Associate Research Fellow John Reader reviews ‘#newpower’ by Henry Timms and Jeremy Heimans and wonders how new the exercise of power in the digital age really is.
The book’s subtitle—”why outsiders are winning, institutions are failing, and how the rest of us can keep up in the age of mass participation”—sets the agenda. From the outset Timms and Heimans lay out the differences between what they call old power and new power. Old power works like a currency. It is held by the few; jealously guarded, closed, inaccessible and leader driven. It downloads and it captures. New power, however, is like a current. Made by the many, it is open, participatory and peer driven. It uploads and distributes, and the goal is not to hoard it, but to channel it (p. 2). The test of the book is the extent to which the examples they offer do represent new power in action.
Alternative understandings of power are not, in themselves, new. According to Foucault, power is always already there; it is not a zero sum game, nor is it something which only an elite possess. Power always presupposes counter-power. What is new in Timms and Heimans’ interpretation is that we are now living in a hyperconnected world where the means by which power is exercised have been transformed by the technology available.
Timms is president of 92nd Street Y, a cultural and community centre which fosters learning and civic engagement, and Heimans is the co-founder and CEO of Purpose, a company that supports and builds social movements around the world. In 2005 Heimans co-founded the Australian political movement GetUp!, and the global campaigning community Avaaz. One imagines that their personal experience may enable them to offer some original insights. They write:
“thanks to today’s ubiquitous connectivity, we can come together and organize ourselves in ways that are geographically boundless and highly distributed and with unprecedented velocity and reach. This hyperconnectedness has given birth to new models and mindsets that are shaping our age.” (p. 8)
The book presents tables and diagrams to illustrate its argument. This includes what the authors term ‘the tale of two mindsets’ which are doing battle in today’s world (p. 18). The Old Power Values are those of formal governance and managerialism; competition and resource consolidation; confidentiality and the separation of the public from the private; expertise and professional specialisation; and long-term affiliation and loyalty—all of which presuppose low levels of participation. By contrast, the New Power Values are those of informal governance and decision making; collaboration, crowd wisdom and open sourcing; radical transparency; a “do it ourselves” ethic; and short-term conditional affiliation—all associated with higher levels of participation. They qualify their claims by suggesting that although these two sets of values can come into conflict it is better to see them on a spectrum, rather than as a binary opposition (p. 19). They also present their ‘New Power Compass’ (p. 28), which places organisations into different quadrants depending on the extent to which they not only espouse, but also practice, new power values. Apple, for instance, operates according to old power values and an old power model. Facebook and Uber function according to the new power model but with old power values. There are cheerleaders such as the Guardian newspaper and Unilever which espouse the new power values but still operate according to the old power model. And then the ‘crowds’, which are examples of businesses or movements which function as new power models allied with new power values. Amongst these—and these are the real test of the overall argument—are LinkedIn, Airbnb, #BlackLivesMatter and Occupy.
Chapter 3 draws a distinction between what we know as sound bites and what the authors term ‘meme drops’. An example of the latter is the Ice Bucket Challenge, which provided a blueprint for action dropped into a fast moving current of ideas and information, and was capable of being taken in different directions in different forms (p. 36). In other words, rather than being prescriptive it allowed people to adapt and develop in whatever way seemed appropriate to them in their specific context. The authors extrapolate from this that the three key design principles for enabling an idea to spread in a new power world are that: an idea be actionable (it makes one do something); it is connected (brings one into contact with others as part of a network or connected community); and that it is extensible (can be remixed and shaped by the participants).
The chapter on leadership throws light on not just the US, but also UK politics. How was Barack Obama’s regime able to be so easily overturned by Donald Trump—particularly as the former had apparently employed many of the new power models and values being advocated? Obama began as the ultimate new power leader with his own background in community organising and his capacity to engage and mobilise grass roots activists. The authors suggest that Obama’s campaigns and subsequent practices developed into something too formal and too structured, whereas Trump’s equivalents were deliberately unstructured allowing people to feed into his approach with a greater degree of flexibility. This makes Trump a very worrying example of new power models at work. As Timms and Heimans so tellingly put it, Trump “revels in the instability of countless truths” (p. 169). Trump is an example of the ‘Platform Strongman’ who co-opts a digital crowd and deploys new power in order to advance largely authoritarian values.
One could argue that similar tactics are at work in the UK. Somewhat like Trump, Johnson articulates a series of bold and brash statements and claims which seem to bear little relationship to the realities the country is facing. Can current alternative movements or gatherings seriously challenge this exercise of power? That is what the authors are clearly trying to propose through the examples they offer, even though many are either trivial, short-lived or not as clear cut as they would like.
One of the real challenges is how to restore public trust and confidence in the structures and institutions which still function according to old power models, even though they may be moving towards espousing new power values. One suggestion the authors present is that of a “public interest algorithm” (p. 249). These would have to be more transparent, participatory and open to scrutiny than those now employed by the participation farms such as Facebook and Google. This idea does offer some hope for a more democratic process in our hyperconnected age, and it is a suggestion worth pursuing.
Overall, there are certainly fascinating nuggets here. But I am left wondering whether new power is really as new and radical as the authors claim?
Like Thomas Picketty’s major opus ‘Capital in the Twenty-First Century’ from a few years ago, Zuboff’s book looks destined to become a standard work in this area. Then again, its appearance on bookshelves may not actually mean that it has been read.
