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want to discuss a few interesting things today: rats, Economics, and laws of nature. More specifically, I want to examine 'The Great Hanoi Rat Massacre, ' Adam Smith's 'invisible hand,' and the 'law of unexpected consequences.'
Let's start with a fascinating piece of French colonial history that occurred in what was then known as Hanoi, Tonkin, French Indochina (present-day Hanoi, Vietnam).
In 1902, the world was grappling with the third plague pandemic (circa 1894 - 1940), and Hanoi was not spared. It was during this time that Alexandre Yersin, a Swiss-French physician and bacteriologist, made a crucial discovery, linking the pandemic's spread to rodents, particularly rats. This discovery would set the stage for the Great Hanoi Rat Massacre.
This inflection point in history is where the intersection of my topics gets interesting: the French colonial 'powers that be' became aware of Alexandre Yersin's discovery and decided to enact a bounty on rats as a control measure for the spread of the pandemic. The payout per rat was 1¢, and to collect that fee, you had to turn in the severed tail of the rat.
Now, some enterprising and clever opportunists understood that if they killed the rats, their revenue stream would eventually dry up. Instead, they came up with a couple of enterprising ways to ensure constant influx into that revenue stream: one, they caught rats, relieved them of their tails, and then set them free; two, some of the more entrepreneurially minded people secretly set up rat breeding venues outside the city limits and then emancipated the mature rats within the city limits of Hanoi.
The outcome of the bounty on rats was a spectacular, if not tragic, irony. Instead of reducing the rat population, it increased, exacerbating the pandemic and causing more suffering and death. This failure to apply strategic foresight not only increased the rat population but also worsened the pandemic, leading to unintended and devastating consequences. The result was the exact opposite of the intended goals: reduce the rat population, lessen the rodent vector's footprint and decrease the pandemic's spread.
This type of failure is affectionately called 'The Law of Unintended Consequences.' The concept of this 'law' may be traced back to John Locke's work in the late 17th century and to Adam Smith's musings in the 18th century. Smith, for example, wrote about the 'invisible hand,' whereby individual self-interest can lead to consequences beneficial to the whole of society, which can be seen as a related concept focusing on unintended positive outcomes rather than negative. This 'law' is a powerful concept that underscores the need for careful consideration of actions and their potential consequences.
Moving on to the present, you would be forgiven if you thought that humankind learned lessons from that dark bit of history; it is, after all, a logical conclusion. Unfortunately, you would be wrong. The Genus Sapiens has an innate propensity for historical amnesia.
Let me validate that statement for you: during the beginning phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, you could not purchase hand sanitiser, masks, gloves, or other personal protective gear unless you paid extortionate sums of money—sometimes 100 times their pre-pandemic value or more. You can bet that this behaviour resulted in increased spread of the virus.
Our local Surgery could not access some of those supplies at all, and I donated what I had personally to help protect the local community to the best of my ability. I also knew that by protecting my community, I was protecting myself, my family and my friends; the act was not solely altruistic; it aligned with Adam Smith's ideas.
Moving on to today, when I was conceptualising how to write about Hanoi, I looked at the news, and a perfect example of the law of unintended consequences popped into view (2).
Kerry Town devised a plan to tidy the town by designating an area to drop off specially produced red bags of rubbish that they would then remove: simple! Not so—in the picture, you can see very few red bags embedded in a mountain of trash. You can bet your 'bottom dollar' that Kerry Town's powers that be did not expect that their plan to tidy the town would backfire so spectacularly. The plan backfired; instead of tidying the town, it created a chaotic mess that was far from the intended outcome.
The tidy idea failed epically, causing a huge expense to clean it up and endangering the local population by creating a vector of infection for rats, mice, and other known disease spreaders. This example is a stark reminder of the importance of strategic foresight and the potential consequences of not considering the long-term effects of our actions. A little strategic foresight goes a long way in helping lessen issues like the ones discussed in my rant. Unfortunately, or fortunately, if the result is positive, it is not a guarantee: it's a roll of the dice, albeit a loaded roll.
Everyone, including governments, councils, towns and cities, and families, can benefit from exercising a little foresight and critical thinking before acting. Remember this: complex problems require well-formulated, well-planned, and well-enacted solutions, not hastily devised interventions. Often, I have smacked a bug that landed on me only to hurt myself: if I had stopped, looked, and then acted, I may have spared myself the indignity of self-harm.
The Great Hanoi Rat Hunt. (19 July, 2018). Retrieved from https://www.amazon.co.uk/Great-Hanoi-Rat-Hunt
Reidy, J. (2024). Farcical scenes in Kerry town as street turned into a dumping site. Retrieved from https://m.independent.ie/regionals/kerry/news/farcical-scenes-in-kerry-town-as-street-turned-into-dumping-site/a1044235352.html