‘Second Renaissance’ is an umbrella concept covering a variety of emerging approaches to social and cultural renewal, including metamodernism, integral theory, teal, liminal web, game B, regenerative and others.
We’d love to see posts exploring these approaches and their interconnections - long-form ‘blog’ style posts (including cross-posts from elsewhere) are especially welcome.
A useful reference point is the narrative and theory of change presented on https://secondrenaissance.net/ and the whitepapers at Second Renaissance Whitepaper
We are also developing a Wiki of key concepts and ideas, to which you’re encouraged to contribute.
Some thinkers and movements we think are especially relevant include the following
Key questions we’re interested in include:
- How should we understand the current civilizational crisis?
- What is the role of personal growth, relationships, art and spirituality in addressing this crisis?
- What theories of change can help generate a ‘second renaissance’
Disciplines we think are relevant to these questions include:
| Discipline | Example |
|---|---|
| Social Sciences (e.g. Economics, Sociology, Political theory) | Studies of capitalism, liberalism, marxism, political metamodernism and social movement theory in relation to civilizational crisis. |
| Cognitive Sciences (e.g. Developmental psychology, social psychology, neuroscience) | Scientific understandings of personal growth, wisdom, relationships, and spiritual experiences |
| Complexity theory | Using theory of complex systems to model the dynamics of cultural change. |
| Literary and art theory | Understand of cultural products as symptoms of crisis and catalysts for change |
| History | Histories of major cultural shifts, cultural collapse, new social movements, intentional communities |
| Philosophy | The role of ‘inner’ factors in major cultural shifts has been a major topic in the history of philosophy (e.g. Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Frankfurt School) and in more recent work (e.g. Badiou, Zizek, Taylor) |