Postcards from March 2020: Where do we go from here? And how do we get there?
By Paul Dowsett, Written March 30, 2020
Well, here we are, solidly into 2020 — and just about to begin the ‘old’ new year on April 1st.
For some fun, read about April Fools on Snopes.
March 2020 will go down in the history books — the month that the world changed.
Transitions are great times for reflection and for change.
‘Out with the old, in with the new’, is a well-known phrase.
Way back in 2017, John Mauldin, writing in Forbes, warned us about The Great Reset.
Mauldin wrote, “As it hits, we will have to deal with the largest twin bubbles in the history of the world. One of those bubbles is global debt, especially government debt. The other is the even larger bubble of government promises.
These promises add up to hundreds of trillions of dollars. That’s vastly larger than global GDP.
These are real problems we must face. It will mean forging a new social contract. It will also require changes to taxes and the economy. I believe that within the next 5–10 years, we have to end the debt and government promises.”
Although, here in March 2020 we seem to be right-on-schedule, Mauldin didn’t tell us how this Great Reset was going to be triggered, however he did write that, “No matter what, hard choices will bring political and market turmoil.”
Well, yup, if this is the Great Reset, then it sure has.
Our current market turmoil appears to have been triggered by the one-two punch of an oil war between Russia and Saudi Arabia coupled with the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. For WBOC News on March 9, 2020, Cassandra Semyon writes about this one-two punch.
The oil war was very much dominating the news, until it was overshadowed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
This pandemic has got me researching the Black Death that ravaged Europe starting in the late 1340s — way, way back. Much horrible death was caused by the Black Death — mostly because there was no understanding of germ transmission — and, thankfully, we should be spared such horror.
Reminder: wash your hands and practice physical distancing, while strengthening social ties !
Medieval scholars looked to the heavens to understand what had caused the pandemic. It was understood to be a particular alignment of the Sun and the Moon, with Jupiter and Saturn. Today, for those who want to go there, the Lunar Planner is telling us that, “In the year 2020, three major planetary cycles complete and begin anew, creating a “Societal Reset” and the start of “The Great Transformation” occurring throughout the new decade, 2020–2030.” Have fun down that ‘prophetic’ rabbit-hole.
Now, back to the 14th century. With historical perspective, there was a marked improvement in people’s quality of life when comparing that of 1340 to that of 1360. For one, it is argued that the Black Death was instrumental in the end of feudalism. Feudalism held in place three social classes, those who fight — the aristocracy; those who pray — the religious orders of priests, monks, and nuns; and those who work — the labourers who supported the other classes, in return for protection by the aristocracy and for intervention with God by the religious orders. Feudalism was a social system with no possibility of social advancement.
By 1360, there were far fewer of ‘those who work’ and they were able to command higher pay for their work. With more land available and with various revolts like the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381, the old system was forced to change.
Tusker Geographica outlines how a new class became possible, a merchant class that could compete with the aristocracy in wealth and social prestige, and with whom they started to intermarry.
“By the 15th century, merchants were the elite class of many towns and their guilds controlled the town government.”
Further, “[t]he success of merchants brought a higher standard of living to the towns. The quality of streets were very important to merchants and, with the cooperation of the king, they would try to make sure that streets were in proper working order and construction would never take too long. Sanitation was always a concern and where merchants had their way, trash would be picked up on a regular basis. Merchants also had a high interest in making sure law-enforcement in town was of the highest caliber it could be, thereby improving safety for all citizens.”
Here was the beginning of our modern, western political and municipal standards, and part of the better quality of life than had existed in 1340.
Remember now that Mauldin wrote that the Great Reset of 2020 “will mean forging a new social contract.” Why can such a new social contract not involve a better quality of life for all people in the 21st century?
Mauldin may not have foreseen the one-two punch of an oil war and a pandemic to trigger the Great Reset, but here we are. For me, this prompts the questions of, “where to from here, and how?”
It would appear that I am not the only one asking such questions.
For example, David Byrne — yes that David Byrne — on March 28th, writes in Reasons to be Cheerful that, “The pandemic is revealing the many ways our lives intersect. Is this an opportunity for us to reimagine what we can be?”
