Authority and Leadership. Values, Religion, Media
Míriam Díez Bosch
Paul Soukup S.J.
Josep Lluís Micó Sanz
Daniella Zsupan-Jerome (eds.)
School of Communication and International Relations Blanquerna
Universitat Ramon Llull
Barcelona, 2017
With collaboration from:
Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations
Facultat de Comunicació i Relacions Internacionals Blanquerna
Plaça Joan Coromines s/n. Barcelona 08001
Tel. +34 93 253 31 08. http://blanquerna.edu/fcc
First edition: October 2017
Edition Copyright: Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations at Ramon Llull University
ISBN: 978-84-947556-2-0
Legal Deposit: B-23.855-2017
Table of Contents / Índex
Notes on the Contributors
Introduction
Scientific Authority, Academic Leadership, Axiological Reference
Monster Prayer Books and Timid Bishops: A 19th-century Perspective on Religious Authority and Media in the U.S. Catholic Church
Authority, New Media, and the Church
Christianism as a public sphere of the digital world
Authority in Digital Ecology: A Christian Perspective
The Authority of Pope Francis and the Internet Culture
Bobblehead Church: The Ecclesiological Effects of Catholic Online Celebrity
Authority and Obedience: Engaging Benedictine Spirituality for Digital Communication
Interpretive Authority in an Internet-Driven Participatory Culture
Are you my neighbor? Theology, networks, and encounters with God and others
Crowdsourcing Divine Truth!? Sensus Fidei and Theological Authority in the Social Media Culture
Social Media Networks and Systems: A study of Aleteia
Magisterium Positioning
Courage to lead and build bridges of trust
“Redemptive Leading” – Barriers and Opportunities in a Digital World
Gameful Learning and Theological Understanding: New Cultures of Learning in Communities of Faith
Russian Religious Leadership. The Orthodox Perspective
Cerveny, Caroline, SSJ-TOSF, D. Min. President-Founder of Digital Disciple Network. Lecturer, Catholic University of America, US. Leader in faith-based learning technology and social media. Cerveny’s ministry explores ways to evangelize effectively in an increasingly technological world. She assists ministers to examine Catholic identity in digital public space, to learn how to spread the Gospel using digital methods, to understand and use existing and emerging social media tools, and to create online community. <c.cerveny@verizon.net>
Díez Bosch, Míriam. Director of the Blanquerna Observatory on Media, Religion and Culture in Barcelona. Professor Díez is also the Infotainment Area Director at the portal Aleteia.org, in Rome. She holds a PhD in Social Science (Pontificial Gregorian University in Rome, where she was a Lecturer in Journalism Studies). She has been the Project Coordination of Riseci.eu (Religion in the Shaping of European Cultural Identity). She is currently a Professor of Communication Theory, Religion and International Relations in the International Relations degree programme at the Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations (Ramon Llull University, Barcelona). <miriamdb@blanquerna.url.edu>
Ehrat, Johannes, S.J. Professor of Communications, Faculty of Social Sciences, Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome. Presently, Ehrat’s research and writing is focussed on a handbook of religious communication, comprehensive of contemporary forms of communication in all major religions. In 2016 he was awarded a Taiwan Fellowship by the Republic of China, in Taipei. Previously, he published on the production of media scandals, The power of Scandal, and on film theory, Cinema and Semiotic: Peirce and Film Aesthetics, Narration, and Representation, both with University of Toronto Press, translated into Chinese with Sichuan University Press. <ehrat@unigre.it>
Ejdersten, Marianne. Director of Communication at the World Council of Churches in November 2014. Coming from Sweden and the Church of Sweden, Ejdersten has more than 20 years of professional experience in the fields of communication, media, marketing, fundraising and management, both with the churches and international ecumenical organizations. Ejdersten and her team were honored with the Grand Prix and Gold EPICA 2009 award for conducting the best integrated and interactive campaign “The Prayer” in Europe. Ejdersten is Vice President of the European branch of the Word Association for Christian Communication. <Marianne.Ejdersten@wcc-coe.org>
Garner, Stephen R. Head of School, School of Theology, Laidlaw College, New Zealand. Garner has a background in both Computer Science and Theology, and his research interests include work in science, technology and religion; theology, media and popular culture; and public and contextual theology. His most recent book is Networked Theology: Negotiating Faith in Digital Culture, co-written with Heidi Campbell. <sgarner@laidlaw.ac.nz>
