PG #72: Staying with the trouble

"The necessity for a form of socialism is based on the observation that the world’s present economic arrangements doom most of the world to misery; that the way of life dictated by these arrangements is both sterile and immoral; and finally, that there is no hope for peace in the world so long as these arrangements obtain."

– James Baldwin, No Name in the Streets

In January 2020, our CEO Chris Marmo wrote here in this newsletter:

“2020 is the start of a vital decade, and we’re looking forward to taking a rest, rolling up our sleeves, and staying with the trouble.”

I doubt he could have predicted the sheer scale of ‘trouble’ 2020 might bring.

In Australia, 2020 started with bushfires – our fossil fuel dependence and climate change chickens come home to roost. Dangerous smoke blanketed the country; lives and homes and habitat were lost, while our senior government officials literally went on holiday. Little did we know that our cursory attempt at mask-wearing to cope with the air quality was just practice for what was to come.

There is not much for me to say about the pandemic that hasn't been said elsewhere. The pandemic is a thing that was, and is, and will remain for some time. This year I learned to casually throw around phrases like, “well, everything is going well, apart from a global pandemic” into casual conversation. It’s just part of the water we all swim in now.

Chris’ prediction did come true of course, in that 2020 meant plenty of “staying with the trouble.”

Here are just a few of the 34 projects we completed this year:

• We co-designed strategy with Beyond Blue to help them respond effectively to mental health needs during the pandemic
• We worked with the Supreme Court of Victoria to help them respond to the increase in self-representation at court, and the coming waves of litigation that tend to follow a recession
• We worked to make it easier to deal with fines in NSW, and easier to apply for the Disability Support pension in Victoria
• We conducted research for Atlassian that looked at the sheer scale of the impact of the pandemic on knowledge workers
• We helped a cemeteries trust understand the impact of lockdowns on funerals and grief
• We worked to make it easier to apply for the Disability Support pension in Victoria
• And we won a good design award for our work to improve justice system outcomes for people with cognitive disability.

These projects were all conducted in the midst of a year filled with uncertainty – uncertainty in the future of our communities, our society, and our planet. Considering the uncertainty of 2020, what might 2021 bring?

As I write this there have been no active coronavirus cases in the state of Victoria for 30 days. But even with the virus effectively eliminated (here, if not yet in much of the world), the last thing I would want to see is a return to ‘normality’.

Why? Because 2020 was the start of a vital decade, and now we are a whole year in. It’s clear that the trouble in our society – the inequities, the injustice, the unfairness, the unsustainability that needed responding to prior to 2020 – are all still with us.

Some issues have been brought starkly to light by the crises of climate change, the global pandemic, and the resultant recession. Some people and organisations are clearly more responsible than others for these problems. But regardless of the causes, I think we can all take this moment to confront the past, fix the present, and shape the future.

2021 will be about coping, managing, responding to, predicting, and creating change. At Paper Giant, we believe the world can be better, and we hope you can join us in making a better world a reality.