This is an attempt to explain profound changes in the world through the lens of Systems Thinking. In particular, this touches on coherence as a principle that is a necessary pre-condition for legitimacy and validation of systems. Contradictions, paradoxes, inferior logic all present themselves as an opportunity for someone to challenge the legitimacy - and that's exactly what's been happening with the world. Most other framings are really talking about manifestations of this phenomenon and are not dealing with root cause. I'm writing a series of article on this topic - all to do with sense-making, blindspots and mystification.
Zygmunt Bauman, a sociologist, saw modernity as two stages. Stage 1 - he called Solid Modernity, Stage 2 - Liquid Modernity.
Modernity generally refers to a period that started in the 15th Century and, depending who you listen to, either ended in the late 20th Century or it's still with us.
For Bauman though - Solid Modernity covers 18th and late 20th Century, Liquid Modernity - from 1980s onwards.
Why an essay about modernity as analysed by Bauman? It's because this particular framing helps make sense of what's going on in the world and, maybe more importantly, offers insights for further research.
Solid Modernity
In Solid Modernity - society, politics, economy - all solid.
When we say something is solid - we convey reliability, logic and certainty.
A solid plan, solid evidence, solid argument, he's a solid guy...
If we imagine solid - that's metal, concrete, a bowling ball, a wall, Mercedes car...
In the world defined by solidity - structures are stable, determinate and rational. They are built to be durable and persistent. Strategic is favoured over tactical, long term planning over short term planning. The outcomes are predictable. Promises lead to fulfilments.
We try to run the world like a tight ship — orderly, efficient, and under control. There's a captain, officers and rules. - Everyone knows their job and there's a chain of command and individual responsibilities. The ship is clean, well serviced. It leaves and arrives on time. It doesn't leak. All the sailors wear uniforms and follow the "tight ship" paradigm - the one they were taught at the Nautical School.
Swiss bank was considered to be trustworthy and stable. Given the choice - everyone would have kept money there. Locked into its own logic and seemingly immune to international efforts to make it part of international logic and answerable to it. Dependable secrecy, numbered accounts, neutrality...
UN and NATO - the global underwriters of international justice and the defenders of the free world.
Gold standard, universities, gender roles, religion, public service broadcasters...
The core ideological and philosophical idea behind solidity was a genuine belief that social order is like a machine that can be perfected and optimised to be just and universally useful for all. As the world saw science make mince meat of old paradigms, our faith in it grew. The belief in collective progress and rationality pushed humanity forcefully towards the utopian future.
Liquid Modernity
While being hurled through decades at neck-breaking speed - the time got compressed. It became apparent that if we were to pursue the logic of opportunity maximisation in the service of growth - we had to become more flexible and reactive.
What frustrated progress was the solidity of the old world. It threw obstacles in the way of risk-taking and limited the scope of what could be achieved. The processes designed to force accountability, honour promises and dissuade irresponsibility also restricted tapping into new opportunities.
Unwilling to invest into permanence (Bauman used phrase - mortgage future) in the world which was now increasingly impermanent- we decided to quietly drop the structure.
In the 1980s - Liquid modernity came onto the stage - to coincide with Post-Modernism. Grand narratives were challenged and objectivity reduced to a social construct. Neolibralism marched on and promoted the concept of Globalisation. We saw power detach from politics and go global.
Why liquid? Because we melted the solid in order to re-mould it. It becomes shapeless, undefined and vague. We could even say that it set itself free from the form. It flowed out of the cage of structure and becomes agile.
Bauman says “In liquid modern life there are no permanent bonds and any that we take up must be tied loosely so that they can be untied again, as quickly and as effortlessly as possible, when circumstances change.”
This paradigm led to a widespread erosion of fixed structures and institutions. In solid modernity there was a prominent place reserved for nation state, church, family and the entire society imposed clear moral, legal and social obligations. Liquid modernity weakened these and made everything more ambiguous, less coherent and ultimately less predictable.
In an effort to delay its inevitable demise, liquid modernity has been spinning elaborate web of illusions to navigate a series of crisis - financial, immigration, identity, information and climate - without ever resolving the underlying incoherence.
For systems to be valid and legitimate - they must be coherent, it was time for a new chapter.
40 years on
We're now roughly 40 years after modernity softened up its stances and became liquid. If we compare liquid modernity to solid modernity across most measures - we'll find that systems defined by flexibility, globalism and individual freedom have clearly outperformed the rigid and solid ones.
Yet we're now seeing massive changes and trend reversals all around the world. What's going on? Why are the very foundations of what is deemed to have been successful now being challenged?
China as a model of neo-solidification
Under Xi Jinping and the watchful eye of the Chinese Communist Party, China represents a good example of neo-solidification. Instead of drawing inspiration from communist doctrine or the liberal west - it picked Confucianism instead.
Coherence is at the heart of China's system. Long-term strategic vision presents its solidity to the changing winds of uncertainty. The government's mindset spans decades, not electoral cycles.
Rather than approach international politics through short-term diplomacy and opportunistic deals - it chooses to engage the world through complex projects that make no sense inside short timeframes that most of the West operates within.
Belt and Road Initiative is a neo-colonial architecture of soft power that has been conceptually rejected by everyone on account of either being exploitative or unprofitable - yet it seems to work for China.
Main characteristics of their brand of solid are order, hierarchy, responsibility and centralised governance.
If we were to compare only China of the last 40 years against the solid block - there would be no contest!
The rise of far right as a sign of neo-solidification
While there are many positive aspects of liquid modernity - it is also marked by uncertainty. Many citizens feel like they are unable to successfully navigate societal complexities anymore. It feels like the rules that were once relatively straightforward, logical and deterministic are now unpredictable. This dissatisfaction presented an opportunity that far right movements moved to fill.
Trump's rise in the USA is emblematic of this trend. He got elected on the promise that he'd build walls, "make America great again" and assert rationality and common sense. Unlike the liquid system which ignored contradictions and frustrations - Trump specifically sought out to resolve them.
Nationalism, traditionalism, and protectionism are attempts to put a structure and grounding where there's none
Back to Coherence
Both social systems (institutions) and individuals have compulsion to maintain coherence. Incoherence can psychologically look like rot and decay - leading to death. We react to these signs of impending death by disassociating ourselves and that results in the loss of optimism and idealism. We’re sad and grieving good that’s about to disappear.
So, systems, societies, institutions, communities and individuals all care about incoherence (or coherence) - the loss of idealism in collective structures results in corruption, in individuals - meaning crisis.
Systemic corruption and human corruption are the signs of distress, like people walking over each other trying to escape a sinking ship. You have no faith in the boat anymore, so your existential needs come to the fore. Even your own humanity gets suspended as you try to be the one that will survive on account of someone else drowning.
We seem to be seeing a strong trend of “neo-solidification” of the world. The rise of China, far right movements and Trumpism, meaning crisis, the death of Agile in software design and finally the techno utopianism of Musk and Co can all be logically attributed to it.