Let’s Generalize Again

February 23, 2017 Leave a comment

Been a while. But now the world has gone so nutty that a healthy dose of applied generalization is needed, yet again. (And sorry for having left you adrift and alone without guidance for so long).

I’m thinking about the crosscurrents of globalization and what we could call tribalization. Let’s stay with that thought for a minute.

Globalization has led to a power shift, from national governments and regional rule-making institutions such as the OECD or the EU, to global companies – who also are being swept along in great flows of trade and capital. Globalization has helped lift millions out of poverty, but also torn apart safety nets and livelihoods along the way.

The challenges created by globalization include

  • growing inequality, as gains flow to the very wealthy
  • unhealthy dependence on untamed market forces such as commodity trading
  • vulnerability of working and lower middle class groups in developed countries

These challenges, in turn, have created a breeding ground for nationalism, populism and strongman politics. All this is thoroughly pundited upon across cultures and languages. What hasn’t been decoded yet, and applied generalization may just come in handy, is the phenomenon that this institute calls Tribalization.

Tribalization as a phenomenon harks back to how very real early interest groups (e.g. rallying against spear-wielding invaders) were formed. Today, tribalization sees groups form bonds and act on religious beliefs, cultural identities and political convictions.

And this is were the nuttiness emerges.

Facts replaced by falsehoods, called alternative facts. The respect for science is eroding, and climate change or even evolution become a matter of beliefs. Self-interest is elevated to general principles, eroding the norms of discourse and civilized co-existence developed over generations. Bias and prejudice have become acceptable reasons for action.

The 45th president of the US didn’t created this nuttiness, his election is an outcome – which will create more nutty messes, no doubt. The populists across Europe are also expressions of the madness, which they amplify and cement. And the strongman rules we see in Russia and Turkey fan and ride the flames of nuttiness to achieve greater power.

So what can we do? Keep on keeping on. Explain – appealing to the cultural values and motivations of those swept up in the nuttiness. Insist on facts, institutional generosity, humanitarian values – and if you’re a business: deal with stakeholders with overwhelming decency. Nothing yields greater returns than respect.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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2012 – A dose of predictive applied generalization

January 11, 2012 1 Comment

The Institute for Applied Generalization lives in the societal space where journalism, government and NGO policy work, and the needs of communities and individual people, meet business reality; where economic, cultural and historical trends encounter human needs and preconceptions.

So let us spend a minute or two on predictive applied generalization – and think about 2012. What might happen? And can applied generalization at the start of the calendar year – a fairly random point in time – help us approach the near future with more confidence? Or should we adopt the brace position and kiss our behinds goodbye?

The Mayan calendar may push us in that pessimistic direction. The Mayan calendar ends in December. Over. Schluss. Terminado. But, experts on such matters say, this may well means that it restarts the next day, a pre-Columbian reset. The wheel of destiny just takes another turn. It’s a good thought. Certainly better than believing that we’re heading for the end of the world (especially close to Christmas when people will have spent money already).

So the short answer to the question about whether applied generalization will help would be a choice between “don’t know” and “possibly”.

But we’re not looking for short answers here at the Institute for Applied Generalization. We want to wander, stray, probe, poke and drift in the world of plausible and implausible options before we apply generalization to life’s complexities. And leave any conundrum a little less puzzled, just a little winded from the exertion of delivering an uncommon contribution of common sense. Plus from all the pontification that comes so naturally to an experienced applied generalizer.

So what will happen? More changes at global and local level. Yep. Tick. But, as the worlds of geopolitics, business – and everyday life –  are becoming more puzzling and harder to navigate, and developments get a little tougher to predict, who knows, really?

In situations such as the one before us, it is key to adopt the right attitude. The Institute for Applied Generalization recommends a world view based on a sense of optimism. It favors adding a mix of genuine belief in the good side of human nature, and a touch of sardonic cynicism. That is half the secret of being able to apply generalization in a helpful way. Reach beyond the stereotype. 

Let’s not be naive.  Predicitive applied generalization is a  lot harder than the rear view or GPS-like application of generalization with the usual aim of trying to understand how we got some place (or not) and where we are. With predicitive generalization we turn the focus forward and, well, predict.

But the Institute has a general policy based on complete but perhaps a mite unrealistic self-confidence, so here’s some common sense-based advance commentary ahead of events for 2012.

