State Surveillance vs Collective Assurance: It’s a choice.

THE NERVOUSNESS TO EXIT

The COVID19 lock down slap has revealed cracks in governance across the world.

Somewhere the governments have forced a lock-down, somewhere they are calling it a peoples’ lockdown and in other places though it is effectively a lock-down, they are not calling it so.

They are now working on lockdown exit strategy.

But there is a sense of nervousness — while economies must resume, what about the safety of people?

What if a pre-mature exit leads to a cluster of outbreaks and escalation?

It will be a sure shot disaster. Health disaster. Economic disaster.

Most importantly a political disaster!

Democratic state leaders are nervous and indecisive.

Leaders across the world are waiting, blabbering and pointing fingers. Nobody wants to take the risk of being reasonable and pragmatic. So much so for the leadership quotient of the world.

IS STATE SURVEILLANCE NECESSARY?

A fundamental question arises in this situation, should a state enforced surveillance on people as a means of safe lockdown exit?

Seems like it should.

Many would favor the argument that the way the virus spreads, a heavy surveillance will only benefit people, than cause harm… duh..

It will demonstrate that government is serious about its job.

Technocrats would heavily put their weight on this side of the argument. Why not? It feels like an artificial intelligence utopia.

Would you rather have a government that puts your life at risk or one that puts you under surveillance?

Debatable.

BUT IT IS DRACONIAN SAY THE FREE …

On the other hand, a draconian public surveillance can directly undermine the democratic framework of many countries.

Already citizens in US are protesting against the lock down itself. Whether it is politically motivated or not. We can’t say.

But one cannot deny a sense of uneasiness when it comes to matters of state sponsored public surveillance.

Many states like China have successfully implemented AI enabled state surveillance. Remember WEF’s viral video on China’s social points system. Are they stepping up this system for COVID19 safety measures? We don’t know.

If you look aeons ahead, you will find South Korea. No country at this hour seems to be as prepared as they are.

South Korea is conducting rapid testing everywhere in the country; social distancing & hygiene is seriously followed and most importantly everybody plans commute relying on their social tracing app.

The attempts by Google and Apple to provide global contact tracing apps have come under attack due to security reasons. Do you smell the fish — your location data auctioned to advertisers or a record sale of phones?

The world is under a trust deficit.

WHAT ARE THE OPTIONS LEFT?

Is“draconian” state surveillance our only option left to exit lockdown? Or, can we generate more options?

You may ask, why am I making such a big fuss about it, again?

To recap quickly…

Because, we must resume economic activity and governments are nervous. Resuming economic activity can aggravate the pandemic. Add to that, there is a leadership crisis & trust deficit across the world.

CAN WE CREATE A PEOPLES’ SOLUTION?

Can we create an option rooted in democracy, modern work ethics and our strength of connectedness?

Democracy? Did I say democracy?

Ok. Democracy is a cursed word. Misused by politicians and beaurucrats for their convenience.

So let me clear some air here…

Or, I be the one guilty of using the “D” word.

I DON’T MEAN CONVENIENCE OF CLICK

For most of us, democracy has come down to mean making convenient systemic choices.

Pressing a button on voting day is the most convenient systemic choice citizens across the world make.

Fair enough. Nothing wrong in selecting your leaders conveniently.

But it gives us a false sense that democracy is always about making convenient choices. And that, media can feed us enough information from all point of views. So that sitting on your couch, we can make informed intelligent decisions.

Here’s how we might love to make a choice for COVID19 safety response.

A survey pops up on the screen.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

“Dear {{XYZ}},

What do you prefer as a response for COVID19 in your country?

a. Government surveillance

b. Public surveillance powered by a powerful multinational technology giant.

c. State surveillance

d. Lock down extension”

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The pop-up bugs you, till you click.

Select one, and the pop up is out of the way of your 100th NetFlix movie.

You have exercised your democratic choice.

Congratulations! You made an informed decision.

Well, this survey is far-fetched.

But you get the idea, the kind of democracy I am not talking about.

I DON’T MEAN PROTESTS AND…

….. trolls, threats, killings, protests outside UN, addressing UN, blabbering crap on news channels, shouting slogans, cursing people on Twitter, trending a hashtag and so on so forth.

These two are not the type of democracy I am talking about.

DEMOCRACY = RESPONSIBILITY

I am talking about the puritan — as preached by the forefathers & early builders of democracy — version of democracy.

The one that demands individuals to be responsible enough so that government doesn’t intervene more than it should.

I believe there is only one pillar of democracy. It is the individual responsibility.

NOW THAT THE AIR IS CLEARED…

Is there an option?

