Who can we trust in 2022? | Coronavirus virus pandemic

The question that defined the year 2021 was perhaps what Pontius Pilate, the procurator of Judea, had made famous to Jesus in the Gospel of John: What is truth? In fact, the most debated topics of this tragic year ranged from vaccines to fake news and finally about “truthfulness.” Beyond postmodernity, it seemed that we had lost the shared set of values ​​that formed the main structure of our societies in the past. This is not necessarily a bad thing. The philosophers Friedrich Nietzsche and Martin Heidegger pointed out how overly rigid structures in history weaken traditional value systems. These structures, whether scientific or economic, are always shaped by the eras and societies that determine their outcomes. So as we enter a new year, the question of truth becomes: Who can we trust in 2022?

We must set aside any pretense of immutability and seek an answer within history. But in this endeavor, we cannot leave our lives in the hands of experts alone, even if the language of techno-science requires a deep knowledge of a hyperspecialized curriculum.

As citizens, we all have the right to discuss the social impact of scientists’ findings and conclusions, even if we are unable to reproduce their experiments or follow their mathematical explanations. This is also the case with COVID-19 vaccines: every honest and consistent argument on this issue needs to be seriously considered. Experts cannot and do not ignore the concerns, questions and arguments of citizens about issues that directly affect their lives, with the attitude of “set aside and leave us our work”. Just as the recommendations of economists alone were not enough to resolve the 2008/9 economic crisis, only the findings and recommendations of scientists cannot end this devastating pandemic. These economic or public health crises require responses from a variety of social actors who can work together to provide appropriate solutions for specific areas. We call these actors “public bodies.”

Typically, the mod operands of democracies are more painful than those of authoritarian regimes. The “Reason for Technocracy” is a historically Western model that has been very successful, but has given way to countless savagery and injustice. Despite the temptation to believe that many scientists believe, science cannot replace democracy or religion. So the only viable solution is to seek an elusive truth within the social community.

As the philosopher Richard Rorty explained, if “truth” is “what your contemporaries let you say,” truth in the human world is not eternal, but the product of current social agreements. This is evident in the story of the pioneers of RNA messenger technology that enabled the production of the most important COVID-19 vaccines. Biochemist Katalin Kariko and immunologist Drew Weissman struggled for years to secure funding for their mRNA research, and the scientific community recognized the importance of their work when COVID-19 mRNA vaccines changed the course of the pandemic. How can we avoid these important scientific advances, or ignore similar important turning points and important political opportunities in the future?

It will not be easy: the consumerism of communication technologies, social media relationships and social atomism have left us fragmented and self-centered, turning solidarity into a concept of the past. Our current lack of shared identity is so depressing – and destructive – that in his work An American Utopia (2016), the famous theoretical theorist Fredric Jameson proposed the creation of a parallel structure: an army of all citizens. The challenge is to build a real community network to start building an alternative, truly democratic society. Like Julian Assange of Wikileaks, however, those who tried to provide the first tools to build this alternative, however, were quickly hindered and silenced, raising doubts about the viability of the project.

So it must be the mantra of 2022: let’s get back to society! We need to be confident in our own ability to live together in our own “zoon politics” (political animal). As the philosopher Paul K Feyerabend suggested, we must conquer “abundance,” the boundless richness of life, against all the abstract views that make up the technocratic world of market globalization. Quoting writer and philosopher Gilbert K Chesterton: “It is not the madman who has lost his reason, but the one who has lost his reason.”

There is nothing new to invent: we have to start with what we already have, and we have to start with what we already have. In 1999, urban sociologist Ray Oldenburg wrote the unforgettable book The Great Good Place “At the heart of a community about cafes, cafes, bookstores, bars, hairdressers, and other conversations.” The book’s message was simple: “Third places — gathering people, setting aside work and home worries, and being alone for the pleasure of good company and lively conversation — are at the heart of a community’s social vitality and democracy.” And this message still holds true: these are the places to make the community (yes, in the remarkable symmetry with the “making of the soul” that John Keats speaks of in his famous letter). In a more complex layer, you can add a church, a mosque, a synagogue to this list in traditional societies, and why not? As well as political parties, unions … everything goes. Even before the pandemic struck, these places were losing ground. But now that we’re struggling to get back to normal, disruptive innovators like Mark Zuckerberg (“Multiversum”) are proposing new platforms that will undoubtedly divide us further. And so the physical “third place” in Oldenburg is more important than ever.

Aside from the different meanings and forms it can take on in different cultures, “dialogue” is at the heart of the concept of community. The Internet is pure magic: it has the potential to spread many aspects of this conversation around the world. But it cannot convey the ordinary perception of a place that gives meaning to the conversation, the faces, the smells, the gestures, the touch. “The agility of social media,” as American philosopher Judith Butler once put it, “supports forms of bitriol that do not support detailed discussion.” So in this new year, to return to society, we should have a dignified and humane conversation, that is, we should take the conversation to those places where we have lost it.

This conversation is more of an attitude than a praxis. A new wave of inflation and the ensuing economic struggle seem to be in the corner again for most of us. So how can “conversations” help us?

It will certainly not give us a solution, but it can pave the way for a collective response – a response based on a sense of community justice and a fairer sharing of sacrifices.

The pandemic has inevitably invited us to rethink the meaning of our community; in the face of a crisis of this scale, it has shown us that our only real way out is solidarity. In fact, we now know that they will continue to produce variants and that the pandemic will not really end until the South has adequate access to vaccines as well.

So can we still trust our public institutions in 2022?

If we can, it is not only because of the guarantees they continue to provide, but also because they support this community network that we call society. Is it a utopian point of view?

Yes, and no, against the strong mainstream that says “there is no alternative,” because our history suggests that there is no single reality, but rather a complex mix of interpretations that crystallize many possible worldviews. What we shouldn’t trust in 2022 is the narrative of an ideological realism that serves the story of a one-sided world.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the editorial attitude of Al Jazeera.