The conditions for change?

So, yesterday evening I was sat at the table having a conversation with my 18 year old daughter. I was explaining to her about the conversation I had had earlier in the day with my colleagues/friends Mel, Kate and Suzanne. I was reflecting on Mel’s frustration that even though we know these ‘new’ systems* can work, they don’t get embedded and they don’t ripple out beyond the frontline team, so nothing ever seems to change.

*I’m referring to things like Human Learning Systems, The Liberated Method, Relational and Restorative Practice and Social Pedagogy, which are arguably part of a family of person-centred, values-driven approaches to supporting/working with people.

My daughter finished her A levels last summer. She did politics, philosophy and economics and got 3 As. What she said to me was really thought-provoking, and I recorded it so that I could share it with Mel, Kate and Suzanne more accurately. It then occurred to me that this would make a great blog post too! So here we are 🙂

This is what she said:

Me: So, what you’re saying is that the economic system in place shapes the way that public services are organised?

E: Yeah. For example, with capitalism it’s an individual. It’s an individualised society so that it’s your individual problem to solve rather than the collective problem to solve. They call it ‘atomism’.

It atomizes people. It individualizes them and makes them small. That is useful economically speaking because it frees up a lot of finance. When you don’t pay for anything other than yourself, it’s cheap to only pay for yourself if you think about it, but that then means you are so individualised. It puts so much burden on to the individual that there isn’t enough energy or headspace to put towards all the other spending, if you will, like social projects. So, it works well economically but not as well socially because you don’t have the energy to revamp the entire welfare system: if the car’s making a weird noise, you have to drop the kids off, how am I paying for laundry liquid…? Whereas if those things are sorted, you don’t have to think about them then suddenly you have this mental energy that you have free to spend, if you will, on other things you have more bandwidth for more and bigger things you’re willing to take on.

A capitalist would argue the other end of the spectrum. They would say approximately – I’m speaking for them at this point and you’d have to ask them, they’d be happy to tell you – but they would say that if you individualize and atomize people then you free up finances which you can then spend on the problem, if that makes sense? They would argue that making ‘everyone’s problem’ [become] everyone’s problem, would actually shorten, like shrink your bandwidth because you have to worry about everyone else’s stuff instead of just worrying about yours. Therefore, you would ironically have less bandwidth.

But mostly I think their issue would be the first bit of that. Which is the finances. They’d say you’re spending other people’s money. You don’t have the finances for this and so they’d argue that the solution for welfare is to individualize it. Meaning (a) you’d have more money to spend on it if you want to and (b) they see they see the spending of the money as the problem. They think that taxes and welfare states drain people and you’re basically ‘supporting freeloaders’ and such like, is a very key part of the ideology. So, they think that if you cut that off people – or at the very least [encourage] good people, working people, people who try, then what comes will be able to thrive and that’s what’s causing the issue rather than the issue being caused by the system.

They’re saying the system is causing the issue. A lot of conservatives want minimal government interference. For that reason, the system is causing the issue. So, if you get rid of the welfare system, you won’t need it. Essentially, you’re causing the problem by getting involved – that out by itself.

Me: But does that not assume that there is an equality of access and agency for every person involved and that it’s only by their own choice or lack of action that they don’t have the same privileges as other people?

E: The same way that communism assumes that by offering access it will fix the problem and that its citizens can afford to offer access to that extent. So, neither of them are necessarily right. But yeah, capitalism assumes that everyone starts off equal and you just need to try harder and communism assumes that it’s a possible for everyone to turn out equal and be that people will turn out equal if you give them the same start if that makes sense.

Me: Thank you!

My daughter went on to explain about the fundamentals of economic philosophy: economic systems are based on four things – Land, Capital, Labour, Enterprise.

Land – physical land, trees, resources

Capital – stuff (from buildings to staplers)

Labour – the people bit

Enterprise – ‘what a CEO brings to the table’

She explained that most problems can be traced back to how resources are allocated. It’s not actually the money…it’s what your money is spent on. It’s not well distributed or we’re distributing resources badly.

She said: Any and all issues in a society in my opinion, can be traced back to the economic system because all the economic system means is the distribution of resources – resources including welfare, money, time and people. Meaning, any issues you will have will be traced back to those four things and therefore the economic system that they’re in. If you’re having an issue with welfare, time, money or people, it’s because of the way you’re distributing them. It’s the distribution of resources so it will come down to the economic system.

I suggested that another factor is culture – how it feels to be there. But she argued that can also be explained by the economic system and how that prioritises things:

Atomisation – isolation – perception – culture

Capitalism is always upwards. Competition. You don’t associate with or consider the needs or rights of others because it might tarnish your own standing, plus you’re busy trying to improve your own situation.

Social Pedagogy (and others) challenges that dynamic and therefore it doesn’t fit

Capitalism creates a separation. It makes gaps and bridging them is difficult.

Economic systems are shaped by politics and thus philosophy, and they create their own feedback loop i.e. each person will hear things which agree with/reinforce their perspective, rather than being open to challenge.

We also talked about the fundamental nature of human beings i.e. how we’re subconsciously governed by fear of change and a deep desire to avoid pain (to the extent that we will inadvertently cause ourselves and/or others more pain, by trying to avoid it). In Esther’s words: We’re zip-tied to the monkey [brain] and we can either drag it with us and force change, or ease it along by giving it a banana.

The summary of all this is that I think my PhD (if I’m successful) will be spending more time looking at the conditions for cultural change, rather than analysing approaches which we already know are beneficial.

Have a good Tuesday!