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There’s a cartoon that has been circulating recently that depicts a couple walking on the street, one character says to the other: “My desire to be well-informed is currently at odds with my desire to remain sane.” With the rise in the voicing of extremist views; more radical, post-truth politics; attacks on civil society funding, eligibility or registration status; the use of SLAPPS[i]; and a consequent polarisation of public opinion, it catches those feelings of heightened disquiet and discord felt in many of the people I work with; and for the civil society organisations they work within. It feels like we are in polycrisis of uncertainty and change.
Since the second inauguration of Donald Trump, the activist discussion group I follow has debated this very issue: ‘Avoiding overwhelm; so, you don’t look away.’ One member shared the ideas of the Swiss sociologist Jennifer Walter[ii] about what is happening in the United States right now and what to do about it. The group found these ideas incredibly helpful and they were shared widely. Here I try to build out from them to offer some thoughts and approaches on what civil society/non-governmental organisations’ (CSOs/NGOs) leaders could do to address feelings of overwhelm and to regain their necessary agency.
Walter’s main theme is that ‘overwhelm is the goal’. She points out that the flood of over two-hundred executive orders in President Trump’s first few days exemplifies what is explained in Naomi Klein’s book The Shock Doctrine (2007).[iii] The point of it is to utilise chaos and crisis so that they are able to push through radical changes while people are too disoriented to effectively resist. She couples this to Marshall McLuhan’s prediction that when we face information overload, we become passive and disengaged: ‘The rapid-fire executive orders create a cognitive bottleneck, making it nearly impossible for citizens and media to thoroughly analyse any single policy.’
This is essentially a bossing of the agenda, so that ‘…multiple major policies compete for attention simultaneously, [and] it fragments public discourse. Traditional media can’t keep up with the pace, leading to superficial coverage.’ Ultimately this results in ‘weakened democratic oversight and reduced public engagement.’ To recognise this and understand the causes of overwhelm is the first step in finding ways to manage and reduce this feeling.
Indeed, human beings are incredibly resilient and the effect of shock and awe can only last so long before people become numb to it or develop ways to cope. Plus, the CSOs/NGOs I work with on tobacco control, environmental, human rights or sustainable development issues are in the business of pushing for change themselves. But, while it is helpful to recognise that there is this purposeful ‘exploitation of cognitive limits’, it doesn’t wholly explain the disquiet coming from populist tactics. So, what is it?
I believe that my colleagues recognise that the current system and its processes are fundamentally flawed.[iv]You only have to consider how easily Greta Thunberg has pointed out that the global climate change response is not working. They understand that the house is already on fire, we are already in crisis, and that for the majority of the world’s population life is a perpetual challenge. There’s a common understanding that our global system needs to fundamentally shift towards one that operates within planetary limits and which is supportive of and fair for all.
They also know that trying to change any system from within its existing structure is inherently difficult. Five centuries ago, Niccolo Machiavelli astutely put it that: ‘There is nothing more difficult to execute, nor more dubious of success, nor more dangerous to administer than to introduce a new order of things, for he who introduces it has all those who profit from the old order as his enemies, and he has only lukewarm allies in all those who might profit from the new’ (1513, The Prince).
Donella Meadows, co-author of the seminal report The Limits to Growth (1972), has ranked the twelve leverage points for changing a system.[v] This, I suggest, is informative for understanding what else is causing disquiet and, more importantly, where the focus of CSO/NGOs has to turn.
I find that much of the solid work of CSOs/NGOs has been focussed on the lower to mid-ranked levers; working through existing political processes to effect positive change. They have been successful, with current rules and norms slowly becoming more progressive. It also requires logic and informed discourse to guide it, and allows for the rule of law. But, there is push back to this from populist politicians and corporate interests as more progressive rules and norms don’t work for them. And so, they look to subvert or by-pass these processes. Such as through the direct attacks we see on the status or funding of CSOs/NGOs. Indeed, Meadows says that the more powerful the leverage point the more the system will resist in changing it.
Moreover, while effective, these levers focus on changing the system in place whereas, in Meadows’ classification, the highest-level levers work outside the current system. They focus on the mindset or the paradigm out of which the system – its goals, structure, rules and parameters – arise in the first place. From a constructivist position, they are fundamental, foundational and very powerful.
