unimaginable

You know what we don’t talk about often enough? How our opinions about leadership are shaped by the images we see of leadership.

By default, what comes to my mind is an established white guy in a suit who has money and (therefore) influence. Why this image? Because this is, still, in 20 G-D 25, what leadership actually looks like in the top tiers of most prominent organizations, business, and government.

Part of what’s worth talking about is that these dominant images are not only uninspired but detrimental. They perpetuate an exclusionary narrative about who gets to have power and decision-making authority and who doesn’t. The leaders that uphold these systems offer a farcical display of priority setting, dictated by their own interests and motivated almost always by profit. By sheer nature of their top-down positioning, there’s an adamant unwillingness to invite other voices to the conversation. Entire groups - disabled folks, Indigenous people, and the unhoused, to name a few - are collateral damage in this system’s scurry to nowhere in benefit of the bottom line. They thrive because of narratives that pit us against each other which distract us from and obfuscate the truth; narratives that ensure the success of a few at the expense of the many.

We need better stories to organize our futures around, friends.

As of late, I’ve found myself in healthy debate with folks that say alternate models of leadership and organizing – feminism, matriarchy, abolition, and democratic socialism, for example – could never work. I challenge this for a few reasons.

First, we understand less than 5% of the universe’s true composition. The rest is a complete mystery – so the idea that we can be certain of the impossibility of anything is frankly laughable. Second, many of these systems haven’t had an appropriate runway for testing or scaling to demonstrate their supposed ineffectiveness. Only a fair trial can prove that.

Lastly, and most importantly: our imaginations have been shaped (aka limited by) the systems we were raised under. In her book Hunt, Gather, Parent, Michaleen Doucleff cites a study done by three cross-cultural psychologists to capture the incredibly problematic bias they dubbed WEIRD: Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic. As they explain, folks from the west “are among the least representative populations one could find for generalizing about humans.”

For most of human history, our cosmologies and religious practices reflected a reverence for the earth. Until quite recently in the scope of our existence, societies were established by way of shared labour, mutual protections, and social bonds. This is still (successfully) the case in many places around the world. Even though the West has organized itself around capitalism and patriarchy for a few thousand years, this does not warrant these systems inevitable and foregone conclusions – especially since they are built on fairy tales of endless economic growth and (no hyperbole here) recklessly careening us toward inevitable planetary decimation.

By nature of our entanglement in these systems, we have cognitive protections around pulling them apart. This means our ability to see them clearly, and therefore our role in perpetuating their harm, is compromised. Dr. Joe Forgas says this brilliantly:

Human thinking is... characterized by confirmation bias, discounting of information that is inconsistent with existing belief, overemphasis of unreliable anecdotal information, simplification and categorization... [therefore] it takes conscious effort to keep one’s mind open...”

It just starts there, with a willingness to admit that perhaps, maybe, there is something curious going on when we are so adamantly opposed to considering different ways of being together in the world – especially since how we do it now puts us at risk for literal extinction. When we are quick to point fingers but never to turn inward well, why is that, really? Building our capacity for curious and open minds, in a time when algorithms and administrations are invested in stealing both our right and interest to do so feels like a crucial strategy to stay both vigilant and informed. Wouldn’t you agree?

We can’t pretend that the structures we have and the leaders that prop them up are working anymore – there’s too much proof of impact to ignore. I’m not saying one specific strategy is the be-all-end-all, simply that ones that are dignity affirming and planet saving should be considered. I’m also not suggesting that the traditional idea of one person in charge is inherently problematic - just that we should diversify the kinds of people we give this authority to. It could be slight reforms and new faces: like Zohran Momdani, a self-proclaimed democratic socialist and new mayor of New York City who promises more affordable, equitable, and worker‑friendly conditions. It could be systems built on collective care, like Latin America’s Solidarity Economies or Finland’s Housing First model. And for climate progress? How about Brazil’s new Indigenous territory plan, or Costa Rica with over 98% renewable energy use, or Sweden with its circular economy? There are so many examples.

My point is: we can be skeptical, but we can’t say impossible – and we should certainly explore why, if we’re so adamant to do so.