Revolutionary Ideas Evolved over Time
I’ve been listening to an audiobook about the American Revolution that happened in the late 18th century in North America, and it got me thinking about what we have come to call DevOps. If you are in the midst of fomenting a DevOps Revolution at your company, your patience is wavering, or you are struggling with the half-measures and compromises (“That’s not revolutionary, that is evolutionary”), indulge me for a moment while I address an older idea in a new light:
Revolutionary ideas evolved over time.
Let me explain.
When Americans look back at the American Revolution, generally, we think of a few very principled, very intelligent men deciding to go against the stodgy monarchy who was insufficient to meet the needs of a growing empire and a modernized world. (At least that is what I think of).
(Sound familiar? Keep reading.)
We then relish in the glorious revolution of freedom and fireworks and Francis Scott Key’s anthem “that the flag was still there”. An impossible victory, granted from Heaven itself.
This may be a convenient way to view how things happened, but it is hardly accurate.
Rewind to the Magna Carta in 1215, where rebel barons wanted to challenge the monarchy of King John, which was, until that time, completely unchecked. The Magna Carta established the idea of representation of non-royalty in government. It established a Parliament.
Britain itself had a “Glorious Revolution” of 1688 which itself established and confirmed the primacy of Parliament over the monarch by establishing the British Bill of Rights in 1689.
John Locke was a contemporary of the Glorious Revolution, and asserted the concepts of natural rights and in his Two Treatises, the second has a paragraph that is actually quoted verbatim in the Declaration of Independence: “when a long train of abuses”.
Thomas Jefferson, an American (then British) luminary, considered Locke, Newton and Baconthe three greatest men that have ever lived, without any exception, and as having laid the foundation of those superstructures which have been raised in the Physical and Moral sciences".
Locke’s ideas were drafted in pamphlets and disseminated to the colonists. Said John Adams to Jefferson: “The Revolution was in the Minds of the People, and this was effected, from 1760 to 1775,1 in the course of fifteen Years before a drop of blood was drawn at Lexington.”
But even with the drafting of the Declaration of Independence, the road was not clear. What followed the Declaration was war with the most powerful nation on earth, the drafting of the Articles of Confederation, the struggle of the fledgling colonies to gain favor as a group with any other nation, the recognition of the need for a stronger federal government, the many different states’ plans for this problem, and eventually the drafting of the Constitution of the United States. However, many, especially after the colonists’ gusty and implausible military victory over Britain, were wary of building the very thing they had just defeated - any centralized executive authority. Anti-federalists did not like the Constitution as drafted. Alexander Hamilton’s Federalist Papers helped shape the rough edges of the Constitution. The Constitution is ratified by the various states, amid a vigorous federalist/antifederalist debate. A Bill of Rights was appended to the Constitution.
One might think they were home free at this point, right? No! If the Declaration of Independence set for the the glorious ideals that all men are created equal, and that they are endowed with natural, unalienable rights - there were still many groups, including Americans Native to North America, Americans of African descent, the poor who had helped win the Revolutionary War, and women of any color, who did not feel that their rights were protected by the Constitution as drafted.
Our nation later fought an incredibly expensive and damaging war over one of these inequities, still struggles with our relationship with our Native American brothers, and still struggles with racial and gender equalities.
However, it is, and has, been evolving for the better for a long time. It has been a model for many other countries and the economic benefit of those evolving ideals over time shows in the success of the United States’ model.
In short, my DevOps brothers and sisters: you have a light and truth to offer, AND you may not have it all figured out. It may take years, but it will prevail. Be patient. Revel in small victories. No one person, including the founders, had it all figured out. Listen to those around you. The best ideas will most likely be ones you haven’t thought of yet. Talk. Collaborate, evolve.
You will succeed. Maybe not in the way you think, but the the truths of DevOps are self-evident. And they didn’t happen overnight.
Revolutionary ideas evolved over time.
Let me explain.
When Americans look back at the American Revolution, generally, we think of a few very principled, very intelligent men deciding to go against the stodgy monarchy who was insufficient to meet the needs of a growing empire and a modernized world. (At least that is what I think of).
(Sound familiar? Keep reading.)
We then relish in the glorious revolution of freedom and fireworks and Francis Scott Key’s anthem “that the flag was still there”. An impossible victory, granted from Heaven itself.
This may be a convenient way to view how things happened, but it is hardly accurate.
Rewind to the Magna Carta in 1215, where rebel barons wanted to challenge the monarchy of King John, which was, until that time, completely unchecked. The Magna Carta established the idea of representation of non-royalty in government. It established a Parliament.
Britain itself had a “Glorious Revolution” of 1688 which itself established and confirmed the primacy of Parliament over the monarch by establishing the British Bill of Rights in 1689.
John Locke was a contemporary of the Glorious Revolution, and asserted the concepts of natural rights and in his Two Treatises, the second has a paragraph that is actually quoted verbatim in the Declaration of Independence: “when a long train of abuses”.
Thomas Jefferson, an American (then British) luminary, considered Locke, Newton and Baconthe three greatest men that have ever lived, without any exception, and as having laid the foundation of those superstructures which have been raised in the Physical and Moral sciences".
Locke’s ideas were drafted in pamphlets and disseminated to the colonists. Said John Adams to Jefferson: “The Revolution was in the Minds of the People, and this was effected, from 1760 to 1775,1 in the course of fifteen Years before a drop of blood was drawn at Lexington.”
But even with the drafting of the Declaration of Independence, the road was not clear. What followed the Declaration was war with the most powerful nation on earth, the drafting of the Articles of Confederation, the struggle of the fledgling colonies to gain favor as a group with any other nation, the recognition of the need for a stronger federal government, the many different states’ plans for this problem, and eventually the drafting of the Constitution of the United States. However, many, especially after the colonists’ gusty and implausible military victory over Britain, were wary of building the very thing they had just defeated - any centralized executive authority. Anti-federalists did not like the Constitution as drafted. Alexander Hamilton’s Federalist Papers helped shape the rough edges of the Constitution. The Constitution is ratified by the various states, amid a vigorous federalist/antifederalist debate. A Bill of Rights was appended to the Constitution.
One might think they were home free at this point, right? No! If the Declaration of Independence set for the the glorious ideals that all men are created equal, and that they are endowed with natural, unalienable rights - there were still many groups, including Americans Native to North America, Americans of African descent, the poor who had helped win the Revolutionary War, and women of any color, who did not feel that their rights were protected by the Constitution as drafted.
Our nation later fought an incredibly expensive and damaging war over one of these inequities, still struggles with our relationship with our Native American brothers, and still struggles with racial and gender equalities.
However, it is, and has, been evolving for the better for a long time. It has been a model for many other countries and the economic benefit of those evolving ideals over time shows in the success of the United States’ model.
In short, my DevOps brothers and sisters: you have a light and truth to offer, AND you may not have it all figured out. It may take years, but it will prevail. Be patient. Revel in small victories. No one person, including the founders, had it all figured out. Listen to those around you. The best ideas will most likely be ones you haven’t thought of yet. Talk. Collaborate, evolve.
You will succeed. Maybe not in the way you think, but the the truths of DevOps are self-evident. And they didn’t happen overnight.
Just because you may never enjoy the shade of the great oak you are planting, doesn't mean that you shouldn't do the work to plant it now.
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