I am writing this on the plane as I am watching the latest about Haiti’s devastating earthquake. The news is of course as bad as it can get.

I remember an excellent  docu-film I watched recently, recommended by my brother. This was about a nuclear attack on Britain, and made this point:

Our social and economic development is built on a number of interconnections, each of which is quite fragile. We have managed to create all this so that when one of those connections breaks, our social system may suffer but will continue.

So for example: if something destroys our homes, we have skills and people to build new ones, and a government to coordinate this effort.

A scary thought then is what happens when a disaster (an earthquake, or a nuclear war) breaks too many of these connections.

How can Haiti recover? They have no telecommunications, no roads, no hospitals, no schools, essentially no infrastructure at all with which to deal with the emergency.

As people run to the streets, and with the majority of people seriously affected, it is difficult to imagine how some kind of “order” will be established as the death toll increases, and as people have no home, no work and no family to go to.

Typically in these cases our social network has the strength of being international – seperated yet joined up enough so that foreign and stable networks can step in to help restore some order when another network breaks.

This would of course suffer when multiple networks internationally break – as would happen in a world nuclear war. It’s worth watching the film if you want to consider the thought.

Meanwhile I hope people in Haiti will be able to restore their country and lives. Donate to help the relief efforts.

world