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This Dissonance overlaps with several others, particularly Leadership and Power, the Restructuring of the Welfare State, Increased Life Expectancy, Under-represented Need groups and Ethics. However, Innovation versus Tradition will be treated here to draw attention to the need for constantly balancing the role of tradition and continuity with the need for innovation. Much has been achieved. Each country gave some examples of innovative development which demonstrated their ability for flexible thinking. For instance, as said earlier, a Peer Help System is used with selected and trained prostitutes who attempt to develop superior safety habits with their colleagues.
A need for innovation and ingenuity derives from the Restructuring of the Welfare State. Although the number of newly infected cases is diminishing, the substantially increased life expectancy of sufferers means that the total number of HIV/Aids patients in need of care is increasing. Hence new and larger resources are needed to cope. However, the government, officials and the general public have been influenced by tendentious media coverage suggesting that the Aids situation is now more or less under control. Additionally, in many countries, the Welfare State is under attack from neo classical economists who urge a reduction in its size and a consequent reduction of the tax burden. Innovative approaches are needed to cope with these pressures. Fund-raising through voluntary organizations is not widely practiced in Continental countries and Aids has a narrower appeal with the general public than competitive causes.
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A particularly successful innovation built on the very traditional Buddy system which had achieved high status in the community as a result of careful selection and training. It started with (usually gay) helpers volunteering to carry out a variety of important jobs and to give sympathetic psychological support to homosexual Aids patients who were dying rapidly. The bonds between Buddy and patient became very strong. Then two things happened. As the result of the new drug treatment, homosexual Aids sufferers could live for long periods and the ‘Buddies’ found it difficult to adjust to this (see Increased Life Expectancy). Secondly, new cases of homosexuals infected with Aids stabilized or diminished while heterosexual Aids increased and needed help. Experience in our groups showed that a redesigned ‘Buddy-like’ system could be developed to cope with these changed conditions. The Buddy system now has women as Buddies and women as clients and Buddies are used with minority group heterosexuals and drug users.
Many of these adjustments are documented under the various Dissonances. Here we will mention only the tendency to form new alliances, to increase networking and co-ordination and to consider the possibility of establishing mergers as ways of managing with reduced financial support and related pressures.
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