{"id":1851,"date":"2020-07-21T16:20:00","date_gmt":"2020-07-21T16:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/?p=1851"},"modified":"2020-07-21T16:20:00","modified_gmt":"2020-07-21T16:20:00","slug":"uncertainty-as-a-driver-for-social-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/?p=1851","title":{"rendered":"Uncertainty as a driver for social change"},"content":{"rendered":"

For a large part of this course I feel that we have been talking about uncertainty from the frame that it is a negative<\/em> feature of scientific understandings and social action. Now I would like to propose that we flip this perspective and consider the benefits: uncertainty is a driver for social change.<\/p>\n

Uncertainty is an inherent part of life, an inescapable truth that we as humans all learn to adapt to, compensate for, and to some degree, accept. Furthermore, it is a fundamental part of creativity, and thus social change.<\/p>\n

The inaction regarding the climate crisis is evident and it can be argued that we are trapped in the cycle of trying to make changes within a system that does not want to change. Simply put, there are invested economic and political interests to keep \u201cbusiness as usual\u201d. We cannot break out of the cycle without a radical rethink of our economy and values.<\/p>\n

A challenge for us therefore, is to be creative. Uncertainty can drive the imagination, and help us to believe that another world is possible.<\/p>\n

We are living currently in a pandemic that exemplifies this. Social and economic aspects of our society that seemed utterly permanent and fixed, were exposed as fragile facades that collapsed under this external forcing. I here take the luxury of a small tangent to my thinking, as one direction that the uncertainty of this crisis has given us the opportunity to explore.<\/p>\n

Prison Abolition<\/u><\/p>\n

Within a very small frame of time, large parts of the global population have had their liberty constricted and felt the colossal impacts of living without freedom. Living in such a constrained environment, it is natural to then consider the section of our community that we legitimize incarceration for. From witnessing first hand the devastating effects of being \u201csocially distant\u201d, it has become ever clearer the importance of human interaction with other humans, and how a lack of social contact can deteriorate ones mental health. How then, is it that we enforce isolation onto a specific demographic of the population, and justify this as beneficial? Prison abolition has never been a more logical step to take.<\/p>\n

At a first glance, prison abolition might seem an absurd, fantastical notion. But the reality is, nothing is more counter intuitive to achieving social justice than to isolate those in our community who have caused harm. With no evident link between crime rates and the expansion of prisons including incarceration rates, it is clear that prison does not deter harmful behaviour.<\/p>\n

If not to deter, then what else could prison be for? The secondary purpose of prison as a rehabilitation facility is also flattened when considering reoffending rates are at around 50 percent, and rises to around 70 percent for the under 18\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s briefly examine instead the origins of the punitive justice system.<\/p>\n

The criminal justice system is inherently flawed in that policing and the penal justice system originated as tools for preventing resistance and establishing racial hierarchies; the founder of the Met police Robert Peel was formerly employed as the Colonial Secretary for Ireland and worked on maintaining the colonial system: he developed a model in order to keep control of the colonialized population in Ireland which was then implemented as the start of the British police force. With origins that are racist and constructed to oppress, the system is unfit for reformation in that it was built for this purpose. It is failing on its own terms.<\/p>\n

Much like our economic system, we cannot find a solution within the frame that caused and perpetuates the problem. We must use uncertainty to nurture our imaginations of what is possible, and of what future we would like to live in.<\/p>\n

Be bold and bright with your ideas!<\/p>\n

https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/novaramedia\/sets\/the-lockdown<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For a large part of this course I feel that we have been talking about uncertainty from the frame that it is a negative feature of scientific understandings and social action. Now I would like to propose that we flip this perspective and consider the benefits: uncertainty is a driver for social change. Uncertainty isContinue reading “Uncertainty as a driver for social change”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":53,"featured_media":1852,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[81,103],"tags":[100,123,124],"class_list":["post-1851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog-post-2020","category-students-blog-post","tag-creativity","tag-prison-abolition","tag-social-change"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/birdswire.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/53"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1851"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1851\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1854,"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1851\/revisions\/1854"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1852"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/uncertain2degrees.blogs.uni-hamburg.de\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}