"Progress" by Johan Norberg

"Progress" by Johan Norberg

Oneworld Publishing 2016

ISBN 978-1-78074-950-1

Why is it that all of the news seems to be bad? Why is it that it is far easier to sell dystopian scenarios than utopian ones? Why is it that many people believe that the future will be worse than the past? This book goes a long way to address the issues these questions raise.

The author laments our apparent loss of belief in progress as a feature of human advancement. The bulk of the book is used to show us that we are living at a time in history when hunger is at its least, sanitation and health are at their greatest, where life expectancy is at its longest, where poverty and violence are at their lowest. We are the most literate, free, and equal humans in history. There is nothing to suggest that this trajectory of improvement in the progress of humanity is either slowing or reversing, and yet we simply refuse to acknowledge these facts.

Why is that? The last two chapters consider this question head on. The penultimate chapter considers the prospects for the generation to come. It looks at the question from a longitudinal view rather than an inter-generational one. It is easier for us to review our own experiences rather than to imagine those of others. If we think about how our own lives have improved as we have become older, then we see the point that is being made.

For example, when I was a boy, we didn't have a TV. I remember the arrival our first TV (black & white) to displace the radio we had before. That was later replaced by a colour TV with three channels, and has now been supplanted by a mobile device through which I can watch literally thousands of channels showing hundreds of thousands of programmes, streamed to me the instant I demand them. This gives an account of the scale of progress over the last 50 years in a relatively inconsequential area. There have been even greater improvements in areas that matter, such as medicine, public health, or the eradication of poverty. There is nothing to suggest that this pace of improvement will slow. If anything, the evidence suggests that the trajectory of improvement will continue, but possibly at an accelerating pace.

If this is our experience, which is uncovered by the simplest of reflection, then why do we see an half empty glass rather than one that is half full? The final chapter in the book - the epilogue - deals with this question head on. The clues to the answer lie in human psychology, which provides us with three biases. The first is that we find that 'bad is stronger than good'. We remember our losses more than we remember our gains. We fear a prospective loss more than a prospective gain. We fear that the present we have will be better than a future that has yet to happen. The second bias is what the author outlines as 'the psychology of moralization'. We use our complaints about problems as a signal to others that we care about our listeners. It is a way of empathising with the problems of others. The final bias is a nostalgia about a golden past that never existed. When we hear about 'the good old days', we tend to forget that they were the bad old days also. These biases are an important part of our make up as humans. They have helped us to evolve as the dominant species on the planet, but they also constrain us as well.

We now live in a world in which, through the use of modern technology, we can witness the drama of events as they unfold. We have access to news events, on a rolling 24 hour basis, right across the world. No wonder the news always seems bleak. It comes to us in planetary volumes. However, if we stop to think about how many of those events have touched us directly, or in which we have even remotely participated, then the news we receive tends to become someone else's news.

In most of our lives, our own news is that not a lot new has happened. Things today are more or less the same as yesterday. This is not enough to capture attention. It lacks drama. It lacks entertainment. It doesn't inform us. This is why we very rarely feature in the news, even in an extremely minor role. The fact is that most of our lives are uneventful. That makes us sad because we want our lives to have had a meaning - a purpose - which causes us to look back to a past that seems so much better than today. Even if the facts say otherwise.

This is a book that is based upon fact. There are nine chapters that consider the facts relating to such issues as food, sanitation, poverty, violence, the environment, literacy and freedom. In each of them, the author presents a factual base to demonstrate a history of improvement. At times, this reads like a list of numbers, which is not the most engaging of prose. The book could do with the simple editing device of tabulation, but that would make it a much shorter book. It is not a difficult read, but there are times when the statistics make it bit of a dull read.

This is, however, an important book because it does provide the basis to address some of the questions which occupy the minds of futurists. For example, it is easier to sell dystopian scenarios than utopian ones because dystopia has the drama necessary to engage an audience. This drama can be used to engage an audience to provide a vehicle through which a message can be delivered, especially if that message is one of change.

It is why we would recommend the book to the more thoughtful of futurists.

Stephen Aguilar-Millan

© The European Futures Observatory 2017