Hess, Mary E. Professor, Educational Leadership. Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN, US. Hess’ research focuses in the areas of religious education, digital media culture(s), digital storytelling as a form of faith formation, games/learning/society, and practical theologies. She has published work exploring changing cultures of learning, processes of dismantling racism in theological education, discussions of learning in the presence of other faiths, as well as the changing environments of theological education. Her most recent books include Teaching Reflectively in Theological Contexts: Promises and Contradictions, and Engaging Technology in Theological Education. Her work has appeared in journals such as Religious Education, The Journal of Moral Theology, Teaching Theology and Religion, Theological Education, and Communication Research Trends, as chapters in edited volumes, as well as in various magazines and blogs. She developed the site Feautor.org, andStoryingfaith.org <mhess@religioused.org>
Khroul, Victor. PhD. Associate Professor at Moscow State University, Journalism Faculty andco-chair of the Religion, Communication & Culture working group in the International Association for Media & Communication Research. He has served for five years as a Member of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, Vatican (1996-2001), was a visiting professor at Central European University (Budapest, Hungary, 2011), Linnaeus University (Kalmar, Sweden, spring 2014) and Rooney International Scholar at Robert Morris University (Pittsburgh, USA, fall 2014). Author of “Media and Religion in Russia”monograph book and over 70 publications in Russian and English, the founding editor of “Media and Religion” book series (published since 2011). <amen@mail.ru >
Micó Sanz, Josep Lluís. Journalism Professor and Vice-Dean at the Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations (Ramon Llull University, Barcelona). He served as Director of the Journalism degree programme, of the Advanced Reporting master’s degree programme at the Blanquerna-Godó, the Fashion 080 MA and of the Master’s Degree in Sports Journalism Blanquerna-FC Barcelona. The Director of the Digilab (Media Strategy and Regulation) Research Group and a Project Coordinator for several research projects, he has published more than 10 books on media and technology. He is a Senior Analyst in Digital, Print and Broadcast Media. He is the Research Head at Blanquerna Observatory on Media Religion and Culture and Co-coordinator of the Chair in Mystics and Religion together with Prof. MÍriam Díez Bosch. <joseplluisms@blanquerna.url.edu>
Monteiro, Basilio. PhD. Associate Professor in the Department of Mass Communication, Director of the Graduate Program International Communication, and Chair of the Division of Mass Communication at St. John’s University, NY. His specialization is in the area of International Communication, and teaches Communication and Global Development, Media and Public Policy, Media and the Politics of Peacebuilding, Media and Human Rights, Media and Public Diplomacy, Ethics in Digital Ecology among other related subjects. His area of research, besides his academic area, covers ICT and the internationalization of human rights, education and social justice, social media in conflict zones, media and sustainable development goals, communication and theology, education in globalized economy, the role of humanities in information/knowledge economy. He is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Church and Society, St. John’s University, NY. <monteirb@stjohns.edu>
Osman, John H. Professor of “Liturgical Catechesis in a Digital World” for The Catholic University of America’s Doctor of Ministry program. Designed and taught the graduate-level course “The History and Theory of Catechetics” for The Catholic University of America’s Masters of Catechesis program. BS in Computer Science and MA in Theology, he also holds a PhD specialized in the area of Religious Education and Catechetics. He is especially interested in combining his high-tech experience with Theology and developing new forms of religious education. He served as Senior Software Architect at Motorola. <johnhosman@gmail.com>
Palakeel, Joseph Scaria. He teaches Fundamental Theology and Social Communication in Ruhalaya Theological College, Ujjain, and a few other Catholic Seminaries in India. Palakeel’s research interests include the interface between theological and pastoral formation and the new information and communication technologies. He founded IMPACT (Initiatives for Missionary Pastoral Animation and Communication Theology) in Kochi, India and established the Syro-Malabar Church Internet Mission. His publications include, among conference papers and journal articles, The Use of Analogy in Theological Discourse, Towards a Communication Theology, and The Bible and the Technologies of the Word. <josepalakeel@gmail.com>