Indeed, I believe that it is also from this that a big part of the disquiet among colleagues is now being felt. There is a realisation that reactionary actors have become more successful than progressives in exploiting these higher-level levers. Populists have realised they must focus on people’s concerns through emotion not truth. So, by controlling and flooding popular discourse with emotive issues and focussing on peoples’ everyday concerns, they are better able to influence the worldview of a sufficient proportion of the population. This presents a much more effective lever for change, or in this case to combat progressive change. But, it is important to trace how they are doing this?
For these levers, Meadows summarised Thomas Kuhn’s proposition (author of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 1962) that: ‘you keep pointing at the anomalies and failures in the old paradigm, you keep speaking louder and with assurance from the new one, you insert people with the new paradigm in places of public visibility and power. You don’t waste time with reactionaries; rather you work with active change agents and with the vast middle ground of people who are open minded.’
This reveals how populists are following Kuhn’s playbook by engaging with, and importantly empowering, a wide swath of this ‘vast middle ground of people’. They have presented themselves as offering problem-solving radical change, but which is actually radical backsliding. Their arguments are emotional, not logical, which has increasing power in a further divided and febrile society. Many citizens become convinced that the system is actively working against them[vi] – note the spread of conspiracy theories and confirmation bias – and they don’t care to question the motivations behind reactionary populism.
This all means that progressive reform can be questioned and is undermined; reviled through a plethora of divisive language and done away with within a faux-revolution. Indeed, the eventual outcome is a reversion of the developing political and social system to the excesses of the past. A re-visiting of the wolfhound century[vii]: war as politics, power over rights, unfettered capitalism, hydro-carbon economics, and systemic repression of women and minorities. And as yet there are still some blue skies, as clearly not everyone is convinced. Indeed, as the evident divide amongst the population shows, progressives have also been rather effective at this mindset level.
So, returning to Walter’s ideas, what now? She has proposed five main approaches to help people to regain their agency and to avoid overwhelm, and reminds us that ‘They want you scattered. Your focus is resistance.’I have reordered, renamed and built out from these five areas to offer some ideas for organisational leaders to think about:
1). Sense-making: If engendering overwhelm is the point of the populist political approach then a group recognition of this is important. You can always regain some of your power when you fathom the strategy and tactics of your opponent. It is important to establish an understanding within teams and across the organisation of this.
Let people explain how they are feeling, what their worries are. Helping people to talk about and process the current political environment or major changes is very necessary. Taking time in teams or across the organisation to discuss the political changes and people’s perspectives is needed. The offering of well-being or mental health support should also be considered (I have previously written a piece on occupational burn-out and purpose-driven organisations[viii]).
As well as the sense-making aspect, one key approach is to build a genuine sense of organisational solidarity. Now is not the time to be making organisational decisions behind closed doors, especially as it would feed into already existing anxieties. There may be resource constraints, but be open about them. The need for assurance and to actively exhibit the stated values of the organisation are crucial here.[ix]
2). Pacing Action: There’s often a natural urge to do something urgently when a new policy or bad news lands. While it is a way of regaining agency, by acting immediately and dropping other activities, one can produce further anxiety and lead to disproportionate and scattered efforts across an organisation.
The suggestion here is to practice going slow, taking a breath, and counting to ten. As Walter writes, ‘The urgent is known to cloud the important. Initial reporting often misses context.’ Indeed, fire-fighting has also been known to become addictive; especially in campaigning organisations.
She has suggested to wait for 48 hours before reacting to new policies, but, I believe that we need organisations who can respond in real time to outrages from populist governments and corporate aggression. So, organisationally, I suggest that when there is a critical issue that can’t be ignored that someone be assigned to write up (not an e-mail) a brief analysis of the issue. This could take the form of the Eisenhower Urgent/Important matrix, coupled to aspects of a PESTLE assessment,[x] and would identify those parts of the CSO/NGO programme that are potentially impacted. It should be no more than one page.