Zuboff’s basic argument is that we have entered a new and unprecedented era of Surveillance Capitalism, in which the main technology companies—notably Google, Facebook, Apple and Amazon—have adapted capitalism to suit their own ends. Meanwhile, the rest of us appear to have little or no control. In order to analyse this phenomenon, she develops her own conceptuality. This form of capitalism is a new logic of accumulation based upon the realisation that apparently useless extra data—available from the digital tracking of our movements, desires and behaviour—actually provides a ‘behavioural surplus’, which can then be turned into ‘prediction products’. The technology companies extract this data with little consent or consultation, and we become, not even the product, but the raw material of this process. By this means, companies can reduce levels of uncertainty about our future preferences—be those to do with consumption or politics—and thus shape our behaviour towards guaranteed outcomes. Even though we may be aware of this, most of us seem content to trade our privacy for the supposed benefits of convenience and ease of communication.
Zuboff traces the context of this development back to the War on Terror, which, she suggests, enabled such surveillance to become the norm for security purposes. Today, the same system now plays on the idea that technology entrepreneurs are the heroes of the age. Our own fear of being left out of this brave new world, and our propensity to become addicted to these technologies all add to the success of this new form of capitalism.
What are the limitations of this argument?
First, Zuboff wants to separate the technology from its particular deployments, while still acknowledging that it cannot be separated from politics and society (p.15). For Zuboff, Surveillance Capitalism is not the same as the algorithms it employs. However, I would argue that the relationship between the two is rather more intimate than Zuboff allows for. She suggests that ‘it didn’t have to be this way’, and that the technology could have been developed and integrated into a more benign form of capitalism. But I am not convinced by this. She resorts to notions of human autonomy and the right of the individual to the future tense as sources of opposition, but these are the very understandings that have been so easily subverted and appropriated by this form of capitalism. Instead, we may well need to turn to the more radical concepts of distributed agency and human/non-human assemblages, as found in an alternative philosophical tradition, in order to better understand the phenomenon of Surveillance Capitalism.
Second, I would agree with Zuboff that one of the objectives must be to ‘slow down the action’ in order to enlarge the space for public debate on these issues, but beyond the religiously inflected idea of ‘the right to sanctuary’ she offers little guidance on how this might be achieved (p.62). If we are all now as ‘psychically numbed’ as she supposes, it is hard to see how and where the resistance will emerge (p.78). Her lengthy descriptions of the way that Google and the other technology giants appropriate basic details of our lives, hoover up all the best brains, and guard their freedom to exploit by disguising their intentions beneath terms and conditions that very few of us will ever take the time to read, seems to leave little scope for alternative activity. As she says, where were the civil rights groups or new social movements which would have led the resistance in a previous generation? Even the Obama campaign used and colluded with these technology companies well before the Trump era took this to another level with Cambridge Analytica. If we have either knowingly or unwittingly sold our personal data for a contemporary ‘mess of pottage’, is it not already too late? Her use of B. F. Skinner’s ‘Beyond Freedom and Dignity’ in later chapters is even more depressing, not to mention a strangely dated intervention in the argument when more contemporary sources might have offered a different perspective.
Is the book an important one?
Yes, simply because it is a significant and detailed engagement with the threat of the digital. Yet despite the new conceptuality she develops to analyse Surveillance Capitalism, Zuboff is still operating from within the very paradigm she sets out to challenge. A more radical perspective is available. Anthony Giddens was talking about the surveillance society back in the 1980s, and Foucault’s ‘disciplinary society’ and Deleuze’s ‘control society’ are both reflected in Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s idea of the full spectrum dominance of global capitalism. On whether the threat of the digital is different in kind from earlier forms of technology she is unhelpfully ambivalent. Those of us who believe it is, turn to more radical philosophical resources in order to address the digital as both threat and promise.
Are humans any different? Why is it that we draw boundaries between humans and nonhumans, between life and nonlife, between the organic and the inorganic? These are the sorts of questions that motivate Timothy Morton to propose his radically egalitarian philosophy—so-called object oriented ontology (or OOO for short)—in which all objects are considered equals.
In his recent book on ‘Humankind’, Morton’s primary objective is to rehabilitate Marxist thought by replacing its ‘substance ontology’ with OOO. To explain: Morton wants to rid Marxism of its hierarchical understanding of being, with humans at the top and nonhumans further down the chain and replace it with a flat ontology in which all beings, human and nonhuman, are on the same level. As the subtitle of his book suggests, this represents an attempt to establish solidarity with the nonhuman and so has a direct environmental motivation. Morton prefers to talk about ‘nonhuman people’ rather than making any further distinction. Without being overly concerned about the Marxist angle, one notes that Morton insists that its outdated ontology is a “bug” which can be erased, rather than a fundamental component of its theoretical basis (p.7).
The question which this raises for me is whether something similar might also be the case for theology? Is theology also hampered by a hierarchical ‘substance ontology’? Morton is not interested in this question; he sees no theological possibilities beyond a post-Neolithic agricultural religion which has God at the head of some great Chain of Being.
My interest in the book also stems from an environmental commitment. I want to argue that, to fully take the nonhuman into account, theology must also work with an alternative to its more traditional substance ontology. Hence, the object-oriented approach within philosophy seems a promising candidate. Is there anything to be learnt from Morton’s attempt to “debug” Marxism that can be applied to efforts to “debug” theology? What sort of theology and understanding of God would remain in such an attempt?
