The old world was built on institutions. Nation-states, newspapers, religions, even science. People's lives revolved around them, every decision they made subject to the whims and fancies of those in power. History and tradition made it so.
The new world still has those institutions, but they have become less powerful and central to people's lives than before. This is not to say that they have become totally irrelevant. People still depend on national governments for fiscal, security and environmental policies, religion for moral support, mass media for entertainment and information. The difference is subtle, and the more powerful social forces has recognised the source of this disempowerment of institutions.
The difference is YOU. The one who everyone wants on their side, who buys their products, who views their shows. As Time put it so rightly in their 2006 edition, the person of the year (and I say era) is the individual. The examples are many: Wikipedia, civil society, blogs.
Your choices matter, because you've been given the power to make that choice. That wasn't possible in the old world, because those groups did their best (and are still trying) to centralise power in their hands.
Isn't it time that the Malaysia's proponents of climate change target individuals instead of the general public? It's reflective of the government's failures to fight for us when littering is rampant, when more rivers aren't even safe to swim in anymore. They target "the public", and hope that they are altruistic enough to save the environment for everyone else.
It's time we recognise that the best way to convince people to take action is when their livelihood is at stake, that the future of THEIR children is in peril.
Is this a call to abandon the safety of institutions? No. But it's a wake-up call to start relying on ourselves.
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