Why do this cold analysis? Well the idea is to diminish anxiety-driven action in two ways. Firstly, someone in the organisation is assigned to deal with it, thus nobody else has to worry about it. It follows that the team knows that it has been seen and it’s been looked into. Secondly, there will be an initial analysis that can then be discussed coldly with the right people and with further contextual information. It provides a calmer pacing to the situation and perhaps aids more rational decision-making. Sharing the planned actions or responses closes the circle and gives the sense that the CSO/NGO is able to manage any shifting situation.
3). Reassess to focus on impact: When it looks like the rules have changed, everything is upside down, and all our plans are now upset, it’s advisable to set some boundaries so as not to become overwhelmed. Walter recommends, that as individuals we can’t track everything, so we should pick two to three key issues we deeply care about and focus our attention there. This is because, as she says, our ‘Impact comes from sustained focus, not scattered awareness.’ It’s also about focusing on what you can control and concentrating on those things that you have power over and letting go of things you can’t control.
For organisations this is a little more complicated, but the principle is the same. It is worth reassessing where we can have true impact in a changed circumstance and it resists those tactics designed to scatter our focus. There are a few levels to this, however, as it relates to overall strategy and to specific tactics.
I would suggest taking time to revisit the basic assumptions of an organisation’s theory of change or mission, vision and goals statements. Addressing where they are challenged, no longer relevant, or are based on now unfounded assumptions. In a way it can show what is perhaps less relevant now, or isn’t going to work in the changing environment. This will help to reveal the actual dimensions of any change. It should try to determine where a CSO/NGO believes it can have the most effect or impact – the biggest bang for its buck – and to thoroughly focus on how to do that; the tactics or approaches that could work.
I suspect, knowing the current system is already flawed, that there is less difference than one might imagine. Even if there is, it will show where to refocus and re-orientate by doing so in a way that is both reactive and proactive, by looking to new ways of operating, campaigning and acting. Claiming agency through a refined strategy and intensification in more impactful areas. This compartmentalisation should help to reduce the sense of being scattered and offer more doable actions.[xi]
From the discussion above, there also appears to be a need to better focus CSO/NGO action towards citizens at the emotional level. To find ways to resonate with the here and now for people, to those things that worry them personally (work, cost of living, health, crime, pensions, social values), and not only through portents of imminent doom or the promise of some esoteric future. This is where reactionary, populists have been acting with abandon and so CSOs/NGOs must closely connect their actions with people’s daily concerns and their aspirations. As Professor John Foster has written in The Sustainability Mirage (2008): …the urge to sustainable action could be made to offer another kind of public sense. …such an alternative sense would have to shift the operative focus onto the present. …it would understand the present motivating force of that concern in a different way.’
Steve Campbell, from the Urban Movement Innovation Fund[xii], told me that “this is an area of great importance, because the forces of chaos work so well in social media.” His belief is that CSOs/NGOs must be prepared to engage actively in the spaces where this debate is happening and to provide powerful, yet thoughtful, evidence-based, and respectful conversation. It’s certainly not easy, as much of the dialogue can be hurtful, lacks evidence, and is essentially designed to enrage. So, it will require the refinement of those skills and approaches necessary to work emotively, yet retaining reasoned scientific positions alongside just and equitable values.
4). Bigger picture: Building an understanding of the patterns of change, not just reacting to events, is another aspect of avoiding overwhelm. Walter suggests finding ‘trusted analysts who do the heavy lifting of synthesis.’She calls them aggregators and experts.
Again, this is something many CSOs/NGOs already do. Working with experts, research institutes and basing their arguments on evidence and science is standard practice. And, although in a post-truth environment it may have less influence, it is still necessary to have a strong evidence base to progressive positions. However, less work is done on the patterns or at the systems level. Indeed, one can get lost in the detail and the nitty gritty of action; mistaking activity and outputs for success.
I would suggest that an organisation use Meadows’ classification of system-levers – or something similar – to characterise where their strategy is seeking to influence policy and what their actions are aimed at changing. This system-based approach can allow for a consideration of the prospective power of where and how they are working by providing an understanding of the leverage of a particular action. It will also reveal the expected degree of system push back. Understanding where an organisation’s potency of effort lies within the larger scheme of things is vital, which is useful for planning, for resource allocation, and to manage expectation.
