I very energetically welcome this response. And I won’t hesitate to admit that some of my phrasing was intentionally provocative, if only to match the enormous gravity of our present political situation and hopefully inspire at least a little reframing. Everything feels so calcified, maybe I found it a bit therapeutic to tease some boundaries.
As it relates to the need to maintain continuity in essential services provided by the public sector, I lament reading that comment if only because I agree wholeheartedly, and clearly failed to address that sufficiently in the writing. I’ll admit that my own exploration of that idea with any real rigor came late in the writing process, and was probably outshone by a lot of research on other things. The public sector cannot, and should not, be a disruptive force in people’s lives, but should instead cultivate resiliency in the face of disruption coming from virtually every other angle.
I think you finish with a very interesting question, and in the process better articulated what I had wondered throughout this: at what scale does human-centeredness best operate? I suppose you can already guess my answer to that. And I suppose to again be provocative, if it’s at a scale where human-centeredness isn’t possible, should we have it at all? Clearly the answer to that depends largely on the problem to be solved, but I contend that if that scale is necessary, it should occur as a coordinated effort among many entities and with a mandate derived from them.
It’s an interesting nut to crack, and this text attempted to persuade far more than past works of mine, which tend to be more curatorial or case study. Thoughtful responses like these help me to learn and do it better next time, so thank you!
