Friday, September 22, 2017

The divisive power of the virtual world

It is tragic how social media, in addition to creating consumer comfort of some sorts, is acting as a psychological primer for nurturing hate towards others.

Has internet got more power than people to undermine or divide democracy? The way in which media has gone ‘social’ in creating echo-chambers of like-minded voices; the chance for such an upturn may not be remote. Conversely, the world of algorithm is fuelling efficiency in the way we make choices and connect only with those whom we like. Why would then like-mindedness be such a threat when in effect it strengthens identity and solidifies views? Cass Sunstein, the celebrated author who proposed Nudge hypothesis for fresh thinking on managing health, wealth and happiness, lets the pigeon out of his thinking hat to suggest that hidden behind the purportedly consumer comfort is a subtle transformation which acts as a psychological primer for nurturing hate towards others.

As social media increases people’s ability to hear echoes of their own voices and social media technologies help them conform to their limited choices, people are pushed into excessive self-insulation that leads them to believe in falsehoods. Self-insulation does offer a degree of comfort though, and possibly a way of life too. But creation of a limited argument pool based on constricted viewpoints ends up undermining the ability to be engaged citizens. As these self-insulated groups continue to churn limited ideas, falsehoods are inevitable outputs which eventually contribute to a politics of suspicion, distrust, and even hatred. A vote in favor of ‘Brexit’ could not have been possible any other way, opines Sunstein.

Social media has come handy for politicians to create political polarization effects, Donald Trump used it effectively and so did Narendra Modi in their respective election campaigns. Curiously, it is now clear that the ‘likes’ on Facebook and the ‘followers’ on Twitter are not the best measure of popularity. The numbers don’t really add up, but do show the use of social media in engineering political polarization among electorates. However, the bottom-line is that the followers create a virtual constituency that adds a wide range of arguments in their leader’s favor, and often shift to a more extreme position against those opposing it. Trolling is the logical next step, built over the cesspool of guarded opinions.

Drawing from research in the fields of behavioral science and social psychology, Sunstein unfolds the implications of the subtle but powerful phenomenon of polarization. The trouble is that much before people get to know it, they are sucked into the prison of their ‘like’ group. Little is realized that such group identity not only undermines individual freedom, but has implications for democracy at large. After all, democracy needs proactive voices and not ‘inert’ citizens who have been silenced into submission for holding divergent views.  One of the most pressing obligations of a citizenry, according to Sunstein, is to ensure that ‘deliberative forces prevail over the arbitrary.’ In dissent lies the strength of democracy.

Sunstein actual experience of working in the Obama administration, however, was to the contrary as his Facebook page was filled with views that fitted with the interests of the administration. This was bound to be so as Facebook’s algorithms construct a picture of who you are, and what interests you. With social media becoming central to peoples’ search for news, however, their worldview is becoming restricted with a liberal dose of fake news finding a place of legitimacy. It is a threatening fact of life in the networked sphere. It is this change during the last ten years that prompted Sunstein to address the dangers that the internet poses for politics following his previous two books, Republic.com in 2001 and Republic.com 2.0 in 2007.

Invoking Amartya Sen’s remarkable finding that there has never been a famine in a system with a democratic press and free elections as a metaphor, #Republic suggests that freedom of expression is central to social well-being precisely because of the pressure that it places on the governments. If we value freedom, we must value the free exchange of ideas. It not only demands a law of free expression but also a culture of free expression, wherein people listen to what their fellow citizens have to say. Sunstein doesn’t acknowledge social media as enemy but provokes the readers to seek out diversity in order to fulfill the promise of ‘e pluribus unum’– out of the many, one.

To doubt if danger of polarization will ever materialize is to ignore the writing on the wall. At this time when false news is guiding predominant media discourse, and when outrage by cyber-polarized communities against dissent has taken a toll on unsuspecting lives, there could be nothing more close to truth than what Sunstein has propounded. If we do not fight against the closing-down of our minds to critical thinking, a deeply divided democracy fueled by hate will be our destiny. The risks of the ongoing evolution of social media are too difficult to ignore.

Republic: Divided Democracy in the Age of Social Media
by Cass R. Sunstein
Princeton University Press, Oxford
Extent: 310, Price: $29.95

This review was first published in wekend BLink of the BusinessLine on Dec 01, 2017

Tuesday, September 5, 2017

The knowledge economy at the grassroots

...the natives are so full of ingenuity that they make any new thing by pattern how hard so ever it seems to be done....

