The Great Disruption vs The Big Shift

There's so much stuff out there today.

If I had all the time in the world, I would be writing a long posting. So, to keep it fairly short, I'll just point out two thought-provoking commentaries from the New York Times.

In the first piece, Maureen Dowd uncovers the interesting family background of Steve Jobs... that he was an adopted child, that his biological father (still alive) is a naturalised Muslim Syrian, that he has a sister whom he finally met in adulthood, and more. Here's the link to Dowd's article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/12/opinion/prosperos-tempestuous-family.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha212

The second piece is by Thomas Friedman. He tries to figure out why there is so much social unrest today. It has spread beyond the Arab Spring to the Occupy Wall Street (New York), Occupy Washington DC, etc, movements in America.

He then taps into two current hypotheses. The first -- The Great Disruption -- is what Friedman calls "threat-based" ie people everywhere have become despairing of the capitalist system, seeing it as serving only the top one per cent (hence the charge of corporate greed), abetted by colluding, or even conniving, or hapless governments. The world order is being threatened with self-destruct.

The second view -- The Big Shift -- is "opportunity-based". To quote Friedman:

"In the early stages, we experience this Big Shift as mounting pressure, deteriorating performance and growing stress because we continue to operate with institutions and practices that are increasingly dysfunctional -- so the eruption of protest movements is no surprise.

"Yet, the Big Shift also unleashes a huge global flow of ideas, innovations, new collaborative possibilities and new market opportunities. This flow is constantly getting richer and faster. Today...  tapping the global flow becomes the key to productivity, growth and prosperity. But to tap this flow effectively, every country, company and individual needs to be constantly growing their talent."

Friedman is optimistic that, either way, global social meltdown can be averted. He concludes:

"...while the Great Disruption is inevitable, humanity is best in a crisis, and, once it all hits, we will rise to the occasion and produce transformational economic and social change (using tools of the Big Shift).... the Great Disruption may be barrelling down on us, but... the Big Shift has also created a world where more people than ever have the tools, talent and potential to head it off."

Here's the link to Friedman's article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/12/opinion/theres-something-happening-here.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha212

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Will mass social unrest hit Singapore as well? I think all the issues that have made Singaporeans unhappy -- from the widening income gap (yes, we have our own "one per cent" too!) to the presence of foreigners -- are a potential powder-keg.

I think too that the PAP government buys into the optimism of the Big Shift hypothesis while also not discounting the social dislocations that the Great Disruption can wreak. But there are realities it cannot wish away -- that there will be winners and losers, that meritocracy and policy offsets can only do so much, that vested interests especially among the elite cannot be wished away albeit attempts can be made to mitigate them (openly and discreetly), etc, etc.

That's why the ruling elite keeps talking about the "new normal" in politics here since the May 2011 general election. The latest buzz phrase is "a more inclusive society". What has emerged is a slicker government PR machinery: from the political leaders to the bureaucrats who deal with the public, there must be no discordant message. Opinion makers, like a certain law academic, are the preferred non-government voices.

I could go on, but I promised to keep my posting today fairly short.