How to lose at risk
Government ministers talk of "striking the right balance" between risk and regulation .
But another balance we may need to consider is that between risk and wider risk: the potential harm to an individual against the potential harm to the fabric of our society.
Britain has become a risk-averse and individualistic nation. Those two characteristics drive so much of our politics: the incessant demand of voters for government to protect them from all dangers.
Or, more accurately, to respond to their fears (however irrational they may be): fear of crime, injury, disease or destitution.
As individuals, we have never been safer. With every hour that passes, life expectancy increases by 16 minutes. The risk of suffering serious injury or death in advance of your expected span is, historically, tiny.
Nevertheless, such is the insistence that our elected representatives reduce hazard to virtually zero, we have collectively manufactured the "health and safety" culture - which we then have the audacity to resent.
One can see it everywhere: measures to make individuals feel safer which end up making our communities weaker and more fearful:
• neighbourhoods planted with CCTV cameras and strewn with barbed wire giving the impression of security but magnifying a sense of threat
• a vetting system designed to reduce the risk to the vulnerable but which makes society more vulnerable to distrust and isolation
• legal frameworks which purport to protect individuals but which undermine community co-operation
We have got ourselves into this mess because we can easily identify individual harm - the abused child, the injured householder, the frightened pensioner.
There is plenty of data to help us quantify these threats and to demand that "something be done". The media bubbles daily with these tales of woe.
However, we don't have an easy measure of community harm - distrust and loneliness, anomie and cynicism.
The concept of "social capital" cannot compete with a tragic story of personal distress and, although we might mourn the loss of community spirit, it is a nebulous notion compared to the hard facts of a gruesome crime.
The consequence is that public mood and policy are often shaped by the perceived risk of harm to an individual without great consideration being given to the risk of harm to wider society.
, a charity which works with young people in the south-east of England.
The survey suggests that one in four people over 26 is so uneasy when they see young people in the street, they will cross the road to avoid them.
This is a potential catastrophe. If the levels of inter-generational suspicion and fear have reached such a point, our neighbourhoods may lack the resilience to survive.
When Parliament was designing the , (), members did not have access to a ready-reckoner on its likely impact on community cohesion.
The concern was protecting children, not some "candy-floss concept" of social well-being.
But I would argue that they are flip sides of the same coin. Protecting individuals cannot be achieved solely by laws, safety protocols or security cameras. Sometimes they make matters worse.
If communities function well, people keep an eye out for each other. Instead of adults crossing the road to avoid young people, generations converse and co-operate. We are safer together.
It is not impossible to achieve. Tomorrow at the Royal Geographical Society in London, an presents hundreds of photographs, films and stories which chronicle the ways in which:
"[O]rdinary people have been doing extraordinary things to make their communities better places in which to live, work, play, grow up and bring up families."
The show, titled And They Say Community Is Dead, reveals how small charitable grants have transformed neighbourhoods "from the Shetland Islands to Land's End and the Atlantic Ocean to the North Sea".
"Gardens, allotments, orchards and whole streets have sprung into life; books, films, costumes, scores and instruments have flowed into libraries, cinemas, theatres, choirs, circuses and brass bands; village shops and community cafes have opened their doors again and football, cricket, netball, rugby, boxing, biking clubs have received balls, bats, bikes and gloves."
The schemes have brought thousands of people - of all ages - together.
So, back to "striking the right balance". While it is of course necessary to have systems in place to protect the individual, there is much more we could do to protect our neighbourhoods. And that balance involves ensuring that in pursuing the former, we don't diminish the latter.
The image above is by Erel Onyecherelam of .
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