Ribeiro, Alexandre A. Journalist, Editor of Aleteia.org Portuguese Edition. MA in Literature, PhD in Semiotics, at Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo. Ribeiro’s research interests include emergence of social systems in networking websites, systemic ontology as scientific ontology for studies in communication and cyberculture, and systemic analysis of virtual sociability. <alexandre.ribeiro@aleteia.org>
Riondet, Odile. Research Center CIMEOS, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté University, France. Her interests include work on the field communication and religion (she is also a member of the research group RELICOM) and philosophy of science. Recent publications, Enquête sur le communication comme science, Harmattan, 2015, Religion et communication, Médiation et Information, L’Harmattan, 2014. <odile.riondet@wanadoo.fr>
Sabaté Gauxachs, Alba. Journalist. PhD Scholar at the Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations (Ramon Llull University, Barcelona), working on a thesis on literary and digital journalism. Researcher at Blanquerna Observatory on Media, Religion and Culture. Coordinator of the Master’s Degree in Journalism and International Relations at the above mentioned School. She served as coordinator at m4social.org project, developed by Barcelona’s City Council, Mobile World Capital Foundation and Taula d’Entitats del Tercer Sector, the biggest federation of social entities in Catalonia. <albasg@blanquerna.url.edu>
Scharer, Matthias, Dr., em. Professor, Department of Practical Theology, University of Innsbruck, Austria. Scharer’s research interests include work on Communicative Theology, Didactics, Leadership, Intermedia Communication, Inter- and Transreligious Communication. He serves as a Certificated Trainer of the Ruth Cohn Institute International. Grünewald Verlag, Lit Verlag, Crossroad a.o. published about 20 books, most in the field of Communicative Theology, Interreligious Learning, Theme-centered-Interaction <matthias.scharer@uibk.ac.at>
Soukup, Paul A. S.J. Professor, Department of Communication, Santa Clara University, US. Soukup’s research interests include work on orality and literacy studies, the use of new technologies in religious communication, multimedia translation, and the effects of new technologies. He serves as a member of the Board of Trustrees of the American Bible Society and an adviser to their Research Center for Scripture and Media in the US. Pauline Books and Media published Father Soukup’s most recent book, Out of Eden: 7 Ways God Restores Blocked Communication. <psouckup@scu.edu>
Spadaro, Antonio. S.J. Editor in Chief of «La Civiltà Cattolica». Spadaro’s research interests include work on digital culture, literature, theology, communication and journalism. He serves as a Consultor of the Pontifical Council for Culture and advisor for the Italian Association of Catholic Publishers. He is the author of the first interview with Pope Francis (2013) and other two interviews with the Holy Father (2015, 2016). Among his 40 books published: Cybertheology: Thinking Christianity in the Era of the Internet (Fordham Univ. Press, 2014) <spadaro@laciviltacattolica.it>
Tan, Matthew John Paul. School of Philosophy and Theology, University of Notre Dame Australia. Matthew’s research interest focuses on political theology and the intersection of theology and pop culture. He is the editor of the theological blog The Divine Wedgie, which is part of the Patheos Catholic blog channel. His latest book, Redeeming Flesh: The Way of the Cross with Zombie Jesus, was published by Cascade Books in 2016. <matthew.tan@sydneycatholic.org>
Zsupan-Jerome, Daniella. Professor of Pastoral Theology at Notre Dame Seminar. Assistant Professor of Liturgy, Catechesis and Evangelization at Loyola University New Orleans. BA in Theology (Notre Dame University), MA in Liturgical Studies (Saint John’s University), MA in Theology (Yale University), she holds a PhD on Theology and Education (Boston College). <dzjerome@nds.edu>
Míriam Díez
Paul Soukup, S.J.
Josep Lluís Micó
Daniella Zsupan-Jerome
This book wrestles with questions of authority and leadership in the digital age, questions that hold particular relevance for religious communication and Church authority. The essays come out of a series of conferences that gathered academic researchers, theologians, and communication scholars together from around the world. Using different methodologies and perspectives, the writers provide both historical, theoretical, and practical examination of authority and leadership.
