What’s on your agenda - Trump, Brexit, Russia? A year ago, Weinstein and #MeToo was an Unthinkable. Now it’s at the top of the public agenda. At the launch of Thinking the Unthinkable, World Affairs Expert Nik Gowing stressed the urgency of this project in a world where unthinkable issues are rapidly becoming realities.
“It’s the overwhelming nature of disruptive events that are taking place,” Gowing explained. The book was published just ten days so that it could be as up to date as possible. The co-authors described the talk as a milestone in their research project and opened up the conversation to the Hay audience by asking for their Unthinkables - from the total collapse of the NHS to mass unemployment when technology takes over big businesses.
Researcher Didi Ogede’s data analysis of the team’s extensive interviews with world leaders supports the book’s claims. Short termism, confusion and fear are top of corporate and political leader’s agendas, and she said the younger generation has undervalued skills which those leaders don’t.
The inter-generational issue is key to challenging the conformism which is holding leaders back, the team stressed. Chris Langdon noted that the issues of conformism at leadership level are not new, but that the question now is “How, in an age of hyper change, of hyper-speed change, of total transparency … do we adjust?” The team stressed that these are political, social and corporate issues of societal stability.
If you missed this, you might enjoy
How Britain Really Works, on Monday 28th May, at 11.30am at the Tata Tent.