Let’s begin in the United States, where the reflection of reality is becoming more difficult to interpret every year. It is easy to predict that the entertaining but unfit-for-purpose pre-election “discourse” in the US will dominate the news this year. But is is hard to understand why the United States, a nation inhabited by people who respect the law of gravity and otherwise seem fairly even-keeled, is content with the brazen limelight theft conducted by groups on extreme ends of the political spectrum. Politics, it is said, is show business for ugly people. But that saying didn’t intend, orginally, to describe their minds. No improvement is in sight. One indicator for improvement  would be if Fox employed news anchor men (or women) instead of rancor men to preside over its “news” shows. As it is, The Onion, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report more accurately reflect the degree of maturity and sanity in US politics than the networks, who must keep up the pretense that developments like the Tea Party actually offer a realistic political option on how to run the world’s most important country, at home and abroad. Some newspapers do an OK job, but who has the time to read the New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, the Financial Times or the Neue Zuercher Zeitung?

In Europe, the euro-fuelled handwringing in European capitals will continue. Like other OECD politicians, the Europeans seem to have decided to leave the tackling of real problems in the actual reality of real life to other “organs in society”. That’s what the UN calls business and civil society. Including, one would have to assume, those business organs who keep finding ways to play with other people’s money and cause us all to reel from one financial cliff-hanger to the next. Those organs are still a lot too active, in the Institute’s view. And someone should rein them in, by taking away some of their toys.

Elsewhere, it will be most interesting – and geopolitically relevant – to see what happens in the Arab world. Hope flared in 2011, but regional reality is rearing its ugly head again. Anything seems possible now, from an empowered march towards more equitable societies with better opportunities for all to a slow islamization of the region. This year, we will probably we see signs pointing in both directions.

China has discovered that a better paid population can contribute more to the national economy, so perhaps in 2012 we will see less manufacturing moving to China, and perhaps even some more re-shoring back to Europe and North America. Brazil booms, and most of Latin America plods along as always. Mexico will continue to have its drug mafia issues. South Africa teeters on the brink of political implosion, and most of the rest of Africa is still a sad place. No sudden change expected here, although deep change would be needed.

But in most parts of the world, there is good underlying news. Civil society is stepping into the void, building stronger networks, making full use of social digital technologies. Whether such groups and organizations can operate openly or still must labor quietly or in the shadows,  in 2012 more people will express their concerns, demands and opinion, and loudly clamor to have their needs met.

There doesn’t seem to be a rallying issue that will pull NGOs and others together as strongly as climate change, for example, did before Copenhagen. The Occupy folks are easy to put on television but they will not have much traction. Their issue, an unfair world, will remain important, but probably be split into sub-issues.

The Occupy movement will probably not have an effect  beyond the world of 24-hour “news” – which, if we think about it, is about as good at reflecting what really matters (and what really is happening and why) as those political bun fighters that many citizens are growing weary of.

But, by force of habit or absent any alternatives, in 2012 the Institute will of course follow the news flow. Here, we will keep an eye out for one thing specially: how public relations – of all disciplines – might help business people better interpret and act on the role that their companies hold in society.

The good news in 2012 is that corporations that “get it” will probably connect better with their stakeholders and customers as citizens. The challenge for business leaders is, of course, to ensure lasting positive effects of their company’s actions. That can only be done if they as leaders possess a mixture a good IQ and an acute strategic eye with sound EQ (emotional intelligence) and what I would call superior SQ, or societal intelligence.

Companies create their own parallel and separate universes, just like other big groupings. But they can find ways to break the big problems to smaller chunks that can be tackled by them and “their” citizens.

Some companies with so-called issues – energy, environment, callous treatment of communities, or others – will in 2012 earn real respect and trust by  approaching their problems as challenges to be solved rather than stuff to be explained away.

And, for a final predictive applied generalization, once companies move in that direction, they will experience how new relationships – needed to solve their problems – will also create opportunities.

It will be interesting to see if the list of companies that “get it” grows, changes or shrinks in 2012. Call it Sustainability, Corporate Social Responsibility or creating Shared Value – a clear understanding of what a company’s socio-political, economic and civic role and contribution, and putting that understanding at the core of the company’s purpose is the way to start showing that you’re “getting it”.

So what do you think? Tell your friends, especially if you agree with us. Framkly, here at the Institute for Applied Generalization, we’re really not interested in your views, but will read your comments over coffee and a smirk.

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Applying generalization to the issue of why people don’t much trust oil companies

April 28, 2011 Leave a comment

It is often best to use a simple model. Input – throughput -output. Not the same as beginning, middle and end, or as thesis, antithesis and synthesis.

In order to get as many aspects of complexity as possible into the input funnel, you should make a long, a very long list of the components of the problem at hand.

