We not only spent the cold and stormy start of the year in a cozy home office, but also used it for our 55BirchStreet BookCircle. This time in focus: “Utopias for Realists” by Rutger Bregmann. The discussion that followed prompted us to personally reflect on our values and goals as a company and as individuals.
In the book, Bregmann addresses various social problems and discusses “utopian” solutions, such as the introduction of a 15-hour week or an unconditional basic income to escape poverty.
We would be happy to summarize our discussion with colleagues using the following three quotes:
“But we must ask ourselves what value freedom of speech has if we have nothing more valuable to say.”
Freedom of speech is the greatest asset in a democracy. In contrast to still many other countries (e.g. North Korea, Turkmenistan, China), we can feel (relatively) safe in Germany when we express our opinion — no matter how alone we may be with this opinion.
However, we ask ourselves whether, in times of ugly online comments, cyberbullying and the like, our right to freedom of speech is even being fully exhausted today and whether our culture of discussion is slowly sinking away due to fear of conflict and more hate as a genuine discourse. We asked ourselves critically: Are we actually still discussing enough? Not only in politics, but also with our friends and families? What is a friendship worth if it can't endure a discussion? And what does it mean for the future if we all actually agree that this right is valuable and worthy of protection and yet we do not dare to exhaust it? We have come to the conclusion that it would help some unqualified, morally substantiated and highly emotional discussions not to “express opinions” but to “exchange observations”: this involves listening, responding to the other person, and not always having to come to a common denominator
“The brightest minds of my generation are thinking about how to get people to click on advertising buttons,” complains a former math genius on Facebook.”
You don't have to look all the way to Silicon Valley to see that there is a lot of truth in it. And that hurts.
After all, shouldn't a math genius have the incentive to develop a model of how we can stop climate change instead of continuing to drive consumption?
Are the incentives in our society set correctly if the most money can be earned by manipulating other people?
If role descriptions such as parents, caregivers or social workers generally seem less valuable than financial advisors, shouldn't the value of work be reassessed or remeasured?
Which brings us to the next point:
“As Robert Kennedy put it: “The gross national product measures everything except the things that make life worth living.”
While everyone is talking about purpose and people across generations ask themselves “What actually makes our lives worth living? “, the same economic policy indicators, GNP and GDP apply as they did over 70 years ago.
Our economic policy compass therefore primarily measures paid work
But what does an indicator look like that measures things that really make our lives worth living? To do this, let's sit down in peace and think about what that means for us. And maybe everyone should do that, because only when we have a clear idea of how we want to steer our lives can we also make new suggestions about the navigation tool.
To take the metaphor to the extreme: Because today hardly anyone steers by compass anymore, but by GPS, and perhaps a similarly revolutionary idea is needed here too, which feels completely normal at some point.
In “Utopias for Realists,” Rutger Bregmann also shows historical developments in many places and it becomes clear how fate and the smallest decisions have changed the path of our society. It is also noticeable that the author has reviewed and reinterpreted a lot of existing literature, so that we have already come across a lot of familiar things while reading. Yet Rutger Bregmann manages to combine things in a modern way, showing previously unusual ways that could help our society think in terms of utopias again and achieve progress.
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