Morton introduces his own conceptual framework and terminology to pursue his objective and I can only provide a brief overview here. In essence, he is attempting to carve out an alternative space which steers between the various dualisms that result from employing a substance ontology. He identifies these dualisms as: subject/object, human/nonhuman, conscious/nonconscious, sentient/nonsentient, lifeform/nonlife, and thing/nothing (p.154). The term “humankind” is part of his attempt to reach beyond these and to “intuit our objecthood in the OOO sense through the porous barrier between dimensions that are not thought as incommensurable, solid, smoothly functioning worlds” (p.154). Humankind, he says, is violently opposed to “Humanity” and “Nature” which are both a distortion of what Morton calls the “symbiotic real” (p.1). “Humankind” is the closest he can come to describing ecological beings in a way that avoids reducing them to some pantheistic Gaia concept or leaving them to be oppressed by an anthropocentric worldview.
The dynamic is always the same: either too much proximity or too much distance between the human and the nonhuman. How can one establish the grounds for a different dynamic? This is the question for an appropriate and contemporary environmental (and digital) theology.
Morton makes further efforts to describe and justify his alternative approach, such as a whole chapter (Chapter 3) on the notion of “subscendence”—the idea that the whole is less than the sum of its parts—as a replacement for both transcendence and immanence. He argues, amongst other things, that neoliberalism is “ontologically small” and that it will be possible to dismantle it by finding the “wiggle room” which represents our attempts to “care for” the elements of contemporary human and nonhuman creation. But I am still not sure how this translates into practice.
There are echoes here of Latour, who also suggests that we need to get closer to and care for the nonhuman rather than attempting to distance ourselves in order to control. Morton, however, criticises the ideas of a network of actants or distributed agency (p.180)—and this begins to feel somewhat forced. The intention is good, but the end result is that Morton misses out on working with potential allies who have developed similar interpretations.
To return to my original question: does any of this contribute to a potential theological reconfiguration which wants to address the environmental and digital issues of our time by proposing a new understanding of the relationship between the human and the nonhuman? In the chapter on transcendence in ‘Theology and New Materialism’—and whilst acknowledging that OOO adds to the debate a vital concern for a flat ontology rather than a substance ontology—I draw upon further resources to lay out an alternative territory between what theologians would see as the two poles of theism and pantheism. I call this Relational Christian Realism. In other words, in that tension between theism and pantheism, we either understand God as totally Other, distant, above and at the summit of a hierarchy with humans lower down, and then the rest of the created order beneath the human; or, at the other pole, God is completely identified with the whole created order. The strength of the philosophical ideas found in OOO and the new materialists such as Bryant, Bennett and Braidotti, is what I call the relational aspect of a flat ontology, which brings the nonhuman fully into play. But what they lack is a sense of that which is still beyond: a “beyond in the midst” or forms of local or mini transcendences (pace Bonhoeffer and Latour)—what Christianity knows as the apophatic tradition.
Retaining the tensions, or disjunctions, between the relational and the apophatic, rather than trying to reverse or resolve them, allows for continuing efforts to destabilise the relationships between the human and the nonhuman; between culture and nature; between proximity and distance; and between an ethics of appropriation and non-appropriation. In the midst of this constant struggle is the territory which opens up exploration of relationships in encounter between identity and difference, neither resorting to a hierarchy where humans control and dominate, nor to a complete identity where all differences are dissolved.
It may indeed be possible to “debug” theology in a way that leads to more appropriate responses to the challenges of the environment and the digital and to further develop this Relational Christian Realism.
John Reader reviews this recent book by political economist Will Davies and wonders whether we would benefit from a New Enlightenment.
When I encountered an early review of this book it was not the title which grabbed my attention but rather the subtitle: “how feeling took over the world”. Given recent concerns over the apparent demise of Enlightenment concepts of reason and objective comment, and ways in which politicians and others appeal instead to the supposedly subjective and emotional, it seemed that this text would be of interest. I was not disappointed; there is much in this volume to stimulate further thought.
In the introduction Davies sets out the central themes that will shape the book. Having given an example of how panic set in when crowds in London thought that shots were being fired—when in fact there was nothing untoward happening, he suggests that the impact of social media operating in real time means that we place more trust in sensation and emotion than in evidence (p.xi). Knowledge becomes valued for its speed and impact rather than its objectivity. When we believe that we might be in physical danger, rapid response seems appropriate. The problem—if that is what it is—is that this now extends into other areas of our lives such as news, financial markets, and even friendships.
Davies then introduces two distinctions that, he will argue, have dominated modern thought, and which are now being brought into question: those between mind and body, and between war and peace (p.xi). Davies proposes that the impact of this is that conflict is intruding into other areas of our lives and that digital technology is making it harder to judge which is which: mind or body; war or peace. One of his major objectives is to map how this has developed in recent centuries.
Sections of the book focus on historical explanations of how these developments have taken place, and he proposes that, “contemporary notions of truth, scientific expertise, public administration, experimental evidence and progress are all legacies of the seventeenth century” (p.xiv). In other words, the approaches and values we associate with the Enlightenment are now being undermined or brought into question by the impacts which Davies will identify and examine. But why was there a search for reason in the first place? According to Davies it was because there was a search for peace, and of ways to end the violence stemming from the religious differences that had hitherto dominated politics. What has happened subsequently is that knowledge and facts are no longer able to settle disputes in the ways that they did under the influence of the Enlightenment. Feelings have come to dominate political activity instead, for reasons that need to be analysed and understood rather than being interpreted as a throwback to an earlier age. In other words, Davies argues, it is not enough simply to react against these developments and express nostalgia for a time that has now passed. What we require are analyses of why this is the case and attempts to steer a new path through the world as it is now.
Another dimension of the book that resonates with William Temple Foundation concerns is Davies’ focus on the political impact of growing inequalities, and he draws upon recent research in the US which both explains how issues of resentment and the loss of confidence in experts and professional politicians has deepened and also how this has led to the election of Donald Trump and the Brexit vote in the UK. The debate does not end there, though, as Davies goes on to talk about the power that can be unleashed by mobilising human sentiment and how modern forms of warfare play into these using contemporary forms of dissemination through digital technology. Timing and speed become even more important as a result.
