2008 and 2020: Two faces of the same crisis?
We missed out on the real lesson to be learned from the 2008 financial crisis. The profound network of interconnections between systems and organizations can facilitate global contagions.
During the 2008 financial crisis, everyone blamed politicians, leaders and regulators but ignored the part played by global interconnectedness. The nature of the current health crisis is different, but it is nonetheless also magnified by the interconnectedness that we continue to ignore. We will emerge from the crisis within a few years, but we still risk making the same mistakes in future crises – though the crisis might be climate disaster, an armed conflict or another pandemic. What lessons should we learn to bring an end the repetition?
- Turbulence is constant and amplified by interconnections. It’s now impossible to isolate and contain shocks.
- Leaders need to favor inclusion to help broaden their perceptions and field of action.
- This interconnectedness facilitates the search for experts and collaborative work, provided that a climate of trust is created.
- Creativity is a key resource for finding innovative solutions to new and complex problems, but it requires space and permission to express itself.
The dire, existential consequences we currently face may finally inspire us to undertake radical change.
To go further
“Our World Is Interconnected. It’s Time Our Leaders Adapt”
by Amit S. Mukherjee (The MIT Press Reader, July 2020).
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