Year Zero (or the correct use of history)

Great post on Anecdote about the relevance of history to future action.

Various regimes have attempted to abolish history, to start afresh. In 1975, the Khmer Rouge declared "Year Zero" and proceeded to decimate their own population. If you have visited the killing fields or S-21, you will not forget them. The close study of history demonstrates the importance of realism & compromise and the futility of utopian social visions. No wonder many revolutionaries want to abolish it.

Other groups have used historical events to justify present atrocities (Israelis & Palestinians today and the Balkans in the 90s spring to mind - even the Khmer Rouge drew on the legends of Ankor to legitimate the expansionist plans that ultimately drew in the Vietnamese). Here it is an over-reliance on an idealised past (rather than the idealised future of the revolution) that is the problem.

Marx suggested that History should be our God. Marx's History was inevitable - a dialectic process ending in a utopian future. And therefore useless. There is no History - there are only histories. Contingent, multiple, confused.

So what the hell has this got to do with organisations? The majority do not commit acts of genocide or ethnic cleansing. But they do attempt revolutionary change without understanding their current situation. They do try and purify their cultures and restructure themselves. Some have an unhealthy reliance on their history and some have an unhealthy ignorance of it.

Some suggestions:

• Know your history but know the histories of others as well (and find the stories of others about you too).
• Base it in the particular rather than the idealistic (the importance of anecdote & narrative).
• Realise that your future will be as contingent and messy as your past was.

"So tell me about this culture change program again?"