Time-Questions

Dr. Martin Bröckelmann-Simon

Director International Cooperation, Bischöfliches Hilfswerk MISEREOR

Transformation processes need a lot of time and endurance. In our study “Sustainable Germany” (1996, together with BUND) we dedicated the subject of time a whole chapter, under the heading: “The right measure for space and time”. Our message was already then a plea for “temporal affluence” instead of material affluence. Faster, higher, longer – that cannot be everything.

For Misereor time is important for three reasons:

• First, because trust needs time: that is especially true for the reliability of partner relationships. With 60-70 percent of our partners we have been working together for years and decades already.
  
  
• Second, we are in the process of changing our approach to time in concrete form in the formulation of our contracts, e.g. through longer-term targets, in order to do more justice to the long term nature of processes.
  
  
• Third, in light of the multitude of global time concepts: the fault lines run even within societies, even in our own country – and especially in our partner countries. One focus of our work lies in rural areas, where a concept of time determined by nature is the norm. In cities people – also in developing countries – have a different sense of time. Thus we know: we must cultivate our view at time, in order to achieve the above slowness and reliability.

We are trying hard to sensitize our employees already in the preparation for their assignments for the culturally different perception of time. On the other hand, we have to of course ask for understanding from the public that change needs time. The donors want to see results immediately. Here we have to work to foster understanding, even in our own society: here change also does not happen form one day to the other!

One important aspect of this is by the way, the increasing tendency to push for military solutions, if and when societal transformations are to be accelerated – not only in Iraq. Military interventions are by definition short term, fast results are expected. The long term that change needs, is lost sight of – a development that we observe with some worry.

How much time does change need? That depends on what needs to change and on the starting conditions. Change is constantly happening, even without our doing. In the initial analysis it is therefore important to see: at which point are we now? Only then can it be gauged how long a process will probably take.

“… Time heals all wounds”: is that really true? Here one has to think longer term then is generally assumed. Healing usually does not happen automatically. How deep lie the atrocities, civil wars, experiences of suppression and injustice even generations later in the individual and collective consciousness and cause behavior that cannot be explained immediately, because we do not know the personal and collective stories and/or do not take them seriously enough. How often do conflicts break out again that had their roots many years before and that one did not come to terms with.

Do deadlines help? They do in order to produce results, but they do not if it comes to long lasting transformations in the heads and minds. Let’s take as an example a deadline for the handing in of a wish list of a neighborhood committee: here time pressure is contra productive, when something is jotted down in the last minute, without consulting everyone involved. In Latin America there is a good saying: “If you are in hurry, walk slowly!”

Slowness is always an expression of something. If people do not cooperate, then there is a reason for that that often has nothing to do with the respective perception of time. One glance at the history of development cooperation makes that quite clear.

On the other hand, speed does not always guarantee success. In the race between the rabbit and the hedgehog, the hurried rabbit in the end tires himself out in vain, while the socially networked hedgehogs win despite their slowness. That means speed does not necessarily and certainly not always have an advantage. This is especially true, when fast action means ill-considered, uncoordinated, lone wolf like action without adequate perception of events in one’s surroundings.

The right moment: Yes, it exists. In order to hit it, perceptions, intuition, and empathy are crucial. Development needs Kairos and Chronos. Of course intermediate aims must exist, so does accounting and so forth. There is a necessity to split up time. But one thing is clear: The time horizons for cooperation should be longer, measured in decades, not years. Long term orientation and the short term must be brought together.

My wish for the conference is that the long term nature of especially partner relationships will be recognized as a value in itself. And that we succeed to foster awareness even beyond the circle of development cooperation, that the long haul is necessary, and that change cannot be had as a quick fix.

In the end we can thus not avoid to think about the approach to time in our own society.