I did not expect Joshua Cooper Ramo's book, "The Age of the Unthinkable" to do much more than provide me with a holiday diversion. After all, I am a well educated, well read, intelligent person with my fair share of street smarts, and 40 years experience in industry. What could this book do for me that I did not already know?
Well, this book has raised up ghosts and visions from the past, present and future for me. We all know that we live in interesting times, and that change is inevitable. For the past 50 -60 years two or three generations have seen it come and go - and the world stayed pretty much on course. The Cold War, oil shocks, the GFC - everything in its season. The past, the present and the future may be difficult, but there is no catastrophe in the making.
Ramo offers a "sandpile" view of the world from the individual to international relations. When does the next grain of sand placed on a pile of grains lead to total collapse of the pile? No one knows. Our future could be stable or catastophic with the next small event added to our complex environment. The ecology of our planet - from social, economic, political and industrial angles - is not predictable; it is merely open to our own view of it. We are probably wrong.
Those who think they know what the future holds are naive or blind - or both. The future depends on a million separate actions, a thousand events happening at the same time, and no amount of politics, charisma, arrogance or self-interest can ward off the outcomes. The best we can do is get ready for the unintended consequences of our actions.
We are in charge of very little at the end of the day - our own lives, our businesses, possibly (hopefully) a share of our family, some friends and our bank account. All else is pretence. The notion of authority ("I am my position"), government, national pride, virtuous goals (democracy, liberty, capitalism) are delusions. They are reflections of our own narrow view of History.
The only values that matter, and in this I am grateful to Ramo for his insights so well expressed, are EMPATHY and RESILIENCE. The former because unless we are able to stand in the shoes of others, we can never really understand their motivations (and their plans for us), and the latter because we have to be ready for the unexpected and the unpredictable shock, and respond quickly and easily to our new circumstances.
Personally, I have always felt that the long term future of the world, my country and my family has been shaped not by our own actions, but by our ability to respond to unexpected shocks and changes in our situation - usually from outside. As others have said its like riding a bull in an earthquake - is it the bull or the ground shaking that throws you out of the saddle?
Read the book. Please. It may just save your business, your family and your life someday.