The Value of Value
Growing Meta #14
Salam!
Last month, I’ve had the immense honor of joining G20 (Group of 20) as a Delegate for a newly established engagement group: V20 (Values20).
The purpose of G20 is to get the leaders of the world’s strongest economies to collaborate on various goals. The themes this year are three: Empowering People, Safeguarding the Planet, and Shaping New Frontiers. Read more in the 2020 Presidency Agenda. This year it’s hosted in my hometown: Riyadh, Saudi Arabia!
V20 believes in the importance of designing public policy around values.
V20 was established this year with the goal of inspiring policy makers to consider a largely untapped capital: individual values.
Individuals are at the micro end of the system, yet their choices have a heavy impact on economic and social systems. Choices stem from behavior, and behavior stems from values. When considering sustainable development policies, we have to study the granularities of individual choice. This helps us understand public policy’s ability to influence those choices, leading back to better designed policies, better systems and better lives.
The V20 Engagement Group has three Task Forces:
So what can public policy do?
Here are some steps that can be employed for a given issue:
Analyse behavior thoroughly — identify the causes and values driving it.
Identify where the value came from — is it externally driven by social norms, or internally driven by belief.
Identify leverage points — where can we shape social norms? where can we employ rhetoric (social, religious, and other)?
I will be covering more examples on my Twitter account.
When you consider values as an untapped capital, you get a whole new reservoir of resources that you can mobilize towards your goal.
P.S. I love how ‘Sadu’ pattern is incorporated in the logo. ‘Sadu’ is a traditional Arabian Bedouin fabric that is enlisted by UNESCO on the List of Intangible Heritage of Humanity.
This is a Bedoiun woman weaving Sadu fabric. Image source.