Six hundred years ago, the first renaissance began in a period with several recurring outbreaks of plague. The fear was real; a third of the European population died and it was clear that neither the church nor the rulers could protect them against this catastrophe.
Simultaneously, two popes – one in Rome, the other in Avignon – were competing against each other. The result was a loss of belief in the authority of the Vatican. The church lost its iron grip on the common people who increasingly felt that independent thinking was both allowed and important.
Today, for different reasons similar trends are in play. We are losing trust in our governments and in big business and the evidence shows that this is not just because of the economic crisis. Rather there is a long-term trend, away from faith in distant forms of authority and towards putting our trust in ‘people like us’: our peers.
We are again seeing a collective loss of peace of mind. Globalisation and the severe economic crisis have cost millions of jobs in the Western societies. Life is not as secure as it used to be. Our jobs may be moved the China and many young people feel that there is no room for them in society. They worry about how long the economic crisis will last and how they will fare. Within this context, governments are seen as powerless.
In the 15th century new means of communication enabled information to travel in unprecedented ways. In Gutenberg's ingenious invention – the movable metal type – made knowledge available beyond the elite as books became cheaper and numerous. Today the internet is a revolutionary global tool that makes global dialogue possible: more than two billion people are using some social media. This is not a top-down dialogue; rather it is non-hierarchal and horizontal.
As well as new means of communication, we are seeing radical changes in the means of production. The way we manufacture products is based on economies of scale, with global companies able to drive what consumers want or need, providing standardised products in a top-down market place. The internet and other technologies are changing this. Within 10 years it is likely that we have millions of small entrepreneurs, producers, sometimes one-person ‘factories’ providing goods to a potentially global customer base. Their tool will be the 3D printer and scanner.
Their products will be marketed through the internet; and the horizontal production and dialogue will dramatically transform our societies.
This second renaissance will challenge traditional hierarchies and established authorities, which will need to develop radically different strategies if they are to adapt to the new market place. The winners will be ordinary people and the result will be a more diverse, richer society as more and more people discover and attain their dreams.
This is not a revolution in the traditional sense because these changes are not driven by ideology with two or more groups fighting for dominance. Instead what we will see is a gradual but radical change of societal structure. Hierarchies are already flattening but this process will be accelerated as the cost of new technologies comes down and their use increases. Government and political institutions will need to respond to these trends by re-organising and developing strategies that make room for people to participate beyond election campaigns.
The first renaissance inspired ordinary people to think for themselves and some of those who led this revolution of ideas - Leonardo da Vinci, Shakespeare - remain famous today. Just so, our second renaissance will create a more participatory society and unleash an explosion of new ideas and creativity in arts, science and exploration.
This comment is based on the book "The Renaissance Society" – How the Shift from Dream Society to the Age of Individual Control Will Change the Way You Do Business by Rolf Jensen and Mika Aaltonen, published by McGraw-Hill in May 2013.
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Fantastic article, gives me a lot of postivity. You read about all the different threads in this theme a lot and its great to have them all tied in to one piece. Thank you.
I would like to be as optimistic as the authors of this article. The reality is, though, those in control will not allow such individualism to evolve. Why do you think incessant wars are happening? Because it allows those at the top to maintain control.
Yes, but the first renaissance was not associated with a radical change in the form of the economy. It was, rather, a ‘renaissance’ of thought and artistic inspiration. In the original renaissance there were very few people who had the education and the economic freedom to think along new lines, but those who did were able to think about all aspects of the human condition. A degree of convergence began to appear to the effect that Aristotle, Galen, Ptolemy, etc. were wrong on many points. Empiricism offered new hope about finding the truth.
Today the only people who have a comparable education and freedom are philosophers, but the public philosophers of the past are virtually extinct. Instead philosophers have been institutionalized in universities and forced to specialize by idiotic government research exercises. Some specialize in linguistic analysis, others in formal logic, others are paralysed by angst ---brought on by the feeling that there is no hope of any convergence of credible thinking about how humankind & the universe can co-exist. None of these lines of philosophy carry an iota of optimism of the sort which was unleashed at the renaissance. We urgently need a new way of thinking about both ourselves & science, but I’m afraid it won’t come from those who will push 3D printers and micro-capitalism to the the limit as Aatonen & Jensen say. Ormell
Foucault we need you!
So, correct me if I'm wrong, the author is saying that even if you fail to make it on Britain's Got Talent you can still become famous by inspiring the next Renaissance? Cool, it's got to be better than teaching a goldfish to juggle.