Last week @alexevansuk and I launched the #LongCrisisScenarios with @localtrust.

Four stories about worlds where we polarize or act collectively, centralize or give everyone a role.

A thread on some of the influences that fed the scenarios. [1/x] http://www.longcrisis.org/scenarios/ 

First @stewartbrand of the Long Now Foundation.

We build on his Layers of Change – proposed in How Buildings Learn.

"A hymn to entropy... kicking the stuffing out of the proposition that architecture is permanent and that buildings cannot adapt.” [2/x] https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/320919/how-buildings-learn-by-stewart-brand/

Buildings have layers that are slow to adapt (Site or Structure, for example)

And layers that change fast – the Space plan, or Stuff that we fill buildings with and which “twitch[es] around monthly.”

But Layers of Change co-exist and interact with each other. [3/x]

We use this framework to explore three interlocking layers of the emergency.

Public health
Economic
Insecurity

These emergencies are unfolding together but at different speeds - and must be confronted simultaneously. [4/x]

Like everyone who thinks about the future, we also took inspiration from the famous Mont Fleur scenarios.

Guided by @adamkahane @reospartners, they were created to explore South Africa’s direction as it escaped from apartheid. [5/x]
https://reospartners.com/wp-content/uploads/old/Mont%20Fleur.pdf

@adamkahane’s lessons from Mont Fleur.

Plausible worlds not fantasy futures.

Shared awareness – “a common vocabulary and mutual understanding”

Platform for action – “We captured the way forward of those committed to finding a way forward.” [6/x]

But Mont Fleur was the culimation of a deep engagement by S Africa’s decision-makers.

Whereas we’re starting the debate about Covid futures.

#ScenariosWeek @globaldashboard from Monday, @localtrust seminar on 3 June, and @TheLongCrisis network. [7/x] https://localtrust.org.uk/big-local/events/after-covid-where-will-we-be/

Influences for each scenario.

Big Mother is a world where politicians promise a lot and are expected to deliver.

It owes a lot to ideas @alexevansuk and I picked up from Joseph Tainter on the dynamics of civilizations. [8/x] https://qcnr.usu.edu/directory/tainter_joseph

Tainter in a nutshell:

Complexity is a civilization's response to unfamiliar problems.

But it’s costly.

So does it solve enough problems to justify its cost?

and a civilization prospers.

and power devolves to a lower level of organization. [9/x] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023%2FA%3A1006632214612

This is the pivot for Big Mother.

Government comes through with Big Policies, Programmes, Finance.

(And already we've seen stuff that would have seemed inconceivable in ye olden days of 2019.)

But are the “wins” enough to keep us happy as expectations inexorably grow? [10/x]

Rise of the Oligarchs is a government of the few not the many.

One inspiration - @MartinGilens and Benjamin I. Page on the power of elites in American politics. [11/x]

"In the US, our findings indicate, the majority does not rule—at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes.

When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites
or with organized interests, they generally lose." [12/x] https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf

In Fragile Resilient we find hope at the grassroots – but at the centre things fall apart.

And they do so noisily and dramatically.

This scenario quotes @jayrosen_nyu [13/x]

For Rosen, the plan is to have no plan.

"To default on public problem solving, and then prevent the public from understanding the consequences of that default.” [14/x] https://pressthink.org/2020/05/the-plan-is-to-have-no-plan/

And finally - - Winning Ugly.

A collective and distributed response to the public health, economic, and insecurity emergencies that is...

"extended

– and at times seemingly endless." [15/x]

This scenario is inspired by a tennis player. Brad Gilbert.

Against supposedly more skilful opponents, he was famous for digging deep and using every tool he had to try and win.

McEnroe was so enraged by losing to him at the US Open that he announced his retirement. [16/x]