the 1980s may have been the seduction of the western electorate as a whole - as well as that in the ex-communist countries - persuading it to commit to a continuation of previous ('reactionary') philosophies. These may have been newly dignified by the theorists as 'competitive individualism but they were more accurately characterised by cynics as simple greed! The market was, thus, the battle-field where competing offerings (political as well as economic) were to be tested against each other - where the strongest would ultimately triumph.
The strength of this ideology is such that, even in anonymous attitude surveys, managers will understate the degree to which they co-operate - because this represents behaviour they expect to be seen as unacceptable by others. The RSA (Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufacture & Commerce, in the UK) inquiry into the future of business - 'Tomorrow's Company' - thus reflects the public position of such organisations when it reports the 1994 Cooper & Lybrand 'Middle Market Survey' as saying that '73 per cent of companies still favour the adversarial approach in their supplier relationships'. For politicians, unfortunately, the effect is even more marked, and overt co-operation is almost totally unacceptable even in practice. It is almost true to say that politics have become the continuation of war by other means; rather than the other way around! It seems that the only time when it is permissible to collaborate with the enemy, represented by the opposition parties, is when jointly confronted by the worst enemy of all - the electorate!
The personal philosophy of 'competitive individualism' is now also being undermined by the revolutionary forces sweeping through society. Indeed, as a cover for greed, it was never truly sustainable.
New models of democracy, based on co-operation, are needed. They are currently being explored by a number of countries - not least some of those emerging from the shadow of communism (which promised such co-operation, but rarely delivered it) - but no widely accepted (or demonstrably viable) model has yet emerged. Even so, it is likely that the search will be expanded as the now fatal flaws of the (western) competitive model become more obvious.
In the view of the Group of Lisbon, co-operation is, in particular, needed at the global level "...a need exists to develop a new generation of social global contracts, both tacit and explicit, to identify the best co-operative solutions in the interests of the greatest number of people and nations."
Stewart Lansley again points out, "The first half of the post-war era that brought the beginnings of the transition from scarcity to affluence was characterised by the sharing of success”
15 May 2003
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