The crucial question is: what antidotes to these developments might be available and what alternative ideal might be appropriate? When intelligence and calculation can be performed more rapidly by machines than by humans, how can we move forward whilst still pursuing the causes of peace and greater social justice? “Maybe it is not more intelligence that we need right now, but less speed and more care, both in our thinking and in our feeling. After all, emotions (including anger), can be eminently reasonable, if they are granted the time to be articulated and heard” (p.xvii).
In his conclusion, Davies draws the various threads together, returning to the issues of the loss of trust in experts, the decline of former approaches to democracy, and concerns over climate change as the major threat now facing the planet. As others have argued, the boundaries between nature and culture, or between nature and politics, are becoming increasingly blurred, and simply appealing to facts or statistics in a traditional scientific manner fails to have the desired impact. The problem is deciding what reason and rationality mean in this context where the older interpretations derived from the Enlightenment seem limited at best and useless at worst. Does it make sense to hold to some understanding of progress when so many experience a decline in health and living standards and the benefits of globalisation seem reserved for a dwindling but ever more powerful elite? When feelings are either weaponised or form such a key component of political debate is it sensible to continue to discount them as part of whatever reason is to become? Davies argues that it is not possible to piece reason back together again (p.223). This would be to resort to nostalgia in an attempt to recover a time that is now past. Objectivity and expertise are no longer sufficient to achieve political or economic objectives, so there needs to be a new configuration of old Enlightenment ideals in order to take account of the speed with which the world now operates and the different levels of what it means to be human that are accessed and mobilised by digital technology. The latter will only become more pervasive, so the question is that of how to respond appropriately, in ways that don’t abandon the quest for planetary stability and peaceful co-existence. Davies thus opens up the debate about reason, feelings and the possible meaning of a New Enlightenment that I believe are crucial for the future, and to which some religious practices and beliefs may yet offer constructive resources.
Associate Research Fellow John Reader reflects on past visions, future projections, and the need for a better world in the here and now.
Kelmscott Manor stands on the banks of the Thames about three miles east of Lechlade and 40 minutes west of Oxford. This remote location (for Oxfordshire) was, between 1871 and 1913, rented by William Morris and his family, one of the founders of the Arts and Crafts movement and associated with the Pre-Raphaelites such as Rossetti. Twice a week, it is open to the public, who can gain a sense of the attraction of the place itself, which is in part what enabled the unconventional lifestyles of its former residents.
Better known for his designs, perhaps, Morris was also a writer and one of his books, “News from Nowhere”, is described as a mixture of a socialist utopia and soft science fiction. The first now seems a dated concept in both respects, while the second does have more contemporary resonances. With thoughts of remembrance and the legacy of those who perished in two world wars and subsequent conflicts in mind, it set me thinking about how we now project ideas for a better world into the future. Ideas of utopia (a non-place, set in the future, but building upon and replacing present realities) have been largely replaced by science fiction. Elon Musk has grand plans to penetrate space itself, for instance, and the prospect of more readily available space travel seems to be getting closer.
For Morris and his contemporary art critic John Ruskin, the reaction was against an apparently grim world of industrialisation (what we now call pollution), the destruction of a quaintly romanticised and nostalgic rural way of life (which only existed for those with the freedom to pursue it), and the vision of a more equitable society where individuals were free to develop their own talents and use them for the benefit of the greater good.
So, what has happened in the meantime? And how might those who sacrificed their futures in the hope of a better future for those who would come afterwards consider what we have created? In some ways, the concerns of Morris and Ruskin still seem relevant in today’s world with its Fourth Industrial Revolution in the physical, digital and biological spheres. Recent images of mounds of plastic waste clogging up rivers or the pouring of toxic waste into our oceans disturb our view of so-called progress, let alone reports which continue to flag up the approaching dangers of global warming.
It is not surprising, then, that our thoughts of the future have abandoned ideas of a utopia based on life on earth and have turned instead to science fiction and life in Star Trek territory. Humans have made such a mess of this planet that we have to start looking beyond it for some vision of a better life.
Is this any more than another version of romantic escapism though? What would those whose names are read out across the country on November 11th think of all this?
I believe they would want to see us continuing to work for a better world here and now (and I mean here, not in space). They might also be keen to ask how and why we have reached a situation where: global inequalities have increased over the last 30 years; there is growing disillusionment with professional politicians and “experts”; anyone promising simple solutions and quick fixes can grab power; and the planet itself is in such a state that millions faced being displaced from our coastal cities and low lying islands. Is this really the legacy the people fought to defend in the past?
So, although we rightly turn the spotlight onto the past and remember those who stood firm so that others might live and thrive, we also need to shine a light into the future via the present and ask ourselves what we have made of the legacy that they have passed down to us. Are we doing justice to their sacrifice in the here and now? What will future generations (assuming we get that far) say about earth’s inhabitants of 2018? Serious thoughts for serious times, and a need for a vision which goes beyond that Fourth Industrial Revolution and our mistaken belief that our own intelligence can get us out of the holes we have created for ourselves. A different sort of Kingdom and its values are as necessary now as they were in the time of Morris and Ruskin.
Ageing church buildings regularly pose challenges. But Associate Research Fellow John Reader, rector of a large rural benefice, argues that they also help us to bridge the false divide between nature and culture.
