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You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/jul/01/hideously-diverse-britain-bright-minds
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| Version 1 | Version 2 |
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| Hideously diverse Britain: when bright minds go bad | Hideously diverse Britain: when bright minds go bad |
| (about 1 month later) | |
| It's been quite a while since I agreed with a speech by major politician so thoroughly. A good many gang members, said Chuka Umunna, the shadow business secretary, have an "entrepreneurial zeal" that should be harnessed. Anyone who has looked at the way the more organised gang structures work knows this is true. They are risk takers, they identify markets, obtain desired products and sell them for profit. They plot strategy and take on employees – full-time and casual. They don't operate from grand open-plan offices, but you get the point. | It's been quite a while since I agreed with a speech by major politician so thoroughly. A good many gang members, said Chuka Umunna, the shadow business secretary, have an "entrepreneurial zeal" that should be harnessed. Anyone who has looked at the way the more organised gang structures work knows this is true. They are risk takers, they identify markets, obtain desired products and sell them for profit. They plot strategy and take on employees – full-time and casual. They don't operate from grand open-plan offices, but you get the point. |
| But how to harness these abilities? I always think back to a conversation I had with a youth worker in Nottingham. Not the dressed-down, trainer and T-shirt-wearing kind of youth worker. This was a big black guy with a crisp white shirt, a chunky watch and a Mercedes sitting in the car park. It said he had a bit of money. Legal money. Once his bona fides were established, he found the cohort more willing to talk. He had been "reasoning", that very day, with a young guy working his way in one of those unofficial corporations focused on the drug trade. I hated school, the young man told him. Especially maths. I just couldn't do maths. And then, with some prompting, the young 'un took him through the calculations he did every day: how much product passed through his hands, how it was divided up, the wholesale prices, the retail price, the profit margins. Thought you couldn't do maths, the youth worker said. The young man smiled. | But how to harness these abilities? I always think back to a conversation I had with a youth worker in Nottingham. Not the dressed-down, trainer and T-shirt-wearing kind of youth worker. This was a big black guy with a crisp white shirt, a chunky watch and a Mercedes sitting in the car park. It said he had a bit of money. Legal money. Once his bona fides were established, he found the cohort more willing to talk. He had been "reasoning", that very day, with a young guy working his way in one of those unofficial corporations focused on the drug trade. I hated school, the young man told him. Especially maths. I just couldn't do maths. And then, with some prompting, the young 'un took him through the calculations he did every day: how much product passed through his hands, how it was divided up, the wholesale prices, the retail price, the profit margins. Thought you couldn't do maths, the youth worker said. The young man smiled. |
| The landscape was different for my generation because the choices were more limited. Either you found a way to participate in the mainstream economy or you ended up skint. But that young man knows that – leaving aside the risks of jail or death – he can have a tolerable-to-good life outside the mainstream economy. If things go well, a nice car, a reasonable amount of cash and a certain status. Of course, things often do not go well, but still this seems a better option than risking all in a hostile mainstream environment, where potential probably won't be recognised and the cards seem stacked. They won't do nothing. They are citizens of the developed world and, broadly, we want the same things. One way or another, entrepreneurial zeal will out. | The landscape was different for my generation because the choices were more limited. Either you found a way to participate in the mainstream economy or you ended up skint. But that young man knows that – leaving aside the risks of jail or death – he can have a tolerable-to-good life outside the mainstream economy. If things go well, a nice car, a reasonable amount of cash and a certain status. Of course, things often do not go well, but still this seems a better option than risking all in a hostile mainstream environment, where potential probably won't be recognised and the cards seem stacked. They won't do nothing. They are citizens of the developed world and, broadly, we want the same things. One way or another, entrepreneurial zeal will out. |
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