Chapter 7 of Development as Freedom by Amartya Sen, Famines and Other Crises, examines the impact of freedoms and leadership through the lens of famines and other crises. This chapter also builds upon Chapter 6’s discussion of democracy. Human agency can cause and sustain famines and other crises at all levels of society.
Sen has noted several times (most recently in Chapter 6) that effective democracies have avoided famines. In this chapter, he delves deeply into the data. Famines are often construed to be failures of food production. The stories Sen highlights tell a different story. A critical quote that set the tone is “Hunger relates not only to food, production, and agricultural expansion, but also to the functioning of the entire economy and – even more broadly – the operation of the political and social arrangements that can directly or indirectly influence people‘s ability to acquire food and to achieve health and nourishment.” Much of the pain of famines and other crises can be laid to the feet of leaders that insulate themselves from those they lead. What lesson can coaches and transformational leaders take from this observation? This chapter suggests four lessons:
- Engage those you lead; go to the gemba.
Gemba walks are a powerful tool for identifying improvements to how an organization does work. At the core of the technique is observation. Seeing provides a basis to compare how people are working to expectations or the process manual. In terms of famine, Sen states, “Understanding the causation of hunger and starvation calls for an analysis of the entire economic mechanism, not just accounting of food output and supply.” - Examine all approaches to mediate the pain of change. Do not assume, without analysis, that you understand how to react to a problem. Even though, like in famines, the predicaments are shared, the causes are different. Simply put, different causes have different solutions.
- Do not cut yourselves off from those you lead. Leaders can be hypnotized into living in an ivory tower, leading through pronouncements. Hierarchy breeds authoritarianism and elitism. Unlike the moral from Simon Sinek’s, Leaders Eat Last, the opposite occurs and leaders eat first – a form of elitism. Because they are strategists, steering the ship of state. Teams, like nations, pull themselves apart when this occurs. Sen notes, “Democracy, on the other hand, would spread the penalty of famine to the ruling groups and political leaders as well. This gives them the political incentive to try to prevent any threatening famine. The same is true for transformations or improvement programs.
- Eat your own dog food. If you make rules, follow the rules – they are not just for everyone else.
Famine and other kinds of crises can be seen as allegories for the trials and tribulations of teams and organizations (one might argue degree). The pains and symptoms may be alike, leading coaches and change agents to prescribe the same solution. Each context is different. For example, famines may be caused by a problem of food production (this seems rarer than expected) or the lack of economic resources of a group of people to buy food (examples of this type abound). Just reacting to symptoms may or may not solve the problem. I have known people who hope they get lucky or more on before anyone notices. When caught, they will tend to blame the victims…how many times have you heard the excuse, “they are not doing it right.” Human agency can have a huge impact on any crisis, positive or negative. As leaders, our goal is to help engage that agency, or it will be engaged by someone else.
Previous installments of Development as Freedom by Amartya Sen:
Week 1: Context and Logistics
Week 2: Introduction and Preface
Week 3: The Perspective of Freedom
Week 4: The Ends and the Means of Development
Week 5: Freedom and the Foundations of Justice
Week 6: Poverty as Capability Deprivation
Week 7: Markets, State, and Social Opportunity
Week 8: The Importance of Democracy
Week 9: Social Choice and Individual Behavior
Week 10: Famines and Other Crises
Week 11: Women’s Agency and Social Change
Leave a Comment