The Eternal Optimism of Economic Development

Economic development requires three things: vision, optimism, and a will for change.

By its nature, economic development--creating new opportunities for people--is about shifting life perceptions and expectations from where they have lived their whole life to a new vision for how they might succeed.

In Maine, economic development often looks like the paper mill worker agreeing to learn new skills to function in a small, entrepreneurial, wood composite development shop.

Or a lobster fisherman, who can no longer afford the price of fuel and bait with an increasingly limited number of traps, agreeing to participate in a grant and use his or her seamanship skills to run research trips for scientists who need to study the movement of fish stocks. Or a lobster fisherman who uses his boat for a filmmaking crews, documenting the Penobscot Bay ecosystem.

Or people who have worked blue collar, manual labor jobs all their lives learning computer and communication skills so they can participate in the growth of weath generated by the creative/knowledge economy.

Whatever economic development looks like, it looks like change and ordinary community members spearheading economic development efforts must have the leadership skills to, as Kouzes and Posner have written, "do extraordinary things." Leaders do this by a) modeling the way; b) inspiring a shared vision; c) challenging the process; d) enabling others to act and e) encouraging the heart.

For those of us on the coast of Down East Maine--beseiged by the fall of the fisheries; the inflation of property values; and the desire to maintain independent, worker-owned businesses under pressure from the tourism/services sectors--this is tough work. Try convincing a lobster fisherman in the spring of 2008 that he or she should think about alternative opportunities, the larger economic context, or just the future in general and it is very likely you will hear only about the flat, low boat price for lobsters in relation to rising fuel and bait costs.

Change happens slowly and incrementally. If we are to sustain our communities, we must continue to be voices for change: the message of other opportunities and how they relate to former natural resources based lives must be consistent and strong. We can't worry if only one or two people listen at first: it is the consistency and persistence of the message, our long term belief in and ability to create a vision shared by the entire community, and not just a single component of it, that must carry the day if we are to sustain year-round, rural communities across the U.S.

Being an Eternal Optimist is not easy, and sometimes it feels as if fewer and fewer individuals are willing to take on this role. I for one am going to keep on trying, and hopefully a few of you will join me.