Herman Wijffels (Dutch economist and Christian Democrat politician) referred to Don’t Be Evil as an adequate analysis of the multiple crisis in which we currently find ourselves. This crisis is financial, ecological, social and institutional. ‘Don’t Be Evil describes the things that will be truly important in the near future.’
According to Wijffels, the paradigm changes that will occur within each of these domains, as predicted in the new VINT publication entitled Don’t Be Evil, can best be translated into personal actions. In everything we do – as an individual, entrepreneur, politician, civil servant – we should ask ourselves: What will be the effect of this on other people and on the earth itself? If, after all these deliberations, we come to the conclusion: Don’t Be Evil, then a great leap forward will have been made. But he calls this a ‘bottom limit’. Really doing good can be taken a step further.
Role of technology
Wijffels: ‘The publication rightly devotes much attention to the role of technology. In my view, the paradigm change in that domain concerns the transition from scale enlargement – which we realized by means of technology in the 20th century – to scale reduction – which is the leading mainspring of technology in this century.’
See the whole Don’t Be Evil speech of Herman Wijffels (in Dutch) at the VINT symposium.
Herman Wijffels over Don’t Be Evil from Sogeti VINT on Vimeo.