27 Mar 2011
After the transparancy-kick
Wikileaks gave us a transparency-kick. We, the public, have no way back and we want more. But how will we get it?
‘Wiki’ is a prefix with a liberating identity and connotation, thanks to wikimedia and wikipedia in general. This connotation gained even more strength when wikileaks first entered our minds. Due to its wiki-heritage we all said ‘finally’, ‘thanks’ and wanted more ‘truth’ coming forward about political issues and other hidden information, all over the world. Finally, we will get the truth, and nothing but the truth – we thought.
But then, something went wrong: wikileaks (Assange) got ‘hubris’ and turned the free truth to something other. But let us stay out of that, whatever happened wikileaks gave us a kick in the ass to find this ‘hidden’ truth, and transparency went official and public.
Among the concepts initiated by sociologist, criminologist and social psychologist Gabriel de Tarde, was the group mind and the notion ‘give the mob circus and they stay calm’. I think that wikileaks gave us a transparency-kick; and once you’ve felt that kick, you want more. We ,the public, now have no way back and we want more. But how will we get it?
Without being too conspiratorial, we can explain the rise of the people in several northen African countries the last months, due to need for radical change. Here we can see similarities to 1989 when the Berlin ‘wall’ fell. Back then Gorbatjov had put ‘glasnost’ on the agenda and this was an opening that gave transparency a face. Further, conspiratorial thoughts claims that David Bowie was (the first) force behind the end of Lehmann Brothers and the deep recession 2008-2009; this because he was the first artist that sold ‘shares’ of his forth-coming revenues. Bowie used the mechanism that drives the stock market and put it into a new context: creative and worthwhile – for him!
Brutal
So what can we expect in the future as a heritage of wikileaks? Radical changes are brutal when they appear: when Germany invaded Poland 1939, the polish army rode horses against the Germans tanks.When the Egyptian leader in 2011 tried to use old military tactics, the ‘people’ used Twitter and Facebook.
The future turns in two major directions. The first and most positive route is that of radical change and that more ‘truth’ coming forward. Today the Swedish Tax Agency sees billions of SEK coming into Swedish accounts in Swedish Banks. This due to the openness and/or new rules on foreign exchange. The EU has forced former ‘tax paradise’ Switzerland to change their rules: their former privacy don’t exist anymore. And this is direct cause of Wikileaks – the Swedes with hidden money abroad are scared to get ‘busted’. The democratisation process will grow stronger, and thereby open-up more transparency – a rings-on-water-effect.
On the other hand the future will turn into a darker context. As more people demand openness, more want to hide their knowledge, money and items. This is a classical trickle-up effect: those who have something want to separate themselves from those who do not have. In one corner we se the openness, insight and knowledge flourish, in the footsteps of Wikileaks. But not all want the openness or (healthy) criticise the phenomenon Wikileaks – what do the really want? What is the mission? What is the purpose of the leaks?
Wikileaks creates disorder and change (radical changes) some things, and there is a strong conservatism inside many people – both from political left and right. It’s not a political issue; it’s a behaviouristic issue. And to change behaviour is very, very difficult.
So side by side will we see openness and closeness. And this is not strange, as we today live in a post-post-modern society, which continues to grow more fragmented and divided. All is out of fashion, and all is in fashion; it depends on what sub-, subsub- or subsubsubgroup you ask or study.
Claes Foxérus (www.foxerus.com) is a trend spotter and a creative communicator. Today he works part-time as Communication Manager for a product development consultancy www.scalae.se and is Editor-In-Chief of Sweden’s first blog dedicated to product development in a wide perspective, www.produktutveckling.nu.
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