Scholarship and research in crisis contexts

On August 7, as the editorial collective was gathering to discuss the publication of this issue, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released its 6 assessment report on the physical science basis (IPCC 2021: Summary for Policymakers, in press) and implications for governmental responses. The report presents what the UN General Secretary has referred to as a “code red for humanity” (McGrath, 2021), a stark look at the climate science that shows that the political goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius is virtually impossible today, and that we are headed toward increasing warming – and the devastating environmental and human effects it brings – for the next three decades. The IPCC report makes plain what journalist and activist George Monbiot recently described as humanity’s tragedy: the disconnect between what we know and what we do (Monbiot, 2021). After years of warnings and calls to action from scientific and civic communities, the latest IPCC report shows the specific impacts of this disconnect. It is precisely at the intersection of thought and action that our interdisciplinary field of research on mind, culture, and activity holds promise as a relevant mediation for actors in this crisis. As scholars in the social sciences and humanities, we recognize our great responsibility to make a difference and contribute to bridging the knowledge-action gap through engaged scholarship and research. Scholars focused on mind, culture, and activity – especially those working in cultural-historical, sociocultural and activity theories – stand to contribute to addressing this crisis given their roots in Marxism and other radical frameworks of resistance. Indeed, it was Marx who revealed the inevitably destructive dynamics of capitalism when, “for the first time, nature becomes purely an object for humankind, purely a matter of utility” creating the “universal appropriation of nature as well as of the social bond itself” (see Grundrisse), and, hence, the global crisis of ecology, social justice, equality, and well-being. Today, in the face of extreme and multifaceted emergency, scholarship in this tradition (albeit not without much needed critical development), must elevate its engagement with radical movements and collective struggles for ecological and social justice, while connecting the task of regenerating this tradition with perspectives, such as Global South epistemologies, that challenge and decenter dominant practices. There is increasing consensus that the climate and environmental crises are materially related to global social crises of inequality, racism, and violence against women and LGBT collectives (Klinsky et al., 2017; Sultana, 2021). The very essence of what is causing climate change, and what is preventing us from dealing appropriately with it, lies in the phenomenon’s cultural, historical, socio-economic, and socio-political dimensions (Adger et al., 2013; Moore, 2017). Issues of culture, power, oppression, and liberation that have been central to our scholarship are at the core of the socio-environmental challenges of our time, as some of the articles in this issue demonstrate. It is therefore important that this journal, and the scholarly platforms to which this journal has historically been connected, are seen and actively mobilized as core resources to build the knowledge, courage, and socio-material conditions for deep systemic change. In line with a recent call in this journal (Ferholt et al., 2021), we continue to encourage, support, and call for submissions that contribute to critically addressing relevant issues through empirical and/or theoretical analyses pertinent to cultural praxis and action.