I remember talking to my friend and mentor John Atherton after the Manchester bombing of June 1996. At that point John was still Canon Theologian at the Cathedral and heavily involved in the plans to redevelop the city centre. His argument was that owning land in the immediate area gave the church a physical stake in the process and enabled the cathedral authorities to play a full part in the redevelopment. My reason for returning to these wise words, over 20 years later, is that I am now (along with key lay people in the benefice) custodian of eight Grade I and Grade II listed church buildings and sometimes feel that my main role as parish priest rarely extends beyond being a caretaker responsible for passing these safely on to the next generation. Can this be justified? In recent months we have suffered a series of lead thefts from three of the church roofs, paralleling a similar spell of two years ago when another two of the churches underwent the same fate. The time and money required to rectify the damage, or to replace the stolen lead with an alternative material seems disproportionate. Should we, both as local congregations and external funding bodies, not be investing our resources in mission and pastoral care? What exactly do these church buildings still offer to the legitimate work of the church and is it enough to argue that they give us a stake in our locality and community?
I am unable to offer a wholeheartedly positive answer, as there are times when the balance between being a liability and an asset tips too far in the direction of the former. After all, how many Methodist chapels have been sold now that numbers can no longer justify a physical presence? Is it simply the fact that rural Anglicans have a responsibility for ancient buildings that cannot be disposed of in this way that keeps the system afloat? In what ways do local non-churchgoers value their churches? Increasingly, they are viewed as just another venue: good for photographs at weddings and baptisms and sometimes useful for concerts or creative events despite the uncomfortable pews and lack of effective heating. Are they “sacred spaces”? Certainly not to the lead thieves who see them as just another easy target. Visitors arrive to examine the historical monuments or to appreciate their links to earlier centuries and famous families. They are still places of worship and gatherings of the faithful, but theirs is the main task of supporting and fundraising with occasional assistance from others. So the system struggles on.
What exactly would be lost if these buildings were no longer open or safe?
In my more romantic moments I would argue for the value of the spiritual symbolism contained in them. The presence of the stained glass windows, the carvings, the bells ringing out (when enough ringers can be found) across the village (although even those now encounter objections from those who move to the country for its tranquillity). The very walls enshrining the prayers and music of generations of Christians who have worshipped here, as R.S Thomas might say. The memories and associations that would be destroyed for good if these buildings were no longer. They are part of our cultural heritage, which is why Historic England like to keep a watchful and controlling eye on proposed changes and Dioceses are duty bound to do the same in order to keep the state at bay. All of these things are true and demand our respect.
Perhaps, though, there is a further reason, which lies deeper in our psyche and philosophy. These buildings are a tangible link between what we have come to call “nature” and “culture”, between what various contemporary philosophers describe as physis and techne. The very materials of which the churches are constructed, the fabric of the buildings, are a practical example of one way in which we negotiate the ever-changing relationships between the natural world which provides the materials, and the technical and even spiritual domains through which we express meaning and values. We adapt our buildings by installing not only toilets but also WiFi in order to make them user friendly for the current generation. They are living stones: they breathe, and move, and we humans attempt to work with the materials in order to create and construct places for activity. Churchyards used to be the open space in the community where everything took place (I mean everything) and each church used to brew its own ale. If “sacred” meant anything it did not mean “set apart” or “holy” as we view it now, but fully engaged and entangled in the midst of life; nature and culture wrapped up in myriad and shifting ways to represent the changes and chances. So, it may be that something important would be lost beyond the individual memories and commitments that many of us share; a way of working that honours the relationships between nature and culture and challenges the stark division between them. This false dichotomy is especially damaging when we come to develop ethical responses to environment (nature?) and culture (technology?). We may still be able to learn from the past by searching for new visions of the future.
As we mark Safer Internet Day 2018, John Reader considers how religious beliefs and practices can help us make sense of digital technology.
February 6th this year is Safer Internet Day. Whilst geared essentially to schools and young people, it highlights for all of us the risks associated with the increasing dominance of digital and social media. As a school governor, I know that children in Key Stage 2 have to sign an Acceptable Use Agreement in relation to school systems and devices which commits them to keeping all their private details secret; being wary of anyone trying to contact them over the internet; not opening files from people who are not known to them and alerting a trusted adult if something online makes them uncomfortable or worried. From young digital natives to aging silver surfers, for many of us it is almost impossible to function without negotiating these hazards on a daily basis whilst also engaging with the opportunities that digital technologies offer.
Following the Connecting Ecologies conference at Campion Hall in December which focused on Laudato Si, the question of technology emerged with a concern that the Pope’s document does not deal fully with this issue and tends to present it in a negative light. Is there a way in which theologians might develop a more balanced and nuanced interpretation which acknowledges the new realities of contemporary life? With so many of us now addicted to our digital technology what, if anything, might religious beliefs and practices contribute to this debate?
I want to propose that one helpful approach is to think more deeply about the dynamic between proximity and distance and that this is an area where Christian thought and practice might have something valuable to offer. For instance, the impact of smart phones is that the internet is now permanently accessible. So much so that sleep patterns are being disrupted because people keep their phones turned on at their bedside. There is no escape from the temptation to check one’s messages or to Google something that raises one’s curiosity. And it’s not simply the permanent presence but also the speed at which these systems operate which creates that potentially damaging proximity. The only moment is now, and if you fail to capture it you risk the danger of missing something important or falling behind. Is it possible to create a distance or detachment from this constant flow of communication with a clear head and a calm conscience?
