As covid-19 raged like wildfire through the UK earlier this year it was clear that the NHS was struggling to cope, for a variety of reasons, one being that its crisis response systems had been honed to deal efficiently with what was, by common consent, the most likely future emergency, an influenza epidemic. It might have been better prepared if it had focussed its planning on resilience rather than a specific threat, thereby taking into account unpredictability.
The virus still rages and the NHS remains under pressure, so people with non-urgent conditions stay away – voluntarily or otherwise. So it’s just as well that, when I took a tumble from my bike this week, I had no need of medical attention. Mind, I was fortunate: there was no motor traffic and I was wearing a helmet plus several layers of thick, winter clothing. Nor did the bike suffer any damage, it being a sturdy, general-purpose machine of no particular distinction, not a specialist mount such as a pared-down, lightweight racer, or a techno-bike, loaded up with costly electronic gadgetry. It is a model of resilience.
I was cycling around Plymouth, reacquainting myself with my childhood realm, noting what had changed, as well as what I had never even noticed at the time. As for the physical environment, I have so far encountered very few surprises, nasty or otherwise. It is in the cultural field that I am aware of obvious difference. The hazy remembrance from my schooldays is of a monocultural community of extended family networks, Devonian in origin and staunchly protective of their heritage – though against whom, I am not sure. The neighbouring Cornish, whom they distrusted, certainly, but other UK inhabitants posed no threat, as they only came here to holiday, precisely to enjoy the quaintly attractive elements of that heritage. Foreigners came and went also, I suppose – though I never met any. But now, multiculturalism has come to town, imported by foreign immigrants and youngsters studying at the university, which has expanded in the last twenty years. It may seem odd but, in returning to live in a place that is no longer quite the same as I remember, I am happy to find it changed. Notwithstanding the relative decline of the extended family networks that provided succour and support (now a common factor in the underlying social structure of Western societies generally) the dynamic feels progressive.
There are still plenty of pasty shops, but they compete for custom with vegan, vegetarian and ethnic outlets. And, while it is still possible to sit down to a cup of instant coffee and a sickly-sweet custard tart at a ‘greasy spoon’, my preference is an espresso with home-made pastel de nata at the Portuguese café, made possible by an enterprising family of incomers. And, while supermarkets provide all the things we want (and more than we need) their monolithic corporate structures make little contribution towards innovations such as sustainability and local production, unlike the independent shops run by youthful idealists whose future depends upon those values. Small enterprises may not be ‘efficient’ if measured by the standards of corporate profitability, but their strengths lie elsewhere, in the need to succeed economically by finding the niche in which they can thrive. Resilience, innovation and staying close to customers all play their part and, when they succeed, they strengthen the fabric of community by adding diversity. Monoculture may be comforting but it is dull – and not even dependable: when the mainstay collapses – say, the major industry, for example – there is no economic back-up; or when the population simply ages and fades away, there is no regeneration. Since we know that such events will happen (even if we cannot predict their exact nature), maybe we should plan for them by building in some diversity, some alternatives, some…resilience.
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