April 14th, 2008 by Maja

Do we change from within or from outside factors? Is change possible from within the system or is a new system needed? If we choose to work from within the system, do we work from the roots or from the top? Or perhaps; from all these angles at the same time?

All these big questions sometimes make me feel like a change is impossible, but then meeting ordinary people living this economic crisis, it is clear that the existing system is not sustainable. Witnessing the fine line between prosperity and poverty, and seeing what multi-national companies are doing to the third world, people at home, and the environment, keeps reminding me of the necessity to change this system quickly, and not spend all energy debating over whether it’s possible or not.

It is a man-made economic system after all, and trading methods have changed before to suit the times, so surely they can change again to suit our present situation. Perhaps it is the free market ideology that is a failed utopia?

 We all know we are in a globally fragile state, and historically this is when extremist forces have got to power. Trying to conserve a no longer suitable system will be detrimental to everyone and heighten existing conflicts.

There is a real need to educate and supply ideas to the public, which give hope for a better future, and inspire solutions. It is up to all of us to decide if we want it.

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April 2nd, 2008 by Maja

For a long time I was looking for solutions to problems we have in our society within the established ideologies and political parties. But even though this political activism taught me a lot about current issues, and gave me various groups to “belong” to, I was always frustrated over how much energy had to be expended on playing the political game. In a way we had to be more concerned about who solved the problem, than solving it. But if we didn’t play this game, we wouldn’t get the political power to do anything.

These were and still are the rules of politics – play it, or do your own thing on the side, in silence.

Of course campaigning is very important in terms of raising awareness and give the public a choice as to what method, from what party, they would prefer. To give the public this choice is one of the fundamental functions in a democracy. But when this campaigning is not about finding the best method for the greatest number of people, by honestly and openly presenting a solution to the public, but about scoring political points through word-twisting, how can the public make a well informed choice? The public can’t be experts in everything and if they don’t know what they are actually choosing, how is this a democracy?

I feel ashamed for politicians when they are trying to belittle each other, and frustrated when they actively and obviously distract from their opponents’ points. Still, I understand how they have become dependent on this to stay on the political scene and achieve anything at all.

Now I’m not looking to any political party to offer “the solution” anymore. The icebergs wont hold back for the next election, and this political game is not working fast or well enough these days.

I know I’m not the only one who feels this way, and I’m sometimes scared I belong to a generation that is about to give up. That we are once and for all resigned to capitalism and egoism because we don’t think we have any real choice. While progress is increasingly measured in minutes on screen, and the feeling of freedom and meaning can be attained chemically, are we distracting ourselves from any existential crisis this development perhaps should infuse, or any real resistance it could inspire?

I’m also scared that the political power has been moved so far away from people’s everyday realities and grown so large, that most political activists will be pushed to challenge it with violence. I’m scared of how this violence is used as an excuse for the authorities to refuse listening to opposing views, making them even more desperate and violent.

Is this a time when we can’t actually change the workings of our society, or is it an era when we don’t feel as though we can? Did the “modernists”, the generation that is now disappearing, have a way to process the world that we “post-modernists” could learn something from? Further, is there perhaps a new language of resistance that is not seen through the normal political channels but on platforms not immediately apparent to most of us?

What’s our relationship to our future? Does the concept of a better future still exist?

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April 2nd, 2008 by admin

It is hard to picture a total social and environmental breakdown and it’s easy and comfortable to dismiss these kinds of predictions. But on the 13 of June 2007 it was ‘made official’: the Crash of the U.S. Economy had begun. In a column titled “The Takeover Boom, About to Go Bust” in The Washington Post, one of the foremost house organs of the U.S. monetary elite, economic writers Steven Pearlstein and Robert Samuelson writes:

“It is impossible to predict when the magic moment will be reached and everyone finally realizes that the prices being paid for these companies, and the debt taken on to support the acquisitions, are unsustainable. When that happens, it won’t be pretty”.

Escalating international tension, crisis, war…

At the same time researchers at NASA and Columbia University determined that man-made greenhouse gases have brought the earth’s climate precariously close to a major “Tipping Point” that would have dangerous and far-reaching consequences for the Global Biosphere and its human inhabitants.

Similar reports are being published all over the world…

This increasing dystopian outlook of the future and the need to be rescued seems to concern the public more and more, making way for documentaries such as Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth and TV series such as Tim Kring’s Heroes.

There is one problem with documentaries such as The Inconvenient Truth: they don’t offer any real solutions, and deep down we all know that to save the cheerleader is never going to be enough to save the world.

While some of the “younger generation” have become activists in the anti-globalisation movement, the vast majority has been called the MTV generation – fluent in popular culture but largely a-political. But perhaps the personal focus, the obsession with style and surface doesn’t mean that people have stopped caring, maybe it was just a shift of language, but a transformation of sorts? Does popular culture hold the key to our beliefs and attitudes, and can it even unlock people’s consciousness, if packaged seductively? If people have lost faith in politicians and traditional political filmmaking, what do they believe in?

Future For Sale will try to focus on solutions already available but at a first glance might appear as science fiction. Futurists have always had a close connection to this genre since it is a way to plant ideas into the public consciousness. But it is rare to see new films depicting a better future, currently a pessimistic view of the future seems to be more popular. Perhaps filmmakers also have to take the responsibility to be a part of this search?

Many “futurists” have changed the focus of their work, however. If futurism is a movement, then one can argue that its tone has largely changed from ideology to business. Two of the main goals set up by the European Futurists Conference Lucerne, for example, are directly related to support European businesses, and to create an understanding of the future of business, politics and society – in that order.

Does restricting the visions to a future within the monetary based economy mean that the great visionaries of our time become important tools for the big companies?

Does futurism become pointless if the monetary system is a problem in itself in order to progress? Or can we create a sustainable change within it?

April 1st, 2008 by admin

Finding a way to marry our current economic system with humanistic and environmental concerns seems to be the challenge of our time, but is this perhaps an inherent contradiction?

In human history “the survival of the fittest” has been a matter of competing over available resources. In modern times this competition has been structured into a regulated global economic system, an attempt to create a more “civilized” world. Today our economy still reflects this competition.

With modern technology we have the ability to produce in abundance. According to both Amnesty International and the UN we are already producing more food than is needed to feed the world. We also have the scientific knowledge to maintain this level of production using new methods and materials that wouldn’t damage the eco-system or rely on depleting resources. Still, millions of people are starving and we keep over-exploiting un-renewables such as oil, gas and coal at a much faster rate than the planet can sustain. Somehow, this unequal distribution of goods and unsustainable management of scarce resources, constitutes a “thriving economy”.

Our system is dependent on constant growth, which has led to over-production and dwindling resources. At the same time we need to waste the surplus in order to sustain value, to balance supply and demand in order to keep our economy – not our environment – “healthy”.

People are beginning to ask the question whether our basic model of “competition” and perpetual growth is still valid and necessary. What was once “modern” suddenly doesn’t seem so “civilized” anymore.

Through the intelligent application of new technologies we have a possibility to re-structure our economic system more equitably, in alignment with what the planet can actually supply. It has become a matter of choice; collaboration or competition. We could choose to feed everyone. It could be a seismic cultural shift.

But instead it is argued that our culture and our technological advancements are motivated by the economic competition. There is a big fear that we would not have the incentive to work and invent if we didn’t have the need to earn money. But the competition for profit also creates the incentive for crime and corruption and there are many people already working for no profit, usually people who passionately love their jobs or can afford to do what they want. Have we become dependent on someone else motivating us to get out of bed?

What would happen to a culture where everyone actually had a free choice over how to live their lives?