Authority describes the power that rules or exerts control, de facto or de jure. Therefore the concept carries indissoluble associations with power, authority, or legitimacy. Who has authority deserves prestige and the credit granted to individuals or institutions competent in a subject. Often, authority is synonymous with solemnity, including apparatus. And the word also refers to the texts or set of expressions of a book cited to support a given position or assertion. In human interaction, leadership or the status of leading describes the position of superiority in which an institution or an organization, establishes a hegemony, within its domain, sector, or product. The leader is the person who directs or leads a social group or community. In another meaning, the word “leader” describes the one who heads a class, not only in sporting competitions.
These two concepts —authority and leadership— also serve in academia, in the marketing and design of curricula of master’s degrees, postgraduate courses, and workshops for managers faced with a loss of a balanced reputation: people either demonize or immoderately praise the leader. Usually in these business spaces, both ideas become simplified to the point of caricature. Here, what action and tactical ability seem to matter more, as with the leader of a football team who scores the most goals and assists to win championships —and sell merchandising material.
Measured by people’s reactions, many often confuse authority with authoritarianism, that is, with the excess or abuse of authority allegedly practiced by the worst bosses. Those who follow this trend, which applies to all types of companies and institutions (religious as well as secular) forget the nature, essence, and substance of authority. For this reason, they do not take into account the origin and the generating principle of harmonious development of the organization in question. As they have succumbed to the fascination of change for change, they do not pay attention to things that persist and remain unchanged in these entities.
The approach of this collection takes the opposite starting point and comes to a different destination of the kinds of courses on leadership mentioned in the previous paragraph. In these pages, a group of international experts presents research, retrieves historical frameworks, provides recent data, and deepens conclusions about the authority and leadership linked to and appropriate for religious institutions.
In a first block, Scientific, Academic and Axiological Authority is explored by Micó, Díez and Sabaté.
Professor Fr. Paul Soukup, from Santa Clara University, offers a general overview of authority in the Church and the challenges that new communication technologies pose to it. In this he suggests some of the topics that other authors develop in more detail later in the volume.
Several contributors suggest historical studies of authority or of how earlier eras in the Church wrestled with solving the then current problems with authority. In “Authority and Obedience: Engaging Benedictine Spirituality for Digital Communication”, Daniella Zsupan-Jerome examines the balance of external and internal authority, with a particular focus on envisioning pastoral formation for our digital culture toward a sense of internal authority that above all serves. John Osman illustrates the little-known story of the 19th century U.S. bishops’ attempt to educate the Catholic laity on the church’s liturgy through a popular media form the devotional prayer book.
In this case study, he traces how the bishops asserted their teaching authority by means of the new technology of mass printing. The study also shows the points of resistance to this new teaching method.
What challenges are caused by faith and their method of communication? How can we ensure that the Church does not become a sort of container of faith, a type of television to be left on that “talks” without communicating? These are the questions that Father Antonio Spadaro, S.J., the editor of La Civiltà Cattolica and author of Cyber Theology, explores in its chapter, “The Authority of Pope Francis and the Internet Culture”.
Johannes Ehrat in his chapter “Magisterium Positioning, is concerned about what is left on the sacramental role of Pastors once they appear in mass media, what implications for Church communication has the construction of central magisterial, pastoral and moral tenets in public opinion and how new forms of public sphere effectively impact the message of the Church.
In “Courage to lead and build bridges of trust”, Marianne Ejdersten explores different ways of leadership through the different stages of her career and talking from her own leadership experience.
In a more explicitly theological work, Joseph Scaria Palakeel, from the Syro-Malabar Church Internet Mission, India, writes in “Crowdsourcing Divine Truth!? Sensus Fidei and Theological Authority in the Social Media Culture” how a traditional theological concept may have renewed relevance today. His chapter focuses on this question: Can we use the interactivity and crowdsourcing inherent in social media for theologizing? In a different approach to that theological question, Matthias Scharer asks, What does religious authority mean in this digitalized media context? In , “Redemptive Leading” – Barriers and Opportunities in a Digital World,” Scharer reviews different approaches to the theological task, particularly those supported by new digital technologies.
