Some people love change, while others will do anything in their power to avoid it. However, most agree that change is a huge and necessary part of life. Those who advocate for change believe that change is always good as it allows the world to constantly improve and move towards a better future. However, many believe that it is not that simple, as such an absolute view of change ignores the fact that the effects that change has on the world and the lives of its people are extremely complex. To classify change therefore as solely good or bad would be inaccurate, as it would characterise the nature of change to an absolute degree, something that the complex nature of change just does not allow. Hence, I would argue that while change is largely positive, there are certain downsides and risks we have to be aware of, and hence, it cannot be always good.
It is often argued that change is good as it leads to innovation and improvements in life. The desire to constantly improve and the willingness to embrace change in order to achieve better and to adapt to changes in the external environment have resulted in a proliferation of innovations and inventions, allowing society to come a long way in terms of technology and quality of life. The willingness to change has prompted the invention of many of the things which we deem as ubiquitous today such as aeroplanes, the Internet and personal computers. The Wright brothers, for instance, saw the need to improve transportation networks and eventually invented a flying craft that could be controlled while in the air, demonstrating how change can be a positive experience for society as the willingness to change and the desire to improve can lead to innovations that drastically improve the way we live our lives. More recently, researchers at Maastricht University in the Netherlands have reacted to anthropogenic climate change by introducing lab-grown meat on a larger scale. Evidently, change is good in that it provokes improvements and encourages greater uptake of that new solution, thus allowing people to improve and innovate. This has allowed society to continuously improve for the better instead of remaining stagnant.
Change is also good when it allows people to become more accepting of new and unconventional ideas. Oftentimes, ideas and traditions are relics of the past, rooted in backward ways of thinking and may not have a place in our world today. With technological progress and increasing diversity, newer ideas and beliefs have begun to permeate society, forcing many to rethink beliefs that have long been present in society. This change in the mindset of many within society has led to the world becoming more accepting not only of different cultures but also of people with ideas and beliefs that do not align with the status quo. In turn, this creates a more tolerant and accepting environment for people to coexist despite their differences. This is in stark contrast to the past where people were segregated based on the colour of the skin or their sexual orientation in places such as America where having coloured and non-coloured designations on busses, restaurants and even restrooms was a common sight. The world has taken great strides in this aspect, with the legalisation of gay marriage in the United States and in Taiwan, and the decriminalisation of homosexuality in conservative India, among others. In Singapore’s context, marital immunity for rape has been repealed since 2019, and widely decried as Singaporeans become more aware of the prevalence of sexual assault in domestic situations. These events – which many would have thought to be impossible years ago – are a testament to the power that change and the willingness to change can have on the nature of society. Evidently, change can be a force for good when it allows people to forgo stereotypes and outdated ways of thinking and encourages people to become more willing to accept different ideas by changing their own views on how society should be. In a world that is increasingly diverse and complex, change has the potential to create a more harmonious, tolerant and peaceful world.
However, the effects of change are not solely good or bad, as the pursuit of change can be destructive and outweigh the eventual positive outcomes that change brings about. Many times, in the pursuit of change and improvement, unintended negative consequences do arise. As society strives to enhance its technological prowess and overall standard of living, the changes that have been made to the way of life on the planet has resulted in the creation of modern problems. Anthropogenic climate change, for instance, is a direct result of the Industrial Revolution, which saw the proliferation of technologies such as the coal-dependent steam engine as humans sought to improve their quality of life. The changes that have occurred in the way that trade, transport and business are conducted have led to consequences such as the increase in air travel and the food we consume. These in turn have led to tremendous amounts of burning and deforestation in order to keep up with the need for energy. As a result, the amount of greenhouse gases has increased tremendously over the past 150 years, and close to 1.3 million square metres of forest cover have been destroyed since 1990. The blind pursuit of change and innovation, motivated by our obsession with improvement of quality of life, has led the human race to a time where the very existence of the entire human race is now under threat. It is often quipped that “the road to hell is often paved with good intentions”, and indeed, while many desire change with altruistic motivations in mind, we must be mindful that these good intentions can and do sometimes lead to detrimental consequences for society in the long term.
Furthermore, change can be detrimental if communities are unable to adapt to these changes, or if the effects of these changes are not appropriately managed. Many communities around the world have deep-rooted traditions steeped in history. Some of these traditions have directed the way these communities live their lives, with many being traditionally subsistence-based in nature. The focus on subsistence has caused many of these native and traditional communities to be unable to adapt to the changes that the world has undergone over the years, as they lack the education and the capital to entirely rework the nature of their societies and align it to the way that the modern world is structured. The Native American communities for example have struggled for years in the United States as their traditional subsistence-based nature and their deep-rooted connections to their lands have limited their ability to adapt to the nature of work and commerce in the 21stcentury. Without the tradition of working for monetary gain and the structures for a proper education system, these communities have often been left behind, swamped by drastic and rapid change, resulting in many of these communities having to struggle in order to survive in the modern economy. The change that the world experienced was therefore detrimental to these communities and their way of life as they did not have the conditions and structures needed to allow them to adapt in the modern world, leaving them vulnerable to the winds of change in the social, economic and technological domains. Besides traditional values, certain marginalized communities such as the poor bear the brunt of the negative repercussions of change due to their conditions and situations they find themselves in. The poor and uneducated sometimes find it challenging to pick up new skills and adapt to new technologies in a world that evolves at breakneck pace, where industries are constantly being disrupted and cheap foreign labour depresses their wages. Taxi drivers in Malaysia have protested against technological companies like Grab and Uber for threatening their livelihood, for instance, and they do not have any recourse against such obtrusive change. Thus, change can sometimes be undesirable as different communities adapt and come to terms with change at different paces, leaving many communities to suffer as the world speeds towards the future.
Overall, to assert that change is always good would be an overgeneralisation of the nature of change and its many facets, while ignoring the detrimental effects that change can bring if it is not properly managed. Although change does have its benefits, these do come with their own sets of challenges which could in fact be worse than what we had experienced before. Ultimately, change is neither inherently bad nor innately good and a lot depends on how change is managed and how it is received by different groups within society.