In this article, I explore a possibility of a distributed collective safety assurance as the most democratic and sustainable way of solving the lockdown exit problem.

DEFINING THE PROBLEM CLEARLY — EVERYONE GETS THE FIRST HALF RIGHT…..

The problem that we are facing globally is how do we resume & sustain economic activity while ensuring safety of people.

How do we keep the curve flattened or under control while continuing to earn livelihood.

By economic activity I mean businesses must start. People must start going to their physical workplaces.

They should be able to interact and visit places for work.

This means at the most basic level, the responsibility of safety resides in the physical workplaces.

It is a no brainer that workplaces must arrange for sanitation, hygiene and safety for the employees, customers and vendors.

Everyone gets this much.

But that just addresses the 50% of the problem.

Here’s why…

THE OTHER HALF & THE MOST IMPORTANT ONE

The real challenge is not whether businesses can make safety arrangements or not.

The challenge is can they ASSURE all stakeholders — employees, customers, vendors, government and community — reliably and openly that they are 100% safe.

The important word is ASSURANCE.

This is the other 50% which can bring power back to the people

“ASSURE safety in workplace”.

WHAT DO I MEAN BY ASSURANCE?

Nothing complicated. Really.

The word assurance must not weigh heavily on your heart.

It simply means — If you follow safety norms, you should be able to say that you follow them.

You should be able to put out in a checklist and say — I did this, I did not do that…

A COVID19 safety checklist can look something like this,

>>>Sanitizer at door? — check

>>>People are using sanitizer? — check

>>>Temperature is being measured at entrance? — check

>>>Social distance is being maintained? — partial

>>>Everyone is wearing face mask? — check

>>>33% work attendance? — check

>Done.

>Publish.

>Repeat after a few hours.

This is a safety check of sorts. Self-audit if you would like to call it so. The technical term for which is internal audit.

You can publish the checklist on the internet for the government and people to see.

And fix any gaps immediately.

Then it becomes an ASSURANCE.

From government’s perspective, it is a safety compliance that you are adhering by.

As a result, government doesn’t need to enforce surveillance.

You might wonder if we really gain anything from assurance besides extra work?

Actually. A lot.

Let me zoom it 10X below to explain the full impact of assurance.

EABC Corp. EXITS LOCKDOWN — THEY ARE SAFE & SOUND

Consider this. A medium sized manufacturing company, EABC corporation, has following facility -

>> a manufacturing unit

>> a warehouse,

>> an office space,

>> and a parking area.

The management of this company has decided to restart their operations after a month-long lockdown.

It is in best interest of the company and the people working there. They must rush to work, or they fear a complete shutdown.

The management decides to make it mandatory for every employee to follow the safety norms as suggested by WHO and as mandated by the government.

Typically, these norms are not very different to envisage –

1. always maintain 1-meter (or 2-meter) distance

2. sanitize surfaces in common areas

3. sanitize manufacturing area, meeting rooms, warehouse & parking lots twice a day.

4. check temperature of the employees when they enter or exit the building,

etc.

EABC starts this program with a lot of enthusiasm.

A company briefing is done.

People are advised to wear face-masks all the time.

Posters and floor markings are also put in place.

While there is no doubt in the intent of EABC management, within 3 to 4 days employees at EABC become used to it.

Everyone settles-in, in the safe, cosy, COVID19-free environment of EABC.

BUT SOON AFTER…. ARE YOU STILL PARANOID?

A weak passes. Everything is fine.

>> “One person did not wear the mask today. It’s ok! Just be careful.”

>> “I shook hands today? Nothing happened. “Oooooo… I gave you virus…. hahahah” …. response a rofl…

>> “We had a packed meeting with A/C on and every safety norm was violated. Boooo! Nothing happened.”

>> “We have been sanitizing for a week. All of them viruses are dead by now anyways, even if they were alive before.”

“Hey, but”

“oh! common don’t be paranoid. we are safe.”

Complacency sets in.

After a week long of being safe and no incidence, if you are fussing about safety then you are being paranoid not alert! Right?

EABC IS LUCKY … BUT ARE THEY SAFE?

Fortunately, ever since EABC reopened, no COVID19 cases have surfaced in their cluster or nearby clusters.

They only hear of COVID19 stories in TV.

After a week or so, can we put our finger on EABC and say they are 100% safe and clear?

They might be, they might not be. We don’t know. The government doesn’t know. The community around doesn’t know.

They will know only if there is cluster outbreak. And that will be a disaster.

They don’t want to know about it that way. Do they?

We need to think of COVID19 response differently.

