These are turbulent times, on that there can be no doubt. Every major system — economic, financial, social, and environmental — is under distress right now with no end in sight. In the past, if one or more of these systems were under stress, the solution could be one system focused and produce results. But the last 35 years has created a phenomenon never before encountered: a global economy resulting in, as Thomas Friedman recently wrote, "an interconnected world where a crisis in one system ultimately creates a crisis in all systems."
We are in, what could be called "the perfect storm". All the forces of a collapsing financial system, combined with an economic system in its final transition from a consumer/industrial economy to a knowledge/service economy, creating major social upheaval and breakdowns in health, family and community resiliency along with environmental degradation and resource depletion reaching peaks that cannot be reversed are now merging together. We are challenged with dealing with not one crisis, but many. Solutions will need to be new, different and immediate and it is entirely doable. The question is not can we do it, but will we? We have the know how, we have the technology, we have the knowledge. Do we have the will?
The perfect storm: A hurricane, a tornado, a tsunami and earthquake walk into a bar and the hurricane says “As a hurricane, I can create the biggest havoc which makes me the perfect storm. To which the tornado just laughs and says, “That’s nuts, I can leave a debris field five miles wide with everything obliterated to dust. I clearly create the biggest havoc of all storms. The tsunami shakes its head and says, “No way, I can wash over an area and suck it all back out to sea, never to be seen again—this clearly is more devastating than either a hurricane or a tornado—I am the perfect storm. At which point the earthquake begins to take off its coat and say, “What does it matter which of us creates the biggest mess? After any of us, the world is never the same for the people, the environment, and the businesses/finances of that land. What could be more perfect?
FESE: Financial, Economic, Social and Environmental.
We could dissect this perfect storm as starting at any one of these four primary systems but in truth, they are all so interconnected that our time is far better spent seeing how changes in one motivates us to create the proactive responses necessary in all. For that is where we are right now: none of our current systems will remain in their current state due to the devastation of this perfect storm. The people, the environment, the businesses and the financial systems have already been forever changed.
The Perfect storm: what comes after it is our choice.
We are now challenged to emerge from the cellar after the financial tornado that has left millions of people without sufficient money to live their lives; We will have to climb down from the tree after the economic tsunami that has left millions of the old consumer industry businesses wiped out; We will have to crawl out from the disruption caused by the social earthquake that has uprooted families and re-configured communities; And watch as the flooding recedes from the environmental hurricane that has left our land, air, oceans, rivers etc., devastated and in need of much repair.
This article appears in Jun 17-23, 2010.