The True Source of Social Change; and it’s not Politics

The world is changing profoundly, rapidly, and in every dimension. But where is this change coming from? What’s causing it? For many, the answer is simple: the world is changing because of political action. Great leaders take a problem and act to solve it. But when we look at history and the evolution of the world, another reality emerges: social change is rooted in everyday life. Change that is not wanted and organized by politicians, but often only sanctioned – or slowed down – by them.

Open a middle school history book and look at the “big dates” in French history. What do you see? The baptism of Clovis, 1515, 1789, 1848, 1958, 1981. The heroes of this history? Kings, a few queens, political leaders. We tend to see history as a series of political events. Reforms or revolutions, but mostly battles and wars. An underlying mental model? That a country’s identity is forged by its political evolution over the centuries. In the case of France, its history is presented as that of the creation of national identity through the necessary affirmation of the centralized state, which triumphed with Louis XIV and Napoleon. We’ve come to take it for granted that the source of change lies in political action. Logically, then, we place our hopes for change there. As a corollary to this mental model, we believe that everyday life is nothing but repetition and execution, that people go about their business in unchanging ways, and that they are merely the recipients of politically driven change.

What we see, what we don’t see

But this belief that the source of change lies in politics is not borne out by the facts. We see the great political events, the epic battles, the deeds of kings and princes, the explosions and fervent movements of the crowds. What we don’t see are the profound changes within society. And it’s not necessarily what we see that matters.

The historian Frank Gavin illustrates this point with the interesting example of the USA in the 70s. It was a very dark time. The involvement in Vietnam, which had cost a fortune and deeply divided the country, ended in an ignominious retreat. It was front page news for months. The major traditional industries, such as automobiles and metallurgy, were in decline, and factory closings followed one another, while Americans watched in amazement as the Japanese, whom they had beaten thirty years earlier, achieved commercial success and and were on course to become the world’s leading economic power. Politically, the USSR seemed inexorably on the rise, challenging American dominance once and for all. Feelings of decline and political powerlessness were strong. But the ’70s were also years of economic ferment. While the climate was one of depression and political lament, young entrepreneurs were preparing the revolutions to come: computers, electronics, biology, which less than ten years later would propel America to the forefront of these new industries, leaving Japan in the dust. The country’s current incredible industrial power, at the forefront of each of these new revolutions, was born at that time; no one saw it coming, and it was not the result of political will.

Gavin cites three significant examples from this period: the birth of Apple in 1976, which marked the invention of the microcomputer; the emergence of Napa Valley, one of whose wines was recognized as the world’s best at the famous Judgment of Paris, also in 1976; and the launch of Star Wars in 1977. All three are examples of innovation and excellence that run counter to the popular notion of a declining, dumbed-down America with mediocre culture. Apple, Napa Valley, and Star Wars are only examples, but they give a sense that many important events are not the product of political decisions, although all three have had and continue to have significant consequences in this regard. In other words, a lot of what is important and significant in terms of consequences is not political, and a lot of what is political is not so important in terms of consequences, even if it gets a lot of attention. Great revolutions are born in everyday life, far from the spotlight, and ferment quietly for a long time before they explode.

Political insignificance

A typical example is that of the greatest of them all, the Industrial Revolution. It, too, was not born of political will. In fact, politics probably did everything in its power to resist it. It was born out of a very gradual change in the mindset of people over a period of time, roughly from the 15th to the 18th century. During this period, the medieval mental model, according to which a person’s dignity depended on his or her birth, evolved. It was increasingly based on talent and hard work. A person was no longer judged by his birth, but by what he had accomplished. This means that a merchant or a servant could have as much dignity as a marquis, and that anyone could rise in society and gain recognition. If this seems obvious to us today, let’s not forget that it was inconceivable to the medieval mind. This change in mental model, which was again very gradual, obviously had far-reaching consequences: it allowed the emergence of a powerful middle class that would find its place between the peasant class and the aristocracy and the clergy, before eliminating the latter two. It also made the idea of universal rights self-evident. These three hundred years of revolutionary thinking owe absolutely nothing to political initiative. At best, politics merely ratified these legal changes when it didn’t try to block them. The French Revolution merely enshrined them.

Letting go

So the idea that politics changes society does not stand up to historical scrutiny. This is all the more true in an increasingly complex society, resistant to direct action, in which citizens are increasingly educated, informed, and autonomous. To think that change can only be political, which in France means from above and from the center, can only lead to stalemate. Political control and the initiative of change are nothing but an illusion, while society evolves enormously on its own. It’s time to update our mental model of change, and to consider that it mostly comes from the daily lives of intelligent actors on the ground, and that the role of politics is simply not to prevent it before it happens.

This article is based on the article “History is in the making” by Stephen Davis

🇫🇷 French version of this article here.