Rather than beginning with theology, Alexandre Alvarenga Ribeiro explores a conceptual framework of General Systems Theory for the study of social systems. He applies it to virtual sociability in a study of the Catholic Global Portal Aleteia.org. Network theory forms the basis for “Are you my neighbour? Theology, networks, and encounters with God and others”, a chapter where Stephen Garner asks what might a “theology of the network” look like that brings together Scripture and Tradition into dialogue with the experience of an everyday world where we’re “wrapped in media”.
Yet another network approach appears in Saint John’s University Professor Basilio Monteiro’ chapter, which illustrates the religion in digital ecology. He shows that it is not simply a repackaging of traditional religious beliefs in a new media wrapping, but a further evolution of seeking transcendence and discovering spiritual relationship with the Divine.
Several contributors provide very concrete examples of the Church experimenting with leadership and authority in the digital world. “Christianism as a public sphere of the digital world” by Odile Riondet analyses how Christian religions explain their internal diversity through blogs and websites. Riondet has chosen three European countries and three religious traditions: Catholicism in France, Anglicanism in the United Kingdom, and Orthodoxy in Romania.
Victor Khroul in his chapter examines Orthodox leadership in the Russian public sphere in a digitalized world. Khroul shows examples like a TV program where polygamy is represented in a positive way could be acceptable for Muslims but would provoke protests by Orthodox believers.
Matthew Tan focuses his chapter on those online celebrities who formally identify themselves with the Catholic Church. He looks at the effects of these online celebrities as they function as a de facto authority in shaping the contours of that faith. Caroline Cerveny, from the Digital Discipline Network, explores what happens in the world around us—especially in the world of education—as technology becomes more of an everyday component in our daily lives. In “Interpretive Authority in an Internet-Driven Participatory Culture,” she offers a view of how is changing the overall learning methodology that was once a hierarchical system. Finally, Hess invites religious educators and communities of faith to learn from game design and gaming communities to teach.
* * *
These essays originated in several academic conferences. Some of them come from the “Theocom 2015” [Theology and Communication in dialogue] meeting hosted by Santa Clara University in California and sponsored by the Pontifical Council for Social Communication, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Communication Department, the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, and Santa Clara University. Others were directly asked from the Blanquerna Observatory on Media, Religion and Culture to several Global experts on Authority and Religion around the world.
Josep Lluís Micó
Míriam Díez
Alba Sabaté
Ramon Llull University
Sientific progress consists of the systematic accumulation of knowledge about our environment. Knowledge is the information which describes the world; it is what allows us to understand how our surroundings function. Our conception of knowledge is normally associated with the encyclopedic mode. In spite of this, knowledge is present in all living beings which need to understand what surrounds them in order to survive. This model is especially elaborate in the animal kingdom and, dominant among animals, are us humans.
Language, a set of symbols which makes it possible to represent and categorize the world, plays a dominant role in human knowledge. Thanks to language, we can conceptualize abstract concepts, such as “knowledge” or “language”. In this way, we can be conscious of our functioning and the dynamics that surround us.
Language is fundamental for the exchange of information between individuals. The collective phenomenon is that which gives its potential to the generation of knowledge. Joseph A. Tainter summarized this is in the book entitled The Collapse of Complex Societies: the form in which subjects organize themselves, relate and reach agreements and consensuses becomes the key to scientific progress.
The methods to attain knowledge were not systematized until the Enlightenment. This precisely, as Stuart Kaufman wrote in The Origins of Order (1993), is what we call “science”: proposing hypotheses about nature and the functioning of the world tested later through observation and experimentation.
To produce effective innovation, knowledge is fundamental. Knowledge enables us to detect the transformations which can provide positive outcomes. As Rolf Kreibich, Britta Oertel and Michaela Wölck stated in the First Berlin Symposium on Internet and Society (2011), at the core of technological progress we can find scientific progress; the latter can be considered a manner of anticipating the former. Thus, scientific advances bring about technological applications after a time.
A feature which these two types of progress share is that they move from that which is spontaneous to that which is deliberate. That is to say, the world has a dynamic independent from the understanding that we have of it. The editors of Beyond Neo-Darwinism (1984), Mae-Wan Ho and Peter T. Saunders, clarified that the task of humans is to understand this world -here what is called knowledge- in order to manipulate it for one’s own interests.
