Small business: The best boots on the ground
Small business owners are worried about world affairs.
In a recent online poll we asked our audience about that and almost three-fourths are either very or extremely concerned about the state of the world.
Is this different than in recent decades? Things were pretty stressful during the Cold War. But after a half-century of aiming nuclear weapons at each other, the parties chose the value of life over ideology.
In recent years terrorists have inverted this reality by employing to murderous advantage two icons of the very society they claim to hate: technology and markets. But just as these icons are ironic levers for terrorists who place no value on life, they become benevolent tools in the hands of those who do.
Indeed, when tolerant humans use technology and markets they do three very good and peaceful things: communicate, conduct business and share values. The 19th century French economist Frederic Bastiat observed that when goods cross borders, armies don’t. He couldn’t have imagined that today, thanks to technology, goods—and values—cross borders at the speed of light.
Traveling abroad I’ve learned when small business owners in different countries know each other they discover more in common than not. I submit that a small company in Kankakee, Illinois, connecting with an e-commerce customer in Kabul, Afghanistan can, over time, neutralize impediments to peace. And when a Main Street business in Bangor, Maine, shares a best practice with a peer in Baghdad, Iraq, ugly hatred morphs into the beauty of shared values.
The 18th century Irish philosopher Edmund Burke said, “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.” Regarding the current debate about “boots on the ground,” there is no greater army of good men and women than small business owners around the globe leveraging technology to do business and share values across borders.
The carcinogens that metastasize into terrorism are ideology, ignorance and intolerance. But since centuries of politics and wars haven’t solved the conflict riddle, is it ignorance or ideology when western leaders don’t include in their peace strategy a potentially powerful and abundant force: small business trade?
Many organizations that have members who are Main Street business leaders can be used to promote business boots on the ground virtually anywhere in the world. The first two President Blasingame would deploy are local Chambers of Commerce and Rotary International.
Write this on a rock … Fight ideology, ignorance and intolerance with small business trade and shared values.
Jim Blasingame is the author of the award-winning book, “The Age of the Customer: Prepare for the Moment of Relevance.”
