This whole economic mess has everyone scrambling to name our state of affairs, to proclaim the beginning or the end of something. Adbusters went so far as to create "True Cost Economics", a kind of New Age paradigm shift where we scrap GDP, among other ideas.
We're so full of it. If we could correctly predict economic reality, or had a real handle on the emergence in financial markets, we'd be in a different place in our economy. The truth is, no amount of financial brilliance can unlock the complexities and codes at the core of our economic life. It's a mess, get used to it.
I'm a fan of Joseph Schumpeter, his notion on the dangers of "circular flow", and the value of entrepreneurialism, and "creative distraction". Shumpeters economic theory proposed that economic calamity would often accompany disruptive technologies, new ideas, new industries and new ways of doing business. It's the unfortunate price we pay to have a growing economy. It means, from time to time, we're going to have these shifts, this pain. Scumpeter argued that the end of Capitalism wouldn't necessarily come at the hands of an angry proletariat, rather it would be our discontent with times like these, and our insistence on trying to resolve it through government interventions.
Instead of declaring the end of our capitalistic society, wouldn't it be more useful to develop a kind of new world "resilience", a responsive "flexibility" in which we recognized why these times happen?
I've studied street vendors and performers for the past 20 years. In each case, they operate in environments that are often hostile to their "contributions" to the local street economy. I recall watching a young tap dancer, a 12 year old kid with shining black tap shoes and a piece of cut plywood, dancing on the sidewalk in the French Quarter of New Orleans. He was terrific, he made some money, and then almost as quickly a couple of police officers chased him away. A few minutes later, he appeared further down the street and did another dance..until the law came down again.
This dancer understood that he needed to remain flexible, he had to have a path out. He knew there were ways he could respond and still make money. I'm not advocating breaking the law, but on some level, the street performer has always managed to work around the often cumbersome and unnecessary ordinances that prohibit performers from visibly working. Creative flexibility.
Resilience means we have the ability to "rebound or spring back" from change and challenge. The street performer is the image of flexibility and resilience. A heckler is expected, distractions are embraced, creative challenges create more creative ideas. If we're in business, we can't afford to waste time talking about how bad things are or to gnash our collective teeth that the sky is falling. We should be weary of analytically certain experts, and intellectual one-upsmanship that provides impressive sounding answers. Instead, lets's embrace what is, deal with the hand we've been dealt, and work together to respond in a way that brings us back into flow. Sometimes that means nothing more than waiting and patience.
Listen, we all know it's not going to get better right away, but it will come back. It seems to me, the less time we spend listening to those that likely can't predict the future any better than the rest of us, no matter which political point of view they endorse, the more time we can invest on keeping it lean, getting out there and being seen, and cultivating our resilience...together.
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