We normally consider that knowledge, in both the scientific as well as technological field, involves designing systems with perfect precision in order to know their dynamics. Following the criteria of the coordinators of Entropy, Information and Evolution (1988), Bruce H. Weber, David J. Depew and James D. Smith, if we do not have this certainty, errors may occur which make the knowledge useless.
There are programs which learn and evolve without human interaction. In an article appearing in The Atlantic in 2014, Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee highlight that researchers are progressively using self-organizing systems in all types of tasks. These systems do not need to understand their own evolution. The theory of complex systems is the branch of knowledge dedicated to understanding how these systems operate and how we can capitalize on these elements.
According to Eric K. Drexler, author of Radical Abundance (2013), self-organization can dominate fields such as biotechnology, nanotechnology and software. As Eric D. Beinhocker noted in an article published in the Journal of Institutional Economics in 2011, progress will probably come the establishment and sophistication of self-organizing systems, in contrast with the in-depth knowledge of classical progress. For Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael A. Osborne, who edited The Future of Employment in 2013, scientific and technological knowledge will be the strategic resource of the future. This is the most important factor when generating innovation. The production and capitalization of knowledge will mark the difference between competing entities.
Universities are society’s principal institution in generating and transmitting knowledge. They have a highly relevant role, since as we have just explained, knowledge is the benchmark resource. Universities should be privileged institutions within states which rely on state-of-the-art knowledge, as Amory and Hunter Lovins and Paul Hawken understand in Natural Capitalism (1999). This goal requires dedicating more funds to universities, and also increasing the pressure so to improve performance.
Teaching and research are the university’s two main functions. Both are closely related: without proper education it is complicated to have brilliant researchers, and without powerful and in-depth research optimal education cannot be offered. University teaching is the continuation of the regular educational system. As Adrià Aldomà and Albert Barqué stated in the journal Idees (2014), the faculties are where the most advanced knowledge that we have about the world is transmitted and circulates, but, above all, where individuals are trained to carry out tasks with notable cognitive demand.
As in regular education, the university must place emphasis on perfecting skills such as critical thinking, information analysis, problem solving, self-learning and creativity. According to Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson, who wrote Why Nations Fail in 2012, without refining these skills, we will not have subjects who excel in workplaces with high added value, a decisive aspect in the economy of any country and in the global economy.
Concerning research, universities are the benchmark, especially in its basic aspect, that which opens the path to progress. However, there are other institutions and people who are dedicated or who duly finance research: companies, foundations, patrons... Expenditure on research, both public and private, is growing. Institutions investment more and more in developing innovations to be more productive: economically, socially, etc.
The link between knowledge and the academic sphere must occupy a central position in society because citizens, companies, institutions, etc. need to understand reality in order to adapt themselves to rapid and profound changes. Researchers’ methods and their organization must be improved. In line with what Steven Johnson suggests in Where Good Ideas Come From (2010), we must progress in meta-innovation, both in the university as well as in other organizations.
Where there is little innovation is in the university structure. The research process in this framework is rigid due to the professional figures, methodology, incentives and other factors involved, all of which is a product of a historical dynamic which does not take into account the demand for constant improvement. The present situation must be modified. Epistemology, philosophy of science and cognitive science investigate the generation of knowledge. From these disciplines, we can articulate better research methods.
It is more delicate to choose which areas to give research priority to. The bodies which bear this activity, together with the spontaneous dynamic of academics, establish the dominant lines. In most centers and countries, there are no in-depth studies about which are the most promising elements or, at a minimum, the most serious problems which must be tackled, according to what Jared Diamond noted in the 2013 IBM Report. A portion of research must therefore be addressed to defining which research should be performed.
Market elements and competition have been introduced in recent years in academia: between isolated researchers, between research groups, universities, etc. to promote motivation and self-organization. This novelty is beneficial, however it also creates conflicts. For example, the quantity of academic publications, many of dubious value, institutionalizes the inefficiency of the university system. It is impossible to process the enormous amount of information and pseudo-information published. Communication between researchers, within each team and throughout academia, has traditionally been insufficient, and these journals do not contribute to solving it.
