Social Solidarity

These last weeks here in Iceland have reminded me of being in Washington D.C. after 9/11. Icelanders are a bit in shock, people are genuinely concerned about job loss and food shortages. But signs have gone up telling people to "stick together", and today I was listening to the mayor of Reykjanesbær discuss ways city employees could bring a sense of hope and optimism to the townspeople, to imagine a brighter future despite the very real problems that must be overcome in the next few years.  I find this a very good strategy, to pull on the internal strengths within Icelandic society, rather than to seek fault and blame. At moments of crisis, there is often the tendency to support social solidarity through emphasizing the enemy without, the "other" who poses a threat, as was done in the United States against Muslims. Appropriately so, Icelanders seem to be using the crutch of an imagined other, an exterior responsible party "who did this to them," (namely the British and "American bankers") rather sparingly. 

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