In his latest book, Thomas L. Friedman offers a critical perspective on the impact of digital technology (Thank You For Being Late, Allen Lane 2016). In a chapter entitled “Is God in Cyberspace?” he suggests that we have to re-think ethics and search for moral innovation (p371). “How can we anchor more people in communities and contexts governed by values of decency, honesty and mutual respect?” Friedman’s answer is to draw upon a Jewish post-biblical tradition which says that we have to bear witness to God’s presence by our own good deeds. Our choices and our autonomy are the only means by which deeper values can be made present. How would this translate into the Cyberspace question that Friedman raises? Can it simply be a matter of individuals exercising their freedom of choice as Friedman suggests? Or do we each sign our own Acceptable Use Agreement and the problems will be solved?
In another book on the subject Irresistible: Why you are addicted to technology and how to set yourself free (Penguin, 2017), psychologist Adam Alter proposes a ‘sustainable’ approach to internet usage, similar to that used in environmental debates. One survey discovered that smart phone users spend a quarter of their waking lives on their phones, the equivalent of 11 years over an average lifetime (p15). This overuse has been termed “nomophobia.” One of Alter’s solutions to this is to reduce the proximity to the technology. If we are unable to totally avoid smart phones, email and the internet, we can at least make efforts to remove ourselves from them at certain times and contexts: “remove temptations from arm’s reach and you’ll find hidden reserves of willpower” (p275). Once again it seems that distance can be successfully created by an exercise of human autonomy, although we are yet to fully understand how we as humans are changing as a result of the technology which is shaping us as much as we are shaping it.
Pope Francis suggests that the ecological challenge is at heart a spiritual one rather than simply environmental or scientific, and I suspect one could argue similarly for the digital technology issue. The question that this raises is that of the relationship between the material and the spiritual. Both environment and technology can be seen as material realities “out there” which we control and manipulate for our benefit, but which come back to bite us when we do so inappropriately. At the other extreme is a view that that there is no distinction between the material and the spiritual. We are one with the natural world and indeed with all those material artefacts and technological developments which we have created. The material is always already the spiritual and humans are fully a part of both.
It seems to me that neither of these solutions is adequate. There is both proximity and distance with both the so-called natural world and the technological one and this is the dynamic which we have to grasp and negotiate. In Theology and New Materialism (2017) I proposed what I call a disjunctive synthesis between the Relational and the Apophatic as an appropriate theological response to the insights of New Materialism. The Relational acknowledges that humans are always already fully part of and in total proximity to that which we see as external to and separate from ourselves. The Apophatic recognises that there is always also distance and separation from that which lies beyond our grasp, articulation and understanding. There is no simple reconciliation or synthesis between these two interpretations but only a continuing tension and dynamic working itself out through the immediate ethical challenges we face.
The material and the spiritual are indeed related but cannot be readily conflated or reduced to each other. If ‘God is in Cyberspace’ it cannot be solely by the force of human will and activity; finding that divine presence lies beyond our immediate understanding and apprehension. We need to create alternative spaces, times and practices, then, through which there can be appropriate distance and detachment but also a continuing ethical proximity and engagement with the digital technologies that are shaping us.
With the support of the William Temple Foundation and Pathways, John is convening a workshopon February 19th at Trinity College, Oxford, entitled Theological Futures: Digital and Ecological.
Dr John Reader reflects on proceedings at the recent Connecting Ecologies conference in Oxford.
As reported by fellow Associate Research Fellow Tim Howles in an earlier blog, Campion Hall in Oxford has just held a conference on Connecting Ecologies, stimulated by Pope Francis’ Laudato Si. As befits an event with this title, the gathering and connecting enabled by this process were at the heart of the occasion. Welcome, hospitality, a willingness to share and debate from a range of perspectives all based on a common concern for the future of the planet and the possible contribution of religion to that end, were the key characteristics in evidence.
The opening key note addresses were given by Professor Kevin Irwin from the Catholic University of America and an advisor to Pope Francis on this publication and Andreas Carlgren, a former minister for the Environment of Sweden, who was heavily involved in the COP15 UN Climate Change Conference at Copenhagen, which took place in 2009. This set the scene for the subsequent short presentations and group discussions which formed the remainder of the conference. What became obvious over the four days is that there is a momentum building up within certain spheres of the Roman Catholic church based on the Pope’s document and beginning to permeate into wider networks and possible areas of influence. For those of us such as myself who have been involved both pastorally and academically over the last 30 years this is a hopeful and encouraging sign as the global reach of these networks will be vital for pressing this agenda at both a local and international level.
In addition to the content that was shared, which it would obviously be impossible to do justice to, let alone summarise, it is the fact of this event taking place which is of real significance, and there are clearly plans for further gatherings and publications which will flow from this. I will however attempt to articulate some of the key themes which I believe were highlighted.
The need for a new understanding of the relationship between humans and the “natural world”, one which acknowledges that we are always already fully part of that world and both an influence upon it but also impacted by it, so that there is an integral relationship, was a major agenda item. As such, humans need to develop a wider interpretation of what it means to be or become human, one which goes beyond a narrow view of reason or rationality but acknowledges the affective and embodied nature of our existence. Rather than the contested concept of stewardship which mistakenly presents humans as in control (or at least, this has been the case in some interpretations of the doctrine), we talked about care for creation. As one philosopher (Michel Serres) has argued, the opposite of religion is negligence or a failure to give proper attention to those things which are of value and significance.
Care is the antidote to that and something that religious traditions can bring to the debate through both practice and belief. Our drives and desires need to be redirected away from the pressures of consumerism which lead to the damaging appropriations of creation which are partly responsible for the state we are now in. Thus there was a growing critique of established economic structures and understandings based on capitalism in its current forms. We talked about time itself, and the ways in which we underestimate what has been called “the slow work of time” so essential for building relationships, not only with each other but with the world around us. Once again, a dimension that religious traditions have a deeper understanding of through constant practice and devotion, not to mention concepts of vocation and sacrifice which seem so alien to much of contemporary culture.