Let’s see – why don’t people in general trust oil companies? The short answer could be because these companies have the world over a barrel, with a product everyone needs and without which not much would be moved or made.

The input list, done well, becomes a manifest to – and of – your most sincere attempt to resist jumping to conclusions.

– Crucial product
– Environmental issues
– Treatment of people around their exploration sites
– Dealings with governments not transparent
– Too powerful
– Too profitable
– Big and arrogant
etc

The throughput phase would consist of mixing all these external views of oil companies with their own view of their raison d’être, and with an analysis of what is technically feasible – can fossil fuels become cleaner? What alternatives to oil and gas exist that seem realistic?

And we would need to add socio-political aspects: Would consumers be willing to pay more for other forms of energy, such as wind, solar, biomass? Would consumers be willing to live less comfortably in order to use less fossil fuels? What moves towards transparency would be needed for people to trust oil companies more? What would governments be willing to do in order to fpromote  sustainable alternative energies (i.e. not including nuclear power)?
etc

The output would probably be threefold:

1. People don’t trust oil companies because they object to their grip on a vital area of the economy, and thus their own lives. (jumped-to conclusions aren’t all that wrong, normally)

2. It is unlikely that most people would agree to forego comfort, mobility and new stuff.

3. And technically, there is no quick fix.

So, it is an issue here of technology, policy and behavior – as with so many public issues that could benefit from a dose of applied generalization.

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Institute for Applied Generalization update Oct 26

October 26, 2010 Leave a comment

In order to advance the cause of the Institute for Applied Generalization, I went to Paris.

Tres locigal.

French traditions include the useful approach of looking at complex situations through the Carthesian lens of thesis, antithesis and synthesis.

So I thought I’d learn. But I just came away with a sore head, from trying to distinguish between what just sounds complex and in fact is simple – the French excel in that – and what indeed is truly complex and could benefit from some applied generalization.

If the Germans are good at turning abstract notions into concrete intellectual constructions, the French do the opposite – convert concrete notions into abstract constructions and discuss them as if they were visible, physical things subject to laws of gravity and other non-optional rules in life.

So, in short, not help from the Carthesian approach.

More next week.

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applied generalization – how it works

October 4, 2010 3 Comments

So, brass tacks. The idea is this.

You have a problem – need a sound intepretation of something puzzling, someone to still some complex waters, a synthesis of a mess of stuff that is buzzing you – you turn to the Institute for Applied Generalization (i4ag).

At i4ag, we (I) will take a look at your problem, go for a walk, call some friends and bore them with old jokes – have a coffee, and then make sense of whatever it was that was troubling you. Honest, we will.

The solution will never be more than 350 words long, have no more than three logical steps (usually input-output-throughput), a maxium of two diagrams or other graphs when these are needed, and contain less than six footnotes and references to other helpful stuff – and we’d possibly add some stuff we (I) just kind of like to point out whatever the issue is that’s being raised. And, for a small fee, you get a PowerPoint pack to dazzle your colleagues and/or boss with.

At i4ag, we’re ready. ‘Common sense, pompously’ delivered is our motto. (Even having a ‘motto’ is pompous these days, but what the heck).

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definitions – applied generalization

September 30, 2010 Leave a comment

The virtual community of a handful with an interest in our new institute may be the start of something good and lasting.

But our mission needs a definition, otherwise a proper Instîtute for Applied Generalization will never be realized – with its Journal (web-based), its Society (meeting as often as common sense dictates) and a thriving membership of nose scratching thinkers.

Applied Generalization – the practice of looking at complex situations, stripping them down to essentials, applying common sense analysis and postulating helpful solutions. 

What would it look like? Say, a journalist needs to back a hunch with a sensible, fact-based observation and a named quote, but doesn’t know which expert to turn to since they all are too complicated. At I4AG he or she gets a two-page report and some punchy sentences.

It could work.

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Hello world!

September 29, 2010 1 Comment

I’ve been too lazy to register my Institute for Applied Generalization, so let’s make this the first step.

As they say in the smart stakeholder relations world, it is good advice to “say it, do it, write it down”.

This will have to count as “say it” – even though it is written.

So, what will I do on i4ag? Who knows. Setting it up comes with both irony and steely determination. I find that much of the debate in the political world, and among the punditry, has somehow lost touch with common sense.

The Institute for Applied Generalization is dedicated to restoring common sense, but perhaps also to delivering generalizations in a slightly high-minded and pompous way, so that they get taken seriously.

Let’s see how it goes.

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