I won’t even try to summarize the news. There’s too much, and as noted in this Groundhog Day post, no one person or organization can keep on top of everything that’s happening in the midst of an unfolding disaster.
But today’s post isn’t about the details.
Today’s post is about some big picture perspective.
There’s a lot of very appropriate concern, worry, and alarm-bell-ringing about history in other moments like these. It’s good to be doing that. We need to take what’s happening seriously.
Yet even though there are many similarities now to other similar kinds of phenomena that have happened in history… we also have different tools available to us than others have had in other places and times.
Yes, we’re going to have a heck of a lot of big challenges of the sort that we haven’t had to deal with before, here in this era.
But we also have a lot of assets, capabilities, structures, and technologies that other folks haven’t necessarily had access to.
For one thing, this country is very, very big.
We have a ton of people.
We have an incredible number of institutions that have not made the decision to cave and defer to the new power structure. Same for businesses.
We have very complex economies, technology, medicine, infrastructure, supply chains, and systems.
Lots of those things want to hold together and keep working because people that work in them and who use the various things need them and are willing to put the time and money into those things.
We have more technology flexibility and access than ever before, including for information sharing and for operational use for everyday people. Entire volumes could written on that. There’s a lot, it’s changing fast, and it’s too complicated to talk about — but it’s an incredible asset in very many ways.
And plus — we have federalism.
I’m not sure that everyone understands the incredible incredible power of federalism that makes this country different than many others who have faced these kinds of power developments.
It is because we have distributed power between the federal government and state and local government and some other entities like tribal and territorial government and some regional stuff.
Most of the power is distributed between state and local and federal government.
That’s true with some of the court things.
It’s absolutely true with capabilities like first responders and law enforcement and the national guard.
This means that tax money and what governments do with it is distributed as well.
And it means that jurisdiction and how laws apply is distributed.
All of that stuff is huge and making a difference. We see Minnesota and we have seen other states using this distributed power very effectively.
Some states are of course going a different direction with it or are likely to do that.
We also have more and faster situational awareness and ability to communicate with each other than other people in history.
That also means lots of things move faster in lots of ways than in history. And it means there is more ability for surveillance than in history.
But it gives the people different options and capabilities and flexibility and information than various other people’s had in history.
And again, as noted above, we have access to more information than ever before — including about history itself and how we can use that knowledge. That helps too.
Anyway we have options and leverage and capabilities and technology and really quite large brains. Heck as far as that goes our brains are evolving as our society and our technology evolve. We’re operating differently as humans. That’s an asset, too.
Through everything that’s unfolded so far around us, it’s been super cool to see such incredible creativity, wherewithal, and persistence in so many places.
It’s been super uncool that people have needed to be doing these things because of actions caused by voters that brought us this version of the federal government.
This era isn’t going to be the same as any other time in history when similar things have developed in power structures. It’s always a little different.
But we have more and different capabilities than many have had before.
I think we’re going to have some success over the long term in getting this geographic area that is now the United States going in a different direction.
Obviously it’s going to take some doing. But I have every reason to believe we can get there. Eventually. Overall.
How about you? What do you think?
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Fierce Community’s work is happening behind-the-scenes for now as we rework the nonprofit’s methodology and approach. Public work will resume once we’ve retooled.
Want to volunteer? Send a note with “volunteer” in the subject line to people@fiercecommunity.com. Here’s what we need the next few weeks —
Evening availability in February at least two nights per month for a group Zoom meeting. We’ll work around time zones.
Ability to do Zooms.
Willingness to communicate with other volunteers via email & text — about the work, for coordinating schedules, & for any schedule changes.
An ability to contribute & listen as part of a team.
Patience, persistence, & thoughtfulness for finding ways through this moment, together.
Flexibility, because we’re in a catastrophe. We’re going to need to be able to roll with some chaos & change. (Semper Gumby.)
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Vanessa Burnett is the director at Fierce Community. Email people@fiercecommunity.com to set up a conversation.
Vanessa is a social entrepreneur, advisor, and empower-er with a systems-level understanding of the pieces and parts that modern society needs in order to survive. She has over 25 years experience in resilience-building, civic engagement, coalition-building, critical infrastructure, systems thinking, big disasters, catastrophes, wildland fire, emergency management, incident management, land management, park rangering, homeland security, continuity of operations (COOP), continuity of government (COG), technology innovation, public communication, and disaster information sharing. This Substack channel does not knowingly use AI.
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