As with the conference itself, tackling the challenges of such threats as climate change requires a plurality of perspectives and voices, and this raises the question of the role of science in this process and how this relates to religion, always acknowledging that both are complex and nuanced. Inevitably there was discussion about what forms of spirituality would be appropriate in this “state of war” as Bruno Latour describes it in his “Facing Gaia”, and how and whether the disciplines or forms of life characteristic of some traditions might offer an important counter to the tendencies of selfish and thoughtless appropriation which are at the heart of human induced environmental problems. How much can actually be achieved by rules, regulations, governance, external agencies at the macro level, and how much needs to happen at the level of local community and indeed individual conversion to a different way of living? Do we live by grace or by law and what are the implications of this for a Christian engagement with the creation?
The above can do no more than scratch the surface of such a rich and varied series of insights and contributions to what was, or could be, a turning point in in Catholic commitment to and involvement in these issues. I hope that I have conveyed something of the hope and excitement generated by this event, but, of course, once that subsides, the real test will be what happens next, and that is down to the individuals present and what they take back to their respective groups and institutions.
Sometimes it is worth trying to recover a wider perspective on current events. As yet another vote looms and the media get to work projecting the campaigns, let alone the result, I return to something I wrote back in the dim and distant days of 1994 on the subject of civil society. I do so because the subject of how faith groups might intervene in politics is once again on the agenda in the light of Brexit and with a particular focus on the role of intermediate organisations.
Civil society can be defined as those areas of life that are not directly under the control of government: so households, voluntary organisations and community-based services. Faith groups fit into this category. Back in the nineties, the argument of the New Right against Socialism was that it encroached too deeply into civil society. One counter argument [1] was that the Right was doing exactly the same thing, despite its rhetoric about rolling back the powers of the state. So increasing regulatory demands upon voluntary groups, and treating people as consumers in the fields of health care and education, led to greater bureaucratic control and a reduction of services to poorer sections of the country. Sound familiar? One set of virtues required by civil society – self-interest, hard work and self-reliance – was being promoted at the expense of others such as a willingness to share resources, concern for others, a sense of the common good and a concept of civic responsibility.
At the time, I suggested we required a new definition of the relationship between State and civil society. Groups operating in the latter needed to be given a framework that would enable more people to participate in their activities, while the State needed to be made more accountable to its people. Much would depend upon how good communal relationships were to be fostered and sustained, and ways in which faith groups could contribute to this. If this sounds idealistic, I was much younger at the time, but also had direct experience of being engaged in church-based community work and had high hopes as a result.
Of course, it begs all the questions about the legitimacy of what in the 1980s was called welfare pluralism and the active involvement of voluntary groups in what was supposed to be the universal state provision of services.
One might ask how this issue will figure in the forthcoming election and what has changed to make this scenario appear perhaps even more remote. If anything, the relationship between State and civil society has both fractured and become more intrusive at the same time. Since the global financial crisis of 2007/8 and the introduction of austerity politics in the UK, more and more has been demanded of voluntary groups in terms of welfare provision as health services and education face increased privatisation and reduced levels of real funding. Meanwhile, the State tightens its grip in such a way that trust and confidence in professional politicians to act in the interest of all but the favoured few diminishes. The Trump card left to the politicians is to claim a direct appeal to either a contrived united front post-Brexit (Conservative) or to the constituency of an old style class conflict (Labour). These would seem to be the only shows in town, along with a continued stirring of nationalism from other quarters. None of these addresses more deeply the crisis of the political itself, which surely requires a more rigorous theological analysis.
The Crisis of the Political
Unlike my approach of 20 years ago, I am now concerned that traditional forms of political life are simply inadequate to tackle the scale of the problems we face both nationally and globally. Faith-based engagement in civil society as proposed back then could only work within that older framework where the State itself could be trusted to deliver at least some solutions.
The most serious challenge to this way of operating has come from environmental problems. Not only are we aware that national boundaries are largely irrelevant when it comes to issues such as climate change, but there has always been a concern that tackling this might require some form of authoritarian government. Trusting solutions to either consumer choice or a popular vote may prove inadequate to the task. This links to the criticisms of liberal democracy attributed to Carl Schmitt [2] which are basically that the belief in institutional systems to resolve concrete conflicts and differences through process and debate alone are misplaced, and deflect attention from the ungrounded and indeterminate nature of political life.
These arguments have been developed further by Bruno Latour in his Gifford Lectures of 2013 where his concern is how to respond to the threats of climate change, hinting that further democratic debate will never be able to achieve the changes required to avoid environmental disaster. The state of exception, the capacity to take decisive action at an effective level rather than waiting for a process of interminable discussion and wrangling, is a constant feature of political life and can alone begin to address the scale of the problems. Even a supposed direct appeal to a passive and manipulated populace will not suffice.
This is Trump trumped by an even more radical ethical and practical demand for action. In which case the forthcoming election feels like yet another case of fiddling while the planet burns.
If this sounds extreme, it is I believe one of the fundamental questions that needs to be addressed in the forthcoming Malvern 2017 conference. Is any form of current political establishment in the UK capable of tackling the deepest threats? Beyond that, where do faith groups stand in relation to this and what contribution do they already make which needs to be further developed? If the wider “community” in which we exist and for which we share some responsibility cannot be extended to include the non-human and the full created order, then I fear faith groups will have failed to grasp the moment yet again.