The research trend toward hyperspecialization is being countered by the urgency to attain generalist explanations and holistic models. We are advancing toward interdisciplinary studies, even through methods are still lacking which allow this to be effectively implemented. The division between natural and social sciences is closing. Social sciences have to gain consistency and form a continual interpretation with natural sciences. Progress in social sciences is a prerequisite for more effective organization. These disciplines, in providing knowledge about society, are essential to innovate the mode in which we organize.
The research paradigm based on utility has marginalized a field pertaining to social sciences: humanities. Although these have a great potential to contribute to society, culture, economics and politics, the authors of Culture and the Evolutionary Process (1985), Robert Boyd and Peter J. Richerson, demonstrated that the formula to channel it has not been found. A future full of challenges such as the one that awaits us must help to strengthen an academy which does not reject or ignore the contributions of humanities.
North American and British philanthropists commonly give part of their fortunes to universities or research centers. Or they create foundations to perform these activities. The belief that research has little use has eliminated this attitude in our country and in nations across our world. If we could rely on more top-tier experts and researchers in social scientists and humanities, the dissemination of advances between the population and decision centers would be quicker and more efficient, which would favorably affect the system.
One of the conclusions of Modernization and Postmodernization (1997), by Ronald Inglehart, was that resources must serve to innovate, not to copy the innovations of others. Whoever copies takes a step backward. What’s more, each time it is more difficult to copy. To do it well, one needs a lot of talent as effort no longer compensates.
One problem of innovation and institutional performance is that their complexity tends to increase. It is more difficult for us to understand and manage the social, economic, political and cultural structures. It is almost impossible to anticipate the consequences of the transformations. Obviously, one cannot turn back. The collapse, as Tainter claims, ended civilizations such as the Romans or Mayans, because complexity significantly reduced their adaptive capacity and made them vulnerable to external shocks.
We cannot forget these factors or, as Aldomà and Barqué call it, “the progress trap”. This term refers to the fact that innovation, in order to solve problems, may cause additional unexpected conflicts. If this happens, progress becomes an infinite lop in which the problems that progress itself has caused are solved. In spite of the rhetorical license, progress is not a trap, however, one must be prudent when innovating.
Values help to distinguish good from bad, that which is permitted from that which is prohibited, what one must do from what one must avoid. The point of departure may seem very abstract, however, this dimension is fully integrated in individual attitudes and in external behaviors, those which are manifested when one interacts with the members of the society that they belong to. In science, research and innovation, but also in daily life, the term “value” is a criterion for action to which one adheres in an emotional and non-rational way, and which, in the short term, is not cast into doubt.
This does not thus mean that values are irrational. In spite of being susceptible to preferential judgment, they have a special significance in defining the principles and guiding behavioral pathways and the nexuses which are established with the world and with society. Zabala (2006), recollecting a conversation between Richard Rorty and Gianni Vattimo, echoes the words of the philosopher from Turin: “The mediatization of our world involves more and more possibility for the individual to participate in defining the norms”. These intersubjective references are linked to the meaning that is conceded to life and to the choices that are made day by day, minute by minute. They have to do with lifestyles, with customs and with the manner that one has of relating with others.
A change of values can be triggered when reality is very different from expectations. New stimuli, surprising findings, technological progress... generate axiological incongruities and demonstrate that values are malleable. This social phenomenon is not static, it is dynamic. This is subject to scientific and economic transformations, among others, which occur over time. According to Inglehart, Western societies experience an inexorable transition between value systems. The original system would correspond with the materialist paradigm; the emerging system would be within the post-materialist or post-modern paradigm.
The materialist paradigm is a model in which the preferential choice is oriented to satisfying the physiological, economic and personal security needs. Post-materialists are focused on that which is affective, intellectual and self-actualizing. The concept of quality of life is now configured based on these intangible parameters, on the feelings that individual vital experience involves beyond mere survival. With all this, the transformation toward postmodern values does not represent the elimination of previous values. In a 2013 report for Time Magazine, Joel Stein emphasized that once a person becomes post-materialist he or she may retain material aspirations.