5). Community alliances: Building – perhaps broadening – community is the final approach suggested by Walter. Here her suggestion is to spread the cognitive load by allowing for different people to track different issues. As she says, ‘Network intelligence beats individual overload.’ For CSOs/NGOs this is a common aim, with groups coming together to develop joint positions, campaigns, and by sharing information; while agreeing who will do what (a kind of delegation outside the organisation). Solidarity across movements and inter-sectionally is important. This means working with trade unions, representatives of business associations, indigenous groups, local authority associations, faith-based groups, and making meaningful outreach into the community.[xiii] Many organisations already do this sort of work.[xiv] Yet, there perhaps needs to be an agreed way to prioritise and direct information between partners, and with practices and mechanisms in place to avoid contributing to overload and the further scattering of focus.
Attaining positive change for a fairer, safer and more sustainable society will require the involvement and enrolment of people through a strong connection to their local and individual interests. Although it is difficult, this is where populist political action is operating by focussing on personal concerns, anxieties, and by exploiting bias. Fundamentally, this is all about building a broader electoral and economic consensus of the benefits of a progressive agenda by winning people over, from the grassroots up, through showing them where their personal interests will be improved.
So, I feel that there is a need to broaden and localise alliances that reach citizens. Talking and working with similar organisations with the same area of influence is fine, but combatting populist propaganda will require ways to share information and organise action through real-time platforms and, crucially, through a direct connection with the wider public. In order to be in the game of combatting disinformation, activists need to be able to find ways to make emotive and truthful information directly available through those same channels being used by the populists and corporate advocates (e.g. Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok, Threads and Twitter/X).[xv] In addition, real life community outreach and organising on the ground is more necessary now; through events, workshops, panels, kitchen table discussions, etc.
These five action areas present some potential ways for CSO/NGO leaders to consider as they face the polycrisis of rapid political change and address the aggressive tactics of reactionary politicians and corporate interests. There are certainly others, but, I hope, they provide a suitable place to start.
[i] Strategic Law Suit Against Public Participation.
[ii] https://www.jenniferwalter.me
[iii] https://tsd.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine.html
[iv] There is a brilliant critique in Foster, J. (2008). The Sustainability Mirage: Illusion and Reality in the Coming War on Climate Change. London: Earthscan.
[v] Meadows, D. (1999). Leverage points; Places to intervene in a system. Hartland, VT: The Sustainability Institute.
[vi] Actually, they’re probably right as the system remains unfair, but the change they are being sold is rather a return to the past and that will never work for them.
[vii] In his book Life and Fate, Vassily Grossman refers to Osip Mandelstam’s poem that likens the 20th Century as the wolfhound century.
[viii] https://endeavour.consulting/2020/03/30/occupational-burn-out-and-purpose-driven-organisations/
[ix] I recall one organisation I worked in had a serious financial crisis. There was a realisation that we either had to cut staff or cut salaries to survive. The management decided that it would be best to keep on as many staff as possible and to cut salaries. However, through the staff representatives, it was argued that lower paid staff would suffer disproportionately from the planned 10% cut (as they do from cost-of-living increases). This was understood by the staff and management and instead a ceiling was established and only those paid over this amount took an eventual 11% cut in salary. The sense of camaraderie from this decision was palpable and the organisation ultimately worked itself out of its financial problems.
[x] A PESTLE analysis is an approach to study those key external factors (Political, Economic, Sociological, Technological, Legal and Environmental) that influence an organisation.
[xi] Several of the organisations I work with regularly map the circle of people they need to influence. They assess the aims of their programme, review the actors, and then see where they need to concentrate. This is coupled to a reality check on who is likely to be swayed by their arguments against the resources they have available (staff, time, competence and funding). This, is a known practice, but, with resource constraints and key issues under threat, it is necessary to focus with more acuity.
[xii] A former campaigner at Greenpeace, co-Founder of the Plastics Solutions Fund, and Campaigns Leader at the Oak Foundation.
[xiii] The United Nations has a good list of what it characterises as Major Groups and Stakeholders: https://hlpf.un.org/mgos
[xiv] For example, Oceana Foundation Europe works with the group Low Impact Fishers of Europe; while Pesticides Action Network – Europe forged an alliance with a multitude of organisations to bring together a successful European Citizens Initiative called Save Bees and Farmers.
[xv] This may even require strategies for encountering Dark Web Social Media.
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