[1] John Reader, Local Theology: Church and Community in Dialogue, SPCK Publishing, 1994
[2] See Carlo Galli, Janus’s Gaze, Essays on Carl Schmitt, Duke University Press, 2015
The Foundation’s Associate Research Fellows John Reader and Greg Smith have written complimentary Advent blog posts that looks at the myriad and complex ways lived religion and belief bring hope, light and resilience to localities. These narratives of progressive engagement and solid presence belie what is often a strident and simplistic narrative of an irreversible decline of religion and the church in public life.
However, what is clear from both rural and urban contexts, is that the relationship between religious and other forms of belief, secularism and the public is changing fast. The fact that belief and the search for a common ethics in public life is often just below the surface, and doesn’t need much coaxing it into being, still leaves huge challenges for institutional forms of religion to connect and harness this spiritual capital in ways that renew both society and those religious institutions themselves.
On the evening of Advent Sunday I sat at the back of the church with my wife – a rare but encouraging experience when I spend most Sundays dashing round my benefice of 8 rural churches worried that I am not going to arrive on time or turn up at the wrong church by mistake. On this occasion my colleague “topped and tailed” the service which had been organised by the villagers themselves and with an attendance of 100 in a community where the total population is only about 150. The evening before we had been at a folk concert in one of the other churches which rounded off the first day of a craft fair being run in the building for the second winter and with a footfall of well over 150 in another of our smallest villages. This had been organised by a group of non-church goers within that community but shows how church buildings – despite lack of facilities – can be used for community events. The previous Sunday we held a Café Church in a village hall with just under 50 present including 7 young families, a pattern which has established itself over the last 18 months. Such accounts are by no means unique and will be replicated across our rural communities as we approach Christmas.
Why does any of this matter? One of the Foundation’s initiatives of the last two years has been a series of seminars looking at “Faithful and Flourishing Communities” and trying to identify where and how faith groups have a positive impact upon their immediate locality. Against a background of threatened withdrawal of Church of England ministerial resources from “the rural” and increased problems of maintaining ancient buildings, such examples provide a counterpoint to what is portrayed as a picture of decline. One must be careful not to overplay the successes nor to diminish the scale of the challenges now facing many rural churches. Across this benefice in North Oxfordshire I calculate that the cost of adapting the Grade 1 and 2 listed churches as regular venues for other activities is close to £1m. Could such an expense be justified, even if funds were available? Two of the churches are having to cope with lead thefts and replacement materials costing more than our reserves or the insurance can cover – the gang has just been arrested in North London we gather! Regular attendances continue to struggle as ageing congregations shrink. Yet, one could argue that with appropriate leadership and investment of time and energy, it is still possible to generate activities through which faith groups have a positive impact upon their communities.
The key terms there are “leadership” and “investment”. What characterises the events just mentioned is that they are either wholly or partially led by lay people with the clergy part of a team or else simply in the background enabling and encouraging. This is still leadership, but one built on contacts established over time and often based on pastoral relationships that are beyond calculation or deliberate design. Another example are two churches in the benefice which had to be challenged in July as to whether the people of those villages wanted to retain their church buildings for regular use at all. At a public meeting 50 people turned up and subsequently volunteered to take on many of the roles previously held by the 91-year-old retired churchwarden. Again, this has led to a lay organised Carol Service supporting “Singing for Syria” and a pre-Christmas social event to draw people into the smaller of the two churches. Others have “come out of the woodwork” to offer their skills on applying for grants and knowledge of buildings. Open the tasks up as we did in the village where the Advent service was held and it seems that there is the will and interest to participate in the general activity for which the churches are a resource and a focus.
The mantra which I hear is that although the churches themselves may be under threat, those now inhabiting these villages don’t want this to happen “on our watch”. That and an interest in creating community events appear to be the motivating forces behind these small signs of revival. Is this enough to construct resilient communities let alone viable benefices in the long run? I think it would be too optimistic to claim that, but one can argue that the physical stake provided by church buildings and the ministry of enabling presence offered by clergy does still have a positive impact. The other crucial dimension ignored by those who would withdraw resources from these areas is that of church schools, now probably the major occupier of clergy time both through regular assemblies, governing bodies, and, in my case, as a board member of the diocesan multi-academy trust which will soon have 25 schools on its books including one in this benefice. Our most regular means of outreach is precisely through these contacts, even though many of the families involved come from outside the benefice. As I have argued for some years, the boundaries are now blurred as people access the resources they need from wherever, not just for education but for baptisms and weddings also. Sticky places and slippery spaces are the name of the game now in rural ministry and a model of leadership and organisation that is more like a rhizome (tendrils and tentacles that spread out underground) than a tree with firm foundations and lots of branches. These are the possible ways forward that are still worthy of organisational investment.
The remaining questions though focus on this issue of resilience and how faith groups can contribute to this. There is a danger that it is simply understood as a defensive reaction and an attempt to help people bounce back to where they were before – maintaining buildings often feels very much like that! One runs faster and faster just to stand still. This cannot be enough. Resilience must also involve that bounce forwards which enables communities to adapt to new and potentially threatening circumstances, whether that means withdrawal of central resources or preparing for the risks attached to environmental challenges. Along with that goes the temptation to get drawn into a political agenda which presents withdrawal of resources as a new norm and thus fails to question or debate whether or not this should be the case. Leadership and investment demand that responses are motivated by a critical perspective and enable people to ask those difficult questions which go beyond the immediate and local. As an Advent theme this represents shining a light on the darkness that descends when injustice determines what happens in our communities and showing how the energy which commitment brings can transform the present by working for a different future.
John Reader is an Associate Research Fellow of the William Temple Foundation
