There’s this idea that compromise is supposed to be a virtue of some kind, but is it? When a group supports plan X, another one supports plan Y, and what we get at the end is plan Z, this is what we call a compromise. The group in charge accepted to fundamentally change its plan in order to find a middle ground with the other group’s plan. The result is a plan that is not entirely own by one or the other group. In a situation like this, how can we be surprised when plan Z proves not to work? As Brett Hall says, neither group ever thought it was the best idea in the first place. This kind of situation is imminently complex when long-term thinking is confronted with ideology, for example in politics. In our democracies, we are used to this confrontation between the group in charge and the opposition group. The group in charge comes up with a plan and the opposition group wants to amend it. Sometimes after weeks of threats, the group in charge decides to distort or drop it completely. But, is all of that really serving the public interest? How can we know if something is working if we can’t test it properly? How can we make something works if nobody can fully endorse it? Is a relation of opposition really sustainable? Is it even possible to move from a relation of opposition and compromises to a relation of collaboration and synergies? I think that the foundational aspect of our democracies need to be questioned because the systems we create are making everyone deeply tired and unsatisfied.
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The poverty of compromise
There’s this idea that compromise is supposed to be a virtue of some kind, but is it? When a group supports plan X, another one supports plan Y, and what we get at the end is plan Z, this is what we call a compromise. The group in charge accepted to fundamentally change its plan in order to find a middle ground with the other group’s plan. The result is a plan that is not entirely own by one or the other group. In a situation like this, how can we be surprised when plan Z proves not to work? As Brett Hall says, neither group ever thought it was the best idea in the first place. This kind of situation is imminently complex when long-term thinking is confronted with ideology, for example in politics. In our democracies, we are used to this confrontation between the group in charge and the opposition group. The group in charge comes up with a plan and the opposition group wants to amend it. Sometimes after weeks of threats, the group in charge decides to distort or drop it completely. But, is all of that really serving the public interest? How can we know if something is working if we can’t test it properly? How can we make something works if nobody can fully endorse it? Is a relation of opposition really sustainable? Is it even possible to move from a relation of opposition and compromises to a relation of collaboration and synergies? I think that the foundational aspect of our democracies need to be questioned because the systems we create are making everyone deeply tired and unsatisfied.