Barnett and the Doom Loop
Barnett’s big bang theory (read Iraq) is inherintly a doom loop function.
Companies that fall into the Doom Loop genuinely want to effect change — but they lack the quiet discipline that produces the Flywheel Effect. Instead, they launch change programs with huge fanfare, hoping to “enlist the troops.”
Grand strategy designed to accelerate the march of a destabilizing force in a complex system (globalization) will not play out well. Robb touched on this a while ago using terms of aircraft dynamics, I just ran across the idea of the doom loop in a 2001 John Collins Fast Company Article. This is all just more framework to understand the future of security.
They start down one path, only to change direction. After years of lurching back and forth, these companies discover that they’ve failed to build any sustained momentum.
Sounds exactly like the government’s current trajectory. We encourage trade, and then block port deals, we attack Iraq and Afghanistan but can’t build or secure, we pull out of the former and then the latter, we get attacked, we blow up Iran, China derails etc etc etc.
What is needed are Flywheel functions – which arguably can only happen at the grassroots level.
-Shlok
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