1st April 2011

The Big Society is still being proposed as a way for a cash strapped nation to solve its problems, cure its woes and get everyone feeling good about themselves.

The trouble with the big society is that no-one seems able to accurately define it.

Good Neighbourliness? That might do. The charity that I worked for was quite big on the big society. One of the aphorisms of the founder was 'do something useful everyday and don't get found out'.

He founded a society in which everyone was committed to doing good by stealth, which was a problem over the long run because of course if no-one knows 'who dunnit' then no-one gives the credit for it being done or worse they sometimes claim the credit.

More than one volunteer speaking of their 'work' said I did it because I was a member of your charity but I did it on behalf of another charity so everyone thought that I was their volunteer.

Eventually the charity's members grew older and no younger people came up because they chose, quite sensibly to, volunteer for named charities with identifiable causes.

But alongside good neighbourliness there is also self interest.

I recall speaking to a community organiser in Birmingham who lived on the sixth floor of a tower block on an outer estate. It wasn't an especially poor estate and enjoyed a good reputation. Over supper we got onto the topic of why people help each other. His reasoning was that if he helped out in his local community centre, it meant that he was known and built up respect and trust with local people, he could then move about his estate freely and without fear.

As he put it; I can sit on my balcony in the evening with a glass of beer and watch the sun go down. Everything is peaceful and quiet and I have been partly responsible. It's a good feeling.

Helping build better communities gives us that feeling because neighbourliness is reciprocated leaving us better off as a result of the social capital we have built.

In the C18th an Irish clergyman called Jonathan Swift wrote a satire on Human Nature; Gulliver's Travels.

It is the story of Lemuel Gulliver, a ships surgeon who sets off on a series of travels.

One of the countries that he visits is very definitely a Big Society.

His ship is driven off course and he starts to run short of water. So he heads into land to find a stream so he can collect fresh water.

Something unnerves his fellow travellers who run off leaving Gulliver to be captured by a farmer who is 72 feet tall and who has a footstep of 10 yards.

The farmer takes Gulliver home for his daughter who whilst not 72 feet tall is a big girl who treats him like a doll. He is treated as a curiosity and exhibited for money.

Eventually he is is bought by the Queen of the country which is called Brobdingnag and becomes a favourite of the court.

I tried very hard to work out if Brobdingnag was an anagram but couldn't find one but you can make 194 words of four letters or more if you're challenged by that, no prizes, success will be its own reward.

The problem Gulliver has is that everything is simply too huge for him to use, chairs, beds, tables, plates are all enormous.

In this big society Gulliver fights giant wasps, is being carried to the roof of an enormous Castle by a monkey, and eventually seized by a giant eagle which drops him into the sea where he is, thankfully rescued.

So there it is the big society full of big people with enormous strides, but very scary for the likes of ordinary sized folks.

You should always be careful what you wish for ............ especially on the first of April.