SOME FACTS AND OPINIONS
ABOUT CRISIS
PRINSJESDAGLECTURE
15 September 2009
WWW.VANDESANDEINLEZINGEN.NL
What is Prinsjesdag about?
You can be proven wrong
Proving wrong not possible
If it is wrong, it is your fault If it doesn’t come out, you can
blame the others
It is a lot of work
The idea comes to you in a flash
You have to be somewhat
intelligent
No special need for intelligence
It is solistic work
You must be a team player
I
Some simple facts about
®
HUMANS
The most flexible animal that nature devised
Making top quality can be time consuming
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Earth: 5 billion years
Life on earth: 3 billion years
Poly-cellular: 1 billion years
Vertebrates : 500 million years
•Mammals: 200 million years
•Primates: 30 million years
•Hominides: 2 million years
•Homo sapiens: 200.000 years
200 mil
100 mil
20 mil
Improvement also takes much time
Our model exists some 200.000 years
Of those years 198.000 were before Christ
All that time we were building up our civilisation
The first 195.000 years this did not amount to much
The last 5000 years culture Prinsjesdag?
grew with dazzling speed
Bullshit!!
The last 200 years,
some amazing developments took place:
We developed the technical means to deplete all fossil material
built up in the last 3 billion years
We developed the technical means to raise average age about
50 years
We developed the technical means to combat almost every
kind of disaster
We developed the technical means to create disasters on an
unheard of scale
These means were then used by people who had the reflexes
of cavemen
PRIMARY CONCERNS OF ANIMAL & MAN
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Procreation (Courting, Mating, Rape, Prostitution, Pornography, Marriage)
Child care (Food, Safety, Temperature, Oilily, Kindergarten, Woonerf)
Belonging (Herd, Shoal, Flight, Family, Clan, Tribe, Nation, Community)
Status (Competition, Dominance hierarchy, Image building, Ferrari, Armani, Sports, War)
Communication (Signal systems, NV behavior, Language, Media, Cell phones)
Aggression (Fight/Flight, Threatening, Bluffing, Killing, Vandalism, Weapons)
Hunting (Awaiting, Chasing, Closing in, Stalking, Making the kill, Sales, Bonuses)
Foraging (Seeking food, Eating, Ruminating, Cooking, Sharing)
Exchange (Helping behavior, Nursing, Reciprocity, Trade, Wage-work)
Hoarding (Honey, Acorns, Food, CDs, Shoes, Model trains, Scalps, Dollars)
Territoriality (Making & defending: Area, House, Garden, Gates, Personal space)
Building (Lair, Nest, Trap, Dam, Tent, House, City)
Reconnaissance (Environment, Foes & Predators, Keeping guard, News, Sensation)
Migration (Swarming, Nomadism, Vacation, Emigration)
Body care (Preening, Washing, Grooming, Lipstick, Tattoo, Clothing)
Resting (Sleeping, Waiting, Sunning, Napping, Dolce far niente)
All 16 in two forms: For
real and Play
II
Everything seems to be mixed up
Symbols as sources of misunderstanding
Mixed up
Pretty mixed up
Salaam
aleikum
Less pretty, but just as mixed up
Why mixed up?
• When things get mixed up, it’s always a question of
misunderstanding
• If we knew why crises happen, we could win a world
• Social psychology gives a useful suggestion here:
Competition is the key
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Things or outcomes have no objective value
The outcome is always relative to what others get
Thus social comparison is the only lead we have
Males become very competitive if the number of marbles
they have threatens to be less than their concurrent
• Females are also very competitive, but not so much in
marbles, they tend to focus on relations
III
Some times are more mixed up than others
We call such times: Crisis
Riots in Holland 1600-1790 (5 year-average)
© 2006 JP van de Sande RuG
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1608 1618 1628 1638 1648 1658 1668 1678 1688 1698 1708 1718 1728 1738 1748 1758 1768 1778
Bron: Dekker, 1982.
Riots in France 1830-1960 Source: Tilly & Tilly, 1975
© 2006 JP van de Sande RuG
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Some facts about “crisis”
© 2006 JP van de Sande RuG
From: krisis: decision
Was used in medicine: death or gladiols
Around 1900 applied to other fields
But the crisis of 1930 was called: Depression
The word crisis nowadays is mainly used for critical
periods in government and management
• A crisis is only a crisis when it is called a crisis
• This is done very eagerly by the media
• So thanks to them we have crises in almost
everything: economics, finance, government, sports, science, the
church, education, health care, family life, politics, the media, etc.
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What is crisis?
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Crisis is not that everybody loses some money, that things
get broken, lives are in danger, norms and laws lose their
power, people and cattle take flight, et cetera.
For bankers, police, fire brigades, etc. that is just: work
Crisis is that the governing system breaks down, loses
oversight and desists to lead or takes crucial wrong
decisions.
Crisis thus is more about what we think leaders do and
about loss of trust. Not about facts: We know them not!
Therefore the Romans knew the dictator (180 days max.)
