The Accelerating Rate of Change

The following is offered by Dr. John Plodinec, Associate Director for Community Resilience Certification at CARRI and Science Advisor, Savannah River National Laboratory.


In my previous post on the need for a national framework for community resilience, I focused on the new spectrum of hazards facing American communities. In this post, I’d like to look at another reason why a national framework is needed – the accelerating rate of change.

As I’ve noted earlier, in early American communities the pace of change was relatively slow – communities usually could adapt to emerging trends and new hazards at their own pace. A person in his prime in 1700 would not be all that uncomfortable in the America of 1800 (unless, of course, he was a violent royalist!). A city dweller in her prime in 1800 might be overwhelmed with all of the new technologies (street lights, streetcars, horseless carriages!) in the world of 1900, but her country cousin would still be able to recognize her world of 1800 in that of 1900. In today’s techno centric world, the accelerating rate of technological change means that those in their prime in 1900 would face a completely unfamiliar – and perhaps terrifying - world.

As noted in an excellent report by Susi Moser and Shanna Ratner (“Community Resilience and Wealth….”), available at the US Endowment for Forestry and Communities, http://www.usendowment.org/communityresilience.html, rural communities are now faced with the need to adapt, or re-invent, themselves every fifteen years. Why is that?

As technologies change, the businesses in a community are faced with a decision of whether to adopt new, or adapt existing technologies to meet their markets’ evolving needs. If they choose to adopt, they face the certainty of increased capital costs and the uncertainty of the value of the new technology. If they choose not to adopt new technologies, they run the risk of imitating the US steel industry after World War II, which was nearly destroyed by a Japan that eagerly embraced new technology.

Businesses making bad choices can start the clock ticking on a time bomb laid at the foundations of a community. We have only to look at how communities in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana are struggling to reinvent themselves in light of the poor choices made by the carmakers. Or how rural communities in the Southeast are struggling to survive in light of the new challenges facing them.

Communities dependent on furniture manufacturing provide an ideal example. Ten years ago, Mississippi produced more wooden furniture than anywhere else in the nation. However, the American furniture industry was very slow to adopt new technologies, for example robots to automate production. Conversely, their competitors in China aggressively pursued these new technologies, and now have captured much of the American market. As a result, many communities in northern Mississippi and Alabama are facing tremendous challenges because of an eroded tax base and a workforce mostly looking for work.

A resilience framework can help a community to successfully adapt to change. First, it should help a community identify its vulnerabilities, whether that is dependence on a single company or industry, or a poorly maintained bridge, or lack of a flexible workforce. The framework should then help the community look at the resources it has and identify actions it can take to reduce those vulnerabilities. A wise community will use these insights to reinvent itself – and reinvest in itself. The result – more resilient communities, better able to respond to change.