bhaskar saikia

“Success was individual achievement; failure was a social problem.”
— Michael Lewis, The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine

This single line captures something uncomfortable, something we often avoid acknowledging: the asymmetry in how society distributes credit and blame.

We love the narrative of the self-made individual. We celebrate the idea that success springs entirely from personal brilliance, discipline, and hard work. But when things go wrong, we suddenly widen the frame. We speak of systems failing, policies failing, markets failing—anything except individuals.

This selective storytelling shapes not only how we view the world, but also how we behave in it.

The Myth of the Self-Made Success

Success stories are rarely told with the full context. We seldom hear about privilege, luck, timing, or invisible support systems. We focus on the hero—the lone genius who “made it.”

Society rewards this narrative because it makes success feel earned and replicable. It creates the comforting illusion that achievement is always within reach, as long as one is hardworking and talented enough.

But this narrative hides something important: No one succeeds alone.
Networks, institutions, opportunities, access, stability—these are invisible contributors. They rarely appear in speeches or memoirs, but they shape outcomes more profoundly than we care to admit.

And When Things Collapse?

Failure disrupts the myth.

Because if success is purely individual, then logic dictates that failure should also be individual. But that is not how society reacts.

When the stakes are large—financial systems, political decisions, public health—blame becomes collective, diffused, untouchable. Suddenly failure is “a social problem.”

• A market collapses?
  The economy failed.
• A corporation makes catastrophic decisions?
  The system was flawed.
• A crisis is triggered by a handful of powerful actors?
  Regulation failed, oversight failed, society failed.

This convenient redistribution of blame shields individuals while burdening everyone else.

If success can be individual, then failure must also allow room for individual accountability—especially for those in power.

And if failure can be social, then success too must be shared. Those who rise should acknowledge the shoulders they stood on, the structures that carried them, and the society that made their ascent possible.

Only then can we escape the asymmetry that Michael Lewis so sharply exposes. Only then can success and failure both become part of a more honest, human story.