BUT EABC KNOWS THERE IS MORE TO MAINTAINING SAFETY

Fortunately, EABC knows from their manufacturing experience; safety needs to be practiced daily. You cannot be complacent about it. Or, mishaps can happen.

So, what do they do?

EABC decides they will not only implement safety controls and protocols, they will also monitor effectiveness of these controls and protocols daily and publish them publicly.

It changes everything.

They form an internal COVID19 task force whose job is to identify all the COVID19 safety controls in the facility and monitor them multiple times daily.

This task force comprises of members from their internal audit, quality assurance and admin team.

For example, while facility manager ensures availability of sanitizers, the task force checks every few hours to see if sanitizers are being used or not.

While social distancing norms are being mandated in the facility, the task force monitors adherence in common areas & work areas.

They check -

…are the signages on social distancing readable and placed in key areas?

…are the floor markings correct or not? Are they legible or torn?

Now there is structured assurance driven approach to safety.

It is not being treated as a good to follow advisory but as a daily safety culture to live by.

Monitored.

The workplaces of EABC are owning the responsibility of ensuring safety.

EABC is not seeing safety as a panic reaction to a President’s address. They see it as a culture that needs daily nurturing and responsibility.

HERE IT GETS BETTER — THE DAILY REPORT

EABC’s task force creates a report and publishes it at the end of the day for the management, board, government, employees and community to see.

The board looks at the report and directs management to correct any issues or inadequacies immediately.

The government looks at the report and keeps supporting EABC.

The employees look at the report and feel safe about working at EABC.

The community looks at the report and feels safe about EABC employees going to work.

Health and safety department frequently check the reports to keep their vigil. They conduct independent audits if need be, whenever needed.

EABC is serious about safety and there is no reason that government should not let EABC to operate.

THE GLOBAL NETWORK OF SAFETY

But what about EABC’s customers and vendors?

Taking lead from EABC, it’s vendors and customers also start following similar assurance policy suited to their work environment. Result?

A network of collective assurance in the entire supply chain.

The neighboring companies also follow suite. It creates COVID19 safety assurance neighborhood.

What if transport department & other neighbourhoods in the town adopt assurance policies too? The entire town creates a network of safety and assurance.

People can now earn livelihood without fear.

What if all industries across the globe follow this assurance policy? It creates a safety network for global economic activity.

The beauty of this global network is that responsibility is always localized at the workplace. Run by local leadership. Not government surveillance.

EXPLORING AN IDEA

Can every company that comes out of lockdown implement safety assurance? Can there be a global safety net created by owning vigilance, transparency, sharing of information, and openness?

THE OTHER SIDE

On the other side, one may argue — do we really need to go so much overboard? Why take so much elaborate pains? We will somehow manage it through by just being semi-serious about it.

I believe we will manage. But it will be ugly.

More serious than pandemic is pandemic stigma.

If we do not build this network of trust and assurance, we will soon start facing the COVID19 stigma. The problems arising from mistrust.

Imagine EABC does not have an assurance policy and there is rumour that one of the EABC employees has contracted a fever.

It will be so easy to stigmatize this person.

From there, it will be so easy to stigmatize EABC.

From there, it will be so easy to stigmatize the neighborhood, the town and so, on so forth…

This is just one chain of mistrust.

Imagine many such rumors.

You just need to crack open one, and the entire pandora box will explode.

Politicians will say, “We told you so. Time for the survey and surveillance.”

THE DIFFERENCE

On the other hand, if EABC publishes assurances daily and in spite of all the efforts a COVID19 case is detected, it will be easy to respond to.

It will be easy to investigate.

Contact tracing will be easier.

It will be easy to learn from the mistakes and rectify controls.

It will be easy for other to learn from it.

It will easy to comeback and fight it out.

It will easy to reassure employees and community that they are indeed safe.

You see the difference?

WHAT ARE YOU CHOOSING TODAY?

You have two choices — either spread trust or be victim to lack of it.

Spreading trust needs effort and vigilance. Letting mistrust overpower, requires us to stay complacent.

A collective assurance & responsibility will ensure that we don’t succumb to rumors or fear mongering.

It will give governments time and space to put attention and resources on emergency services rather than wasting them on surveillance.

A distributed collective assurance will help businesses restart and prevent pilferage of social stigma.

Shouldn’t “SAFETY & ASSURANCE” be a global socio-economic movement right now?

What will you choose?

…Taking responsibility & publishing assurance or getting surveyed by government?

…Building trust & taking care or getting feasted upon by mistrust and stigma?

Make a choice.

I propose we choose the first.

Let us put all our technological expertise of the information age in creating collective distributed assurance.