Espousing the Culture of Sustainability

Culture is everything. More than you may realise, culture engineers the entire global economy.

The wheels of culture drive day-to-day decisions of economic agents in the global space, viz: individuals, households,  firms, governments, and institutions. 

Here are some scenarios of pervasive culture:

Wherever the culture of superstition prevails, the awareness creation about evil forces tends to be more pronounced than the knowledge of good forces.

Wherever the culture of mediocrity prevails, how we are seen and perceived tends to become more important than how we actually are when no one is censor.

Wherever the culture of slavery prevails, the people tend to be habitually intimidated and coerced into submission.

Wherever the dragon culture in enterprise prevails, the substance of humanity may not count and draconian including shaming policies tend to rule the day.

Wherever the culture of competition prevails, the pursuit of short-term self-interest tends to over ride the concern for long-term corporate interest. 

Wherever the culture of nepotism prevails, only the influencer's relatives may be good enough for constant consideration.

Wherever the culture of idle certification prevails, acquisition of signalling qualifications tend to payoff far more than technical skills and competencies building.

Wherever the culture of bitter division exists,  the clamour for secession tends to sound louder than calls for peace and unity-in-diversity.

Wherever the culture of struggle-for-survival prevails, every contending threat to individual existence may rather be eliminated without conscience. 

Wherever the culture of insecurity prevails, subjugation tends to surpass influential oversight.

Wherever the culture of inferiority prevails, blind imitation and adoption replaces creative ingenuity, industry, and adaptability.

Wherever the culture of inequality prevails, only some ideas and voices tend to be welcome while all others are merely irrelevant opinions.

Wherever the culture of reliogiosity prevails, people may rather follow an erring religious leader than listen to the rattling noise of a poor but truth-peddling sage.

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Before any culture ever becomes entrenched, its sponsors package an intensive, invisible, and sometimes visible process of indoctrination, tailored for the subjects. With this stream of steady thoughts, concerted words, actions and inactions the once envisioned culture becomes reality.

Varied means and methods,  including systems of formal education, corporate ethos, traditional media, new media, propaganda, and celebrity imagery are fundamental in the intergenerational entrenchment of popular culture.

For instance, using formal education curriculum and delivery modules, colonial masters taught African colonies to wholly embrace all the 'superior' solutions the West graciously had to offer. While many actions of our colonial forebears may have been well meaning, several others created and entrenched a pervasive culture of mental backwardness in the average African; that will only take a visionary reorientation programme to break free from.

Furthermore, many decades after former colonies have gained formal political independence, the culture of dependence on aid and 'superior' solutions from the West persists. We still drink hot tea in hot weather, wear ties on sunny streets, and adorn hair wigs to achieve a Western-straight look when our given-hairs are plain kinky.

So many processes, institutions and enterprises have been built around prevailing cultures that may be wrecking a disservice to our collective humanity. The earlier we make intentional structural transformations, the more predictable our path to true freedom and sustainable development will be.

To take a useful detour to global sustainability, we all have a role to play. For instance, In order to collectively esteem the people-peace-prosperity-planet-partnerships (five Ps) paradigm focus of sustainability, we must of necessity prioritise the following as popular culture (SUCCIS):

🌍 Stakeholder mentality

🌎 Unity-in-diverisity

🌎 Inclusion

🌎 Circularity

🌎 Collaboration

🌍 Structural transformation 

In effect, we can think and grow our tailor-made national solutions to sustainable development and build partnerships for effective execution.

Nigeria must not be left behind.

Africa must not be left behind.

No one must be left behind.

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Photo credit: Oluyomi Ola-David