People in rich, developed countries are increasingly disillusioned, and realising that politicians are short on long-term answers
These nations need to agree on a new approach to managing the future and a fresh compact with their society and the rest of the planet
The idea that those living successful, advanced countries can look forward to perpetual advancement is no longer a given after Covid-19 .
I thought the end of the world would look different. There are no horsemen, no mushroom cloud, no alien spacecraft. Just sweatpants and Zoom. As it turns out, rumours of our demise have been exaggerated.
If you live in the developed world, the first 20 years of this century might have resembled the apocalypse in slow motion – from September 11 to Sars, the war on terror, the global financial crisis, technological disruption and Islamic State, to Trumpian anxiety and now Covid-19. Are we reliving the Crusades or fast-forwarding to the dystopian world of Blade Runner?
And yet, for many others, the 21st century has also been a revelation. Money to spend, real-time connections with the world, the Babylonian wonders of urban life and much more.
THE (DEVELOPED) WORLD IN CRISIS
Time and again, data and insights have supported this dichotomy. For years now, polling and analysis have pointed to growing levels of dissatisfaction and malaise in a number of rich countries. This is against the backdrop of people who are not only living better lives, but empowered with opportunities thanks to greater mobility and education, which have transformed their existence.
Our study by Blackbox Research, “World in Crisis”, measured the sentiments of citizens from 23 countries toward their governments’ Covid-19 crisis management efforts. While news coverage has focused predominantly on the study’s political findings and how leaders performed, these results are in many ways less interesting and largely predictable. What really stood out to us at Blackbox were the wider perceptions of how business, media and communities were seen to have responded.
The results of our study, which have been reported in nearly 30 countries to date, show that most countries were rated poorly across the board. The major revelation for us was how people in the majority of the world’s most advanced countries – in both the East and the West – were not only shocked and surprised by how quickly the crisis overran their daily lives, but also expressed a wider feeling of being let down, giving the impression that they had expected more.
Performance ratings for business leaders and healthcare systems, even local communities and neighbourhoods, all scored more poorly in advanced nations.
Our findings, from the United States to Italy and to Japan, all point to one thing: People living in wealthier nations feel isolated and vulnerable in a way they have not felt for generations. Of the 11 developed countries and territories covered in the study, only New Zealand scored above average in our index. Who knew the Kiwis were living in the last well-appointed bungalow in a run-down neighbourhood?
A REJECTION OF THE TRUTH
Despite the long-standing evidence from even before our study, we are witnessing a level of denialism, with some commentators suggesting that the scores do not reflect the best route ahead. The wealthier nations, they argue, just need the time to organise their resources in response to such an unprecedented event. Once this happens, they claim, public opinion will soon shift. Yet the most recent polling in nearly all of these countries indicates that perceptions have actually deteriorated further.
Japan and France, for example, scored the lowest in our study, and public opinion in both countries remains anaemic. Yet the responses from these countries hardly feel like outliers. South Korea, which scored fourth lowest in our study, even voted overwhelmingly to reelect a president during the crisis. So in all likelihood, the scores reflect more than simple antagonism towards political leaders. Something else is going on.
Flaws laid bare: South Korea, which scored fourth lowest in the study that measured citizen sentiments, even voted overwhelmingly to reelect a president in the middle of the Covid-19 crisis. —
On the other end, some argue that the countries that scored well are often authoritarian and have leaned on state-controlled media to the extent that their people tell pollsters everything is hunky-dory. While their media diet can have some influence in what people tell pollsters, it does not tell the full picture. Singapore, Thailand and even Iran are all dominated by state media, yet none of them recorded stellar results in our study. Barking up the propaganda tree only gets you so far.
Two months on, the vulnerability expressed in our study by people in advanced countries largely remains. It also appears to fit a continuum that has been developing for some time now: the belief and confidence that unravelled after World War II and peaked with the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989, but was rock solid by the end of the 20th century.
TIME TO SET THINGS RIGHT
The rich global disillusionment reflected so obviously in our poll, as well as in others conducted during the current crisis, has not arisen out of nowhere. It demonstrates a real sense that all is not right. The emotional mindset also goes well beyond anger. There is a growing realisation that political and business leaders are short on long-term answers, and “community” is now a term more likely associated with social media than social cohesion.
What this crisis has done more than anything else is expose the real flaws and weaknesses that have been emergent in advanced countries for many years. The scab has been peeled off, and the wound is worse than we thought.
The findings of our study reveals something pertinent: It is time for developed nations to truly reflect on the way forward. The idea that those living in successful, advanced countries can look forward to perpetual advancement is no longer a given. More and more people are coming to comprehend this. The present crisis, more than all the other recent ones, has laid this bare.
With that, confidence can only be regained through new ideas and action. Developed countries need to agree on a new approach to managing the future and a fresh compact with the rest of the world. As with a major war, Covid-19 has left everyone with heavy losses, and now is the time to acknowledge that simply trying to paper over long-standing flaws (that are much worse than most have been prepared to concede) is not going to offer either stability or hope
These could include rethinking the global institutional framework – whether it is for trade, health, finance or even technology. Countries also need to reconstitute and develop new forums to include a more diverse representation of key global stakeholders. In the same way leaders have been forced to address changing attitudes and demands on race and gender in recent years, they now need to expand this change of approach to society itself.
So, it turns out once again that the apocalypse is not nigh. People too often confuse end times with a reshuffling of the order. Those who have enjoyed sitting in the premium seats for a long time will have to pay more for them or give them up altogether.
By David Black, the founder of Blackbox Research, a Singapore-based research agency and data content specialist, mainly covering national and regional opinion across Asia. David has lived in Singapore for the past 20 years
As R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe sang, “It’s the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine.” – The Jakarta Post/Asia News NetworkThe writer is founder and CEO of Blackbox Research, a data-driven content and research agency based in Singapore that primarily covers national and regional public opinion. The views expressed here are solely the writer’s own.
Flaws laid bare: South Korea, which scored fourth lowest in the study that measured citizen sentiments, even voted overwhelmingly to reelect a president in the middle of the Covid-19 crisis. — On the other end, some argue that the countries that scored well are often authoritarian and have leaned on state-controlled media to the extent that their people tell pollsters everything is hunky-dory. While their media diet can have some influence in what people tell pollsters, it does not tell the full picture. Singapore, Thailand and even Iran are all dominated by state media, yet none of them recorded stellar results in our study. Barking up the propaganda tree only gets you so far.
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