Notes from the Future – February 17, 2023

This is part of a monthly series of posts to share a few things I run across regarding the future of social work (and beyond). For people involved in foresight practice, the practice of scanning, organizing and creatively interpreting “signals of change” in the ecosystem is a primary and foundational part of the work. This blog is a place where I’m doing that “out loud” and in public to both share what I’m finding, and encouraging readers to do the same. Sometimes I turn these signals into interesting “Social Work Jobs of the Future” as another type of foresight practice (worldbuilding and artifacts from the future in the form of new job descriptions). This combination of “finds” tends to be focused on five intersecting categories that my work in social work futures is increasingly oriented to:

1. The future of social issues
2. The future of social movements
3. The future of social welfare
4. The future of racism and other isms
5. The future of professions
6. And a good old “miscellaneous” category in case something great appears that doesn’t directly fit. Here goes!

Here’s a couple of previous posts from December and one devoted to futures of Tech Justice in January.

The future of social issues

• “The Need to Protect the Data in our Brains” is a fascinating read dives into the futures of privacy and rapidly expanding neurotech applications. How do we protect our thoughts and keep them from becoming data on the open market? Also mentioned in this recent piece (sorry for paywall...”When Your Boss is Tracking Your Brain…”
• George Mason University’s Center for Climate Change Communication’s new report “Climate Change in the American Mind: Beliefs and Attitudes” which reveals trends in how people are thinking about this vital issue. Highlights include that a surprising (and encouraging) majority of Americans (64%) say that they are somewhat worried about climate change.
• “Americans’ Climate Migration has Begun” focuses on one of the most significant and important transitions most experts agree we will see more of in the coming years. You can read more about it here, here and here. There are huge implications for the future of social work embedded in this coming trend.
• Increasing surfacing of “collapse” language, models and frameworks. Her’s a group called “Just Collapse,” which is identified as “an activist platform dedicated to socio-ecological justice in the face of inevitable and irreversible global collapse.” If you’re not familiar with this framework – a few other notable sites include “Collapse Psychology” and a new favorite article authored by David John Kenkel entitled “Social Work in the Face of Collapse.” These are not “hope free” zones of thought or action, but rather zones of an accountability to face the hardest truths about the fragility of our social and ecological infrastructures and acknowledge the work that is to be done in the midst of this reality.
• The Washington Post had the following as an actual headline: In a Tight Labor Market, Some States Look to Another Type of Worker: Children. It is mind-boggling to think that reviving child labor protection laws needs to be on our radar screen for US-based social work futures, but heads up!
• The “Gig Worker Learning Project” begins to operationalize some important and ill-defined current and future issues of gig economies. A worthwhile read. Related: another intersectional piece called “When Gig Workers Become Care Workers.”
• Lots of attention regarding this piece called “Teen girls ‘engulfed’ in violence and trauma, CDC finds” from the Washington Post.
• Important insights from privacy/surveillance capitalism scholar Shoshana Zuboff: “Privacy has been extinguished. It is now a zombie.”
• This is an excellent series of blog posts regarding “Re-Imagining Economic Possibilities” put together by the group Civic Square. A lot to explore and learn from here – some inspiring ideas.

The future of social movements

• Many suggest there is an important trend being increasingly revealed having to do with increasing violence and surveillance concerning social movement participants. The death of environmentalist Manual Esteban Paez is the latest example, but there have been other stories about this as well – here, here and here.
• What is the relationship of love to social change? Special thanks to fellow Social Work Futures Lab member Dr. Finn Bell for sharing this beautiful and moving resource called: “Measuring Love in the Journey for Justice: A Brown Paper.” by authors Sammy Nuñez and Shiree Teng.
• Found this article deeply moving – “Police Killings are Public Executions” giving fuel to increasing calls for responding to issues of community safety dramatically differently in the future.
• This is a powerful piece called “Citizens’ Assemblies: Are They the Future of Democracy?” suggesting new ways to enliven, engage and protect practices of democracy for a new age.
• Love this “action” taken by a group of Black Studies scholars to intentionally engage Chat GPT in matters of Black history, thought and culture to “train” the data on accurate and vital Black history ideas. It’s called BlackHistoryChatGPT and speaks to incredibly creative ways of thinking about activism and all the spaces where it can and needs to occur.
• Special edition of JS/Journal for Body and Gender Research on “Anticolonial Feminist Imaginaries” with 17 articles from global scholars on this broad and engaging topic.

The future of social welfare

• Growing literature on the futures of long covid as an emerging social and health issue. Here’s a piece from Katherine J.Wu at the Atlantic called “The Future of Long Covid: The Emergency is Not About to End.” The presence of long has potential to fundamentally shift the inadequacies of our social welfare system to support and respond effectively to the basic human needs of people experiencing this challenge, and the impact of the magnitude of the scope of the problem.

The future of racism and other isms

• Progress in Organ 3D Bioprinting is a really intriguing piece which shines a light on the exciting and rapidly expanding science of organ 3-d bioprinting. This is but one of an incredible array of medical breakthrough technologies that promise a new era of health. However I got to wondering, how do we assure that this new chapter doesn’t perpetuate existing health disparities and structural racisms. Of course, I’m not the only person wondering this. Found this, this, and this. In the coming years, we are likely to see extraordinary opportunities to both prevent and treat disease…how can this best be achieved equitably and what is social work’s role in helping to make that happen?
• This piece entitled “What if we framed new economic systems from the perspective of decolonization and Black liberation?” from Civic Square will stretch the way you think about the possibilties of economic justice in the future.
• This is a profound piece on racism and pain in the healthcare arena called “Racism as a Source of Pain.” This is an ultimate marker for health inequity and an important read.
• The backlash regarding African American Studies is well documented at this moment in history. This piece called “The Meaning of African American Studies” centers the “why” of the scholarship and the underlying power issues that concern it. Also note this open letter from more than 800 African American Studies scholars.
• Horrible unfoldings in South Dakota with passage of anti-trans laws (part of a larger trend) requiring Trans kids to “de-transition.” These are fundamental human rights violations.

The future of professions

• The Fight for the Soul of American Medicine and Doctors Aren’t Burned Out from Overwork: We’re Demoralized by our Health System. These two pieces really shine a light on increased strain, moral distress and injury, and increasing activism and resistance among medical professionals in the U.S.
• Had a student request information regarding MSW/JD academic programs recently and could not find a list…so with the help of Twitter colleagues…I made one which you can see here. Is the future about increasing interdisciplinary perspectives in this way? Perhaps so – I was struck by how many of these programs there are and yet how little we study, regard and amplify this powerhouse combo across the profession. I’d like to see, hear and learn more about what folks with this background are learning and accomplishing in the field – and how it can better prepare and strengthen the profession of social work as a whole.
• Critique and imagination applied to the topic of the Ph.D. – an important and thoughtful piece called “PhD Training is No Longer Fit for Purpose – It Needs Reform Now.”
• (Note: Exploration of topics DOES NOT EQUAL ENDORSEMENT). For anyone who is interested and active regarding the ways that policing and/or state violence has, is and might unfold in the years to come, this new publication from Interpol (the International Criminal Police Organization) is a powerful examination of the ways global policing leadership is considering, framing and exploring the future. The report is called “Scanning for the Future(s) of Policing: First Steps Towards a New Global Paradigm.” This is an important and concerning read for many reasons – but a piece that should be considered by all those who work in this space.

Miscellaneous

• Mad respect for the country of Finland for embedding “misinformation resiliency” into elementary schools and throughout the education of young people in a variety of national experiments.
• Great interview of colleague and brilliant futurist Stuart Candy on what futures studies and practice is all about.