Add to that, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, on March 23rd, questions the continuance of capitalism when he spoke to Emily Maitlis on the BBC Nightly News about how to care for others in the coronavirus crisis. Williams opined that, “The apparently sacred cows of capitalism are going to be slaughtered.”
To take a deeper dive into why quality of life, not GDP, should be our measure of success read this March 20th article from The Correspondent.
I have no doubt, yes, even hope, that when the present situation resolves itself into something, there will be a tremendous opportunity for those of us who want to do things differently and who have a plan.
Writing for CBC Arts On March 26th, Alicia Elliot asks as a headline, “After the crisis, what kind of world do we want?”, and gives us a guide that “Post-apocalyptic novels hold lessons — and warnings.”
Elliot continues by asking: “While [today, we have] a pretty clear idea of what our individual, immediate futures will look like — more social distancing, more sickness — we still don’t have any idea what our collective future will look like. What’s going to happen when this global pandemic opens our eyes to the cruelty of our priorities, the callousness of our society? Can we really go back to the way things were before? Can we really close our eyes again and pretend we haven’t seen what’s been right in front of us all along?”
“…the me-first, trust-no-one mentality the man [in Cormac McCarthy’s novel The Road] relies on to get by is exactly the sort of behaviour our society has pushed all along.”
Elliot’s questioning goes on with, “Art gives me hope. Will we take those values, that hope and use them to imagine a better collective future? Or will we remain in a holding pattern, helplessly watching ourselves make the same mistakes over and over?”
“Are we going to take this moment to stand up for the most vulnerable among us and ensure their needs are met? What about ourselves, in our everyday lives? So many grocery stores have had their stock almost entirely depleted as customers think about themselves and only themselves while under quarantine. So many people have continued to go out unnecessarily. Is that the kind of community we want to create right now — the sort where everyone continues to care for themselves above all else, putting other peoples’ lives at risk without a second thought? The kind that values the market over the lives of the people who make up that market?”
Yuval Noah Hariri, writing in the Financial Times on March 20th, tells us that, “This storm will pass. But the choices we make now could change our lives for years to come.”
Yes, many people will want to return to the ‘normal’ that we just left.
Yet, many others will want to rebuild something quite different.
These people will be looking for leaders …with a plan.
At this point, I think that we should lead with ways to support each other’s physical, social, mental, and financial health.
Over the next days, weeks, and months, these four ‘healths’ are all about to get seriously stressed in ways that we can’t yet imagine.
Some sober, calm thought has been given to the question of rebuilding with a focus on community health and is collected in the book Healthy, Resilient, and Sustainable Communities After Disasters: Strategies, Opportunities, and Planning for Recovery published in 2015 by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
The authors tell us that it is important to recognize that, “In the devastation that follows a major disaster, there is a need for multiple sectors to unite and devote new resources to support the rebuilding of infrastructure, the provision of health and social services, the restoration of care delivery systems, and other critical recovery needs.”
Their book, “Healthy, Resilient, and Sustainable Communities After Disasterscalls for actions at multiple levels to facilitate recovery strategies that optimize community health. With a shared healthy community vision, strategic planning that prioritizes health, and coordinated implementation, disaster recovery can result in a communities that are healthier, more livable places for current and future generations to grow and thrive — communities that are better prepared for future adversities.”
While this book may look mainly at three of the four healths — physical, social, and mental — we know that financial health has a major effect on the other three.
While, at this stage, I still have more questions than answers, I can soundly offer the following advice:
Hang on.
Ride this tsunami.
Hope that we survive.
See where we land.
Plan to rebuild together from there.
Let’s use this time of physical distancing to make sure that we are strengthening our social cohesion.
Over and over, it has been proven that communities with greater social cohesion have been the most resilient to shocks and have recovered better and faster.
My task for you during this pause is to give some serious thought to the type of society to which you want to re-emerge …and how you can help us to get there.
Feel free to connect with me at info@sustainable.to.
Nature is giving humanity the amazing opportunity to collectively hit ‘pause’.
This could be our cocoon period, which we entered as caterpillars to re-emerge as beautiful butterflies.
What force is compelling us to realize that we’re all in this together?
Images sources
The Tower, Hamilton Facebook Page
Mari Andrew (@bymariandrew)