The fact of being post-materialist does not imply being anti-materialist. There is the possibility that values fall in the short term: due to economic and social turbulence, scientific and technological novelties, etc. Ulrich Beck and Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim, in Individualism (2002), added that these changes have frequently been the accurate reflection of the First World’s philosophical and ideological transformations over recent centuries.
The rationalism of the Enlightenment promoted the idea of the autonomous individual, with a critical spirit, and that humans would forge their own destiny. The process of secularization was thus inaugurated. As Friedrich A. Hayek noted in Individualism and Economic Order (1957), this movement accelerated in the second half of the 20th century. Individuals disconnected traditional social institutions and placed emotional welfare over reason. The externally imposed moral obligation, from secular (administration, universities, etc.) or religious institutions started to lose legitimacy. As Horsfield (2015) notes, the interactive nature of digital practice “subverts the construction of authority”.
The authority ascribed in digital practice is one earned in the process of interaction on specific topics or issues, a type of authority that is more common in oral-dominant communities than in the aloof, institution-based authority that most churches have carried into this third millennium. (From Jesus to the Internet. A History of Christianity and Media, Peter Horsfield, 2015, p. 266.)
These new values have a lower profile in the present. They enter on the scene according to their capacity to adapt to the environment or surroundings. They do not always involve profound reflection, nor even a basic commitment. They are values without conviction, unstable; they can be modified suddenly in one way or another. Grace Davie (1990) theorized this with the concept of “Believing but not Belonging”. They are subjected to the dynamic that molds our society: competition. No entity is free from it: companies, professionals, institutions, universities, faiths, political parties, sports clubs...
In this dynamic, religions have experienced a resurgence which has given rise to contemplating the factor of competition. This recovery is part of a broader crisis of modernity, and reflects a disillusionment which has reduced the world to that which can be conceived and governed through reason, science, technology or bureaucratic rationality, while leaving out religious, spiritual and sacred considerations. (Thomas, 2003). Heidi Campbell, in her studies about religiosity and authority such as Who’s got the power? Religious Authority and the Internet (2007), recalls the role of the community as an “interpreter” of knowledge and religious practice, especially in monotheistic religions.
In any competitive process, there is a difficult to reach objective sought by different agents. The value which is given to this goal motivates actors to strengthen themselves, to progress or fight, according to Weber, Depew and Smith. The only way of increasing performance with continuity is through innovation, that is, through the introduction of changes in the entities which are in competition. What has happened in the religious field, frequently, is that competition has given rise to radicalization and fundamentalisms. Gabriel Almond, Scott Appleby and Sivan Emanuel explored this in Strong Religion. The Rise of Fundamentalisms around the World (2003), where they posit that authority is usually vested in a small number of individuals (preferably one, at least for each local community of the enclave).
They conclude that while the scholarship and formal training may play a role in the selection of the leader(s), the crucial factor is charisma, that special heavenly grace (in Arabic Baraka, in Hebrew hesed elohi) that sets one man (virtually never is it a woman) apart from the rest of the enclave members.
The competitive structures are usually successfully and are copied; those which are not frequently lag behind and fall out of the orbit. The process slows down when the resources of competing entities is reduced: because the objective no longer has interest or because the sources which nourished the agents have been overexploited. Competition is not a product of any will or plan. It is a characteristic of all human and biological systems. The spontaneous interaction of the parts of the social system sets off the collective dynamic. Competition cannot be confused with the lack of cooperation. Competition at the highest levels precisely encourages cooperation.
Competition stimulates progress. Cooperation is a much more effective strategy than competition, but it is more difficult to implement and to supplant competition. Progress has been historically associated to a normative question: it was linked to improving the quality of life. However, the relationship is not secure. Progress in the future is inevitable, however, its favorable impact cannot be ensured; it will depend on the evolution of the system and the management we make of it.
In summary, accumulated knowledge is the engine of progress. Without the authority of science, the growing complexity would be ungovernable. The university for the most part leads innovation. These concepts, conveniently grouped and associated to others such as research or technology, already operate as values in themselves. They fit together without problems because they share the language, register, processes, goals and limitations. However, they live together with other less solid values and bear the delicate tension between competition and cooperation. For this reason, the community which works in science, technology, the university, innovation, etc. requires an axiological guide, an ethical and moral reference point.
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