REPUBLIC SERVICE

The Seven Is of Lasting Change

By Ricardo Saludo In two courses this writer currently teaches as Ateneo de Manila University, Understanding the Bureaucracy at the Ateneo School of Government (ASoG), and Media and Politics at the Asian Center for Journalism (ACFJ), addressing climate change came up in discussion. Senator Loren Legarda spoke on the issue to our bureaucracy class and another class handled by ASoG Dean Tony La Via. In the ACFJ, meanwhile, one of the Media and Politics students proposed articles on the issue of whether journalists should take sides in covering climate change and actively advocate needed changes in society. One key question in both classes emerged: How can one drive social change, especially the bureaucracy, on the one hand, and the media, on the other? It would, of course, take much more than one or two columns or even a month of them to do justice to this issue. But from a couple of courses taken last year, one in strategy and innovation at Oxford and another on change leadership at Cornell, seven is come to mind as the keys to driving and establishing lasting change: information, initiative, interaction, innovation, implementation, institutionalization, and inspiration. The first task of change agents is to inform themselves and key sectors about the problem. Nearly all situations demanding change, whether it is violence, oppression, corruption or environmental degradation, happen in large part because the people and entities that can do something about it do not even know there is a problem, let alone what needs to be done to solve it. That was certainly the case with climate change. Only with data of the past half-century did scientists become aware of the link between rising global temperatures, greenhouse gas emissions, and worldwide human activity. And it was only in 1992 when world leaders agreed in Rio de Janeiro to undertake planet-wide efforts to retard, reverse, and cope with global warming, and in 1997 when specific targets for emission reductions were set in Kyoto for implementation from just 2005. After filling the mind comes flexing the will. Knowing whats wrong, we must take the initiative to correct it. That may seem obvious, but too often, people are content to learn about and expound on the worlds concerns, and nothing more, as if packing ones mind with facts and figures about a problem fulfills ones duty to address it. How many

Congress inquiries have we seen on all manner of ills and illicit schemes, yet nothing comes out of them except glib soundbites in the media and thick reports gathering dust.

Next step: innovation. If we mean to change things, we begin by looking for innovative solutions. Clearly, present modes of doing things arent working; thats precisely why we have a problem. The good news is, humanity has a sterling record of devising new devices, methods, processes, and policies. Once people see the need, it mothers invention. And with the Internet linking minds across the globe, the quest for innovative ideas and initiatives zooms at Google speed. The Internet has also accelerated the fourth I of lasting change: interaction. To achieve any major social reform, we must interface with people of common purpose. Jesus Christ had his twelve apostles. Jose Rizal joined fellow expatriates in the Propaganda Movement; Andres Bonifacio formed the Katipunan. And for a global problem like climate change, the interaction must also span the planet, not just to push harder by joining hands, but also to act smarter by sharing information, insights and initiatives. Now comes the second-hardest part of driving change: implementation. We in the Philippines excel in crafting brilliant programs and policies, including world-class legislation in many areas. For instance, the Thais and Vietnamese learned modern rice cultivation at the International Rice Research Institute in Laguna. And our anticorruption laws are rated better than those in most other nations. But all our bright ideas and plans go nowhere because of poor implementation. Hence, we import rice today from Thailand and Vietnam. And while the Philippines ranks higher than three-quarters of the world in the Global Integrity Index for anti-corruption legislation, nearly the same number of nations rate higher than us in implementation and enforcement. As if getting a country implementing programs werent hard enough, try the whole world. In fact, implementing programs is not even the hardest task in beginning and sustaining reform. How many successful programs have ended in backsliding when their champions leave the scene? Take the sweeping reform and computerization, which reduced corruption in the Bureau of Customs from among the five worst in the government to below 30th place under Guillermo Parayno in 1992-98. All that ended after Parayno was replaced by the Estrada Administration. Customs has never recovered since. Hence, more than implementation, we need institutionalization. Reforms must be entrenched, deeply rooted, and grafted into the structures, cultures, and everyday habits and practices of society and its key sectors. This is particularly indispensable to reverse a problem was centuries in the making, like ethnic strife, endemic corruption or

climate change. Only the sustained, daily effort to alter decades- or centuries-old wrong practices and attitudes can such problems be solved and reversed. Throughout all the foregoing efforts, it is necessary to inspire both the change advocates and the public, not only to sustain their collective efforts for change, but more so to stimulate the innovation needed to generate new approaches and solutions. It is impossible to prescribe for every person what changes she or he should undertake in their particular circumstances. For hundreds of millions of people across the globe, their own thinking and will must move them to discover and do what is right. Hence, people have to be inspired and imbued with the inner perspective and motivation to achieve the vision of change, whether it is democracy, environmental conservation, social justice, or economic development, so they would themselves devise and implement what needs to be done in their own individual circumstances for the advancement of imperative reforms. That inspiration is also crucial to keep the quest for reform going after todays change leaders eventually pass the baton to others. Moses, Jesus, Mohamed, and the Buddha all inspired disciples to spread their message and continue their work, building todays great religions. With the same gift of spirit, may we all be driven to be informed, take the initiative, interact and innovate, implement and institutionalize for a better, brighter future for humanity and the world. _________________________________________________
Ricardo Saludo heads the Center for Strategy, Enterprise & Intelligence (ric.saludo@censeisolutions.com), publishing The CenSEI Report, which provides analytic research on national, business and global issues.