Surprises: not just the spice of life but the source of knowledge

Abstract

As befits a publication whose very name suggests surprise, I have decided to present some reflections on surprises or, perhaps, some surprising reflections. I cannot be alone in seeing two startled eyes staring back at me from the word M@n@gement. Nor can I be alone in thinking that surprises, good and bad, are an important part of every sphere of life—political, cultural, scientific and personal. Think of it like this—what would life be without surprises? There would be no space for stories since stories demand reversals of fortune, transformations of trouble into opportunity, of crisis into challenge, of glory into catastrophe, of order into disorder and disorder into order. Nor would there be much space for the arts, at least not for those arts that thrive on astonishing or rattling the public. There would certainly be little scope for sport, since the result of every contest would be known in advance. There would be little space for adventure and exploration; there would be no discovery, good or bad. Hence, there would also be no space for the creation of new knowledge, at least no knowledge beyond that which merely builds infinitesimally on what already exists and which seems to find favour with a certain genre of academic publishing. What a drab, boring world this would be! And yet surprises are far from a straight blessing. We mistrust surprises, some of us more than others. Surprises bring excitement but they also bring trouble. ‘The best surprise is no surprise’ was the founder’s logo for the hotel chain Holiday Inn. ‘No surprises’ holds the promise of a smooth, predictable, orderly, managed universe, one that runs with the reassuring predictability of Prussian bureaucracy or a Swiss clock. Eliminating surprises certainly reduces anxiety and induces a sense of being in control. The elimination of surprises, or at least their normalisation and containment, may be seen as virtually a definition of the word ‘management’ (though not of ‘m@n@gement’). Management offers the promise that life can be ordered, organised and controlled. More than this, it claims that the forces of disorder and chaos can be contained through rationality, knowledge and science. As Jules Verne’s hero Phileas Fogg demonstrates (with the help of a Thomas Cook timetable, an ingenious Passepartout and sensible planning), one can travel around the earth in precisely eighty days, no matter what surprises are thrown in one’s path. In times of change, stress and uncertainty, it can be comforting to believe that the world is a predictable and regular place, or at least that there are certain things on which we can rely—aeroplanes delivering us to our destinations, electricity powering our homes and workplaces, promises being honoured, tasks discharged and assumptions fulfilled. At the same time, we are aware that in a highly interdependent world like ours a volcanic eruption in Iceland can