In 1973, our little country embarked on a journey that promised to take us ‘Forward, Upward, Onward, Together’. The simple but galvanising mantra was visionary and optimistic, and instilled a feel-good factor in all of us at the time. After 45 years of relatively exemplary democracy, political stability, steady economic growth for most of those years, we have demonstrated an impressive record of avoiding and circumventing the challenges and implications that attend being a Small Island Developing State (SIDS).
Consequently, The Bahamas is at a critical stage of development, which can be understood by asking two simple questions:
(i) To what extent have we moved forward, upward, onward and done so, together? and
(ii) If so, what is the evidence to support our claims and if not, how else can our situation be explained?
My take is that there is a decidedly unflattering response to these two overriding questions because we have neglected to capitalise on our comparative advantage, strengths and opportunities, but instead have been damaged by our weaknesses and not responded to obvious threats. We face challenges of 'Gulliverian' proportions in sharp contrast to our patently Lilliputian stature. I have ‘narrowed’ these challenges to a certain number, which I term ‘Ugly Giant Evils’, approximately half of which are government-induced and the remainder, a mix of serious socially-grounded issues, a geopolitical fallout and an ‘Act of God’.
Several are quite easy to guess, and include Crime, Economic under-development and Immigration, but what about the others? How many are obvious and do not require much thought or are not-so-obvious and require a sustained thinking? Either way, if we must put our minds to the task, because as we struggle onward, amidst intensifying regional and global competition, and having to compete from an increasingly weakening position as precious internal resources (human and social capital) diminish or are squandered, and mismanagement of resources continues at a steady pace, our best hope is for a collective change of consciousness that visits our most pressing challenges and prioritises these for urgent attention because as succinctly put by Einstein, the bulk of the work will have been done:
“If I had an hour to solve a problem and my life depended on the solution, I would spend the first 55 minutes determining the proper question to ask, for once I know the proper question, I could solve the problem in less than five minutes”.
Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955) Physicist & Nobel Laureate
© S3S