In hindsight it is mostly possible to devise a reasonable
solution
Then it must also be possible in foresight!
Consequences of crisis
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Because our society is so highly organised, it is also very
susceptible to crisis, and a crisis is very devastating
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Everything is connected to everything
Everything thus needs to be managed an coordinated
There is little slack and thus small margins (lean organisations: small
stocks, high productivity of work force, no redundancy)
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Employees are highly specialized
There are only a few sources of energy, over which we have no
control
Only a few know something about “Natural Mechanics”
Therefore modern man, and thus modern society is far less
flexible as regards survival than 50 years ago. (Life without computers,
cell phones, TV’s, plastic, cars, supermarkets, etc. is unthinkable)
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Subconsciously we realize that it is so, thus we are very
interested in crises
Starting and ending points of crisis (Chaos model)
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STRENGTH of STIMULUS
CRISIS is intrinsically human
• CRISES ARE CAUSED BY HUMANS
• Things are normal until we call them abnormal
• CRISES ARE MAINTAINED BY
HUMANS
• When things go wrong everybody reacts in the same
way, thus causing more havoc
• CRISES ARE SOLVED BY HUMANS
• As soon as confidence is restored, and this will
happen inevitably, the crisis is solved
Lessons from psychology therefore may be of some
use to us
IV
Some opinions about HUMANS®
The meeting of caveman and culture
Mankind travels along two rails
© 2006 JP van de Sande RuG
NATURE
We are mammals
‘Instincts’
Behavioural mechanisms
Slow development
SOCIETY: Gemeinschaft
Need to belong
Group goals
Duty; Honour; Tradition
Conservative; Stability
Religion; Magic
Charismatic leadership
STRONG TIES
Crisis
Cohesion & cooperation up
Improvisation
Fight/flight
CULTURE
We are rational thinkers
Norms & Values
Cost-Benefit analysis
Quick planning
SOCIETY: Gesellschaft
Need for freedom
Goals are individualistic
Freedom; Money; Change
Progressive; Dynamic
Ideology; Science
Transactional leadership
WEAK TIES
Crisis
Cohesion & cooperation down
Planning & priorities
Professionality
LEADERSHIP & CRISIS
• Crisis: Grave perturbation of normal business and normal forms of
organization. Per definition not well prepared
• Effect: New norms and forms of organization are needed. Everyone
tries his own solutions and primarily cares for himself and his family.
This generally results in CHAOS.
SO
• In crisis people need direction, and any direction is better than none.
• Therefore people in crisis look for leadership as a means of obtaining
unidirectionality
• The leader must be a suitable person to identify with
• If the leader is seen as ‘one of us’, and thus as strong and honest, he is
effective, e.g. in combating rumors
• In crisis it is impossible to obtain correct information, therefore we
believe what the ‘one of us’ leader says
Charismatic or transformational leadership.
Freud’s vision (1921)
• Basics
– Man is born with the aptitude for many social mechanisms
– In the Primal horde, these are seen in their purest form
– Hierarchy and despotism are the rule. Love and hate for the leader occur together
• Starting points
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Leader has special competences (practical and verbal) and fascination for an idea
Leader has personal liking for his inferiors and tends to seek them out
Leader has Narcistic personality
Therefore leader needs constant confirmation of excellency of own self by inferiors
• Development
– On the basis of these competences leader gains credit
– Credit is seen by leader as proof that his narcistic choice was right
– Followers feel important through identification with the leader
• Effects:
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Leader’s wish is felt as own wish (identification)
Leader keeps gaining strength (vicious circle)
Every follower has the idea that he has a personal relation with leader
Strong and self-willed followers get into conflict and either leave group or win
PROBLEMSOLVING for FOLLOWERS
Some opinions
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A crisis is a malady of the commonwealth
Crisis is worldwide, because our economy is worldwide.
Globalisation not only enhances the benefits of being clever, it also enhances the penalties for
doing wrong.
If economy were something which was different in each human group, then these groups
would still have crises but they would not happen together at the same time. For one
community the camels would get scarce, for another there would be too much kauri shells, for
one community the potlatch would appear to have been too ample to stay alive, for another
the maidens would run out, so that no suitable offerings for the gods could be found and
consequently it would not rain.
Autonomy and autarky thus are means to ensure the survival of most of us
The motor of globalisation is the Faustian wish to conquer all.
(e.g. “Denn heute gehort uns Deutschland, und morgen die ganze Welt”)
Growth is something which belongs to childhood
War organisation vs.
Peace organisation
Training period short
Selection on inspiration and
enthousiasm
Promotion based on results
Training period long
Selection on managerial capacities
Promotion based on avoiding
blame
Goals short term
Goals long term
Autoritarian attitude and leadership Democratic attitude and leadership
“Cutting the red tape”
Concern for correct procedures
Polarisation in sanctions
Sanctions for relatively small
infractions
Technical solutions for human
Human solutions for technical
problems
problems
Superordinate goal reduces rivalities Rivality between services
Professionalisation
Improvisation
Preparation
Resilience