Rarely do these young men get noticed by pilgrims who throng the holy city of Haridwar for taking a dip in icy waters of the Ganga, and offer their obeisance by throwing coins in it. What is salvation for some is sheer survival for the others. Holding a transparent glass pane and standing through the day in water, these men search for coins that lie at the bottom of the flowing river. By pressing the glass pane against the turbulent flow the coins lying at the bottom get clearly located. Fluid dynamics they would not have even heard of but they know the value of the idea that has eased their lives. Ask them, and they won’t even know who has been behind this innovation.

This is one amongst innumerable innovations that abound in everyday living of a largely impoverished society in India. From handy tips to improvised tools and from enhanced techniques to adaptive practices, there is a rich repository of innovations on offer. Think of the multiple variants of ‘scare crow’ to protect mature crops or the ‘belled rat’ that drives away others of its species. Even the buttermilk churning washing machine and the motorcycle-cum- tractor have been locally evolved, to make life easier for million others. What fuels innovative desire in ordinary people, and why are such innovations gifted anonymously to the society at large?

There could be many explanations for this. Simply put, improvisation is the mother of survival and a lost opportunity remains an unforgiveable waste. Resource constraint is viewed as a challenge by the poor, firing imagination in the most ordinary of minds. As a result, people do not succumb to the constraints but transcend them by improvising on inputs and reducing costs. An English traveler during the Mughal period had recorded that ‘the natives are so full of ingenuity that they make any new thing by pattern how hard so ever it seems to be done.’ It will suffice to say that an Indian is inherently an entrepreneur and willingly a devotee, nurturing a DNA of innovation for the larger good of the society.

Yet, in the welter of contradictions it may be risky to paint a nation of people with a single brush. By default people are innovative but they are spaced by socio-cultural differences, and thrive in diverse ecosystems of challenges and opportunities. Few ecosystems mould some of them into entrepreneurs, while a large number is left unattended on the margins. In his quarter century of efforts at documenting and celebrating informal knowledge produced at the grassroots, Anil Gupta displays a seriousness of purpose in fostering voluntarism to scout innovations from the grassroots. Else, the double-decker root bridge from Meghalaya, an efficient brick kiln from Andhra Pradesh, an innovative tree climber from Kashmir, and the bamboo windmill for water lifting from Gujarat would not have earned social recognition.

Grassroots Innovation chronicles the personal journey of the author in building an institutional architecture that has ensured respect, recognition and rewards for unsung innovators spread across the country. Each of the more than 200,000 ideas, innovations and knowledge practices have been registered at the National Innovation Foundation (NIF), set up by the Government of India. Out of the registered innovations, NIF has filed for more than 730 patents and about two dozen plant variety protection applications on behalf of the grassroots innovators.

What began as a voluntary effort through the Honey Bee Network has grown vertically; the process of translating an innovation into a good or service that creates value for the inventor through the payment it may receive from the potential customers has been set in motion. Though the process has been carefully designed, it seems these are still early days for the entire value chain to be fully operational. Part of the problem rests in keeping the cost and also the supply chain of these easy-to-use innovations frugal. One may baulk at this characterization but it does throw up a challenge more for the promoter of innovation, than the innovator himself. After all, grassroots innovators have rarely been inventing products or processes for the market.

The overtly interpretive acrobatics by the author in lending philosophical perspective to the social capital of grassroots innovations has reduced an interesting narrative into an exercise in theorizing the sociology of innovative culture. It raises more questions than what the author had set out to address. If the resource constraints give wings of imagination to the impoverished for being innovative, will connecting them to the marketplace of opportunity not curtail their inherent freedom of expression? What is the relationship between the idea of freedom at the grassroots and the rational for institutionalizing marketable perfection out of it? In the end, are the high ideals of an innovative culture need to be tagged to a monetary value outside the society that nurtures it? It could be anybody’s guess if creating a marketable opportunity for grassroots innovations can nurture the backend ecosystem to continue generating useful ideas.    

Aamir Khan’s 3 Idiots had scored brownie points in using some of these innovations in challenging a system of education that nurtures clones of a kind. In contrast, Anil Gupta’s Grassroots Innovation struggles to bring clarity between thoughts and reality. Yet, it gives a tour d’Horizon of the enriching world of grassroots innovations. Part illuminating and part preachy, the lengthy narrative can be tough going for readers unfamiliar with the subject. It nonetheless throws light on some unusual questions on and about the mainstream knowledge economy.

Grassroots Innovation
by Anil Gupta
Penguin Books, New Delhi
Extent: 381, Price Rs. 599

This was first published in the Hindu BusinessLine weekend magazine Blink on Sept 23, 2017.