Andrew Leigh - Reconnected

Andrew Leigh is the federal member for Fenner. Before being elected in 2010, he was a professor of economics at the Australian National University. His books include Battlers and Billionaires, The Luck of Politics and Randomistas.

Nick Terrell is an adviser to Andrew Leigh MP. He has worked closely with Australias charity and non-profit sector to protect the voice of community organisations and promote the value of their contribution to Australian communities.

SOCIAL CAPITAL

I magine your ideal community. One in which youve got plenty of friends, and plenty of time to spend with them. A society where your street is lively and safe, and neighbours are happy to mind your dog when youre on holiday. Local cafs where people know your name. Creative communities telling Australian stories. More local sporting teams than you can shake a cricket stump at. The kind of politics where people work together to solve local problems, rather than bickering about leaders, slurs and slip-ups.

Suppose that this sense of common purpose extended to the workplace, so that people felt fulfilled in their jobs, respected by their co-workers and valued by their managers. Imagine employment thats flexible by default, so the boss doesnt scoff when you say youd like to work a four-day week so you can care for a relative or just practise your favourite hobby.

Picture, too, an Australia in which friendships comfortably bridge traditional divides, in which everyone shares a pride in the nations 60,000-year Indigenous heritage, volunteers to help those who are down on their luck and takes the time to check in on neighbours whove newly arrived from overseas. Envisage the strength that such a connected society has when adversity strikes: volunteer fire brigades at the ready, foodbanks well stocked, community centres prepared.

Its a world wed all like to live in but too often the reality of modern life is rushing past your neighbours (who you really must introduce yourself to one day), getting stuck in traffic, rolling your eyes at the latest social media outrage and wondering how anyone ever finds time to catch up with friends. In Reconnected, we look at how Australia has become more disconnected and how together we can turn it around.

Living in a more connected way isnt just pleasurable, it enables us to tackle larger challenges. Problems such as climate change, inequality, inactivity and loneliness threaten our future. Solving them will require collective action. In all of human history, theres few instances in which a crisis was resolved by one person acting alone.

The missing pieces of Australias community-building puzzle are hiding in plain sight. Australia is fortunate to have thousands of inspirational social entrepreneurs in our midst. From sporty types organising weekend fun runs to altruists providing laundry services to homeless people, social capitalists are helping to grow a more connected community. Better yet, many are deploying tactics that can be replicated elsewhere. Identifying these common threads is the purpose of our book.

But first, theres a core concept we need to understand: social capital.

Four hundred and fifty kilometres south of New Zealands South Island lies Auckland Island, a cold and hilly landmass. For most of human history, the island has been uninhabited. Then in 1864 something unusual happened.wrecked at opposite ends of the island: the Invercauld on the northwest, and the Grafton on the south-east.

The Invercauld was under the command of Captain George Dalgarno, who when disaster struck seems to have been focused only on his own survival. Dalgarnos attitude of every man for himself saw six of the twenty-four sailors under him perish in the shipwreck, including a sick young crewman. In the coming weeks, the survivors roamed the island, repeatedly abandoning those who were ill to die on their own. When they caught wild pigs, each man ate as much as he could. One night, William Hervey threw another of the shipwrecked sailors, Fred Hawser, out of their stick shelter on the basis that he was being a nuisance. Hawser died. A few days later it was discovered that Hervey had been eating some of Hawser. A year after the shipwreck, a rescue ship arrived. Only three of the Invercaulds original twenty-five crew survived.

On the other side of the island, things unfolded differently. Commanding the Grafton was Captain Thomas Musgrave. When his ship hit a rocky beach and foundered, Musgrave ordered his men to stay aboard and wait until daylight. They then took ashore food, a gun and a dinghy, and even managed to transfer a critically ill crewmate. Over the coming months, the five