New SPACE Convocation Address

Welcome. I want to introduce what we feel is a novel experiment in radical education.

First of all we envision this project as one which in order to work needs to be an ongoing process involving all the elements that make up the school, teachers, students, organizers, and so on. The mark of our success would be to build relations among the participants, discuss strategies, develop ideas, and, to the extent possible in this alienated society we live in, prefigure new relations, especially in the field of education. We think that we can begin to make steps in this direction as we envision this school to be a place where liberatory ideas can and will be developed—a principle we have stated in our mission statement.

Such places, needless to say these days, are getting rarer by the moment. But never have they been so important as now. The success of this new space requires openness, transparency, and an honest airing of differences in a cooperative spirit as a prelude to working out real unity among our movements, that is unity that will not subsume differences, but be strengthened by them.

In these times of desperation, after the failure of a somewhat narrow anti-war movement to stop the war in Iraq or even prevent Bush’s election —- not to mention the weakening of the anti-globalization movement in light of terrorist attack and heightened permanent imperialist warfare by the present administration -— in these desperate times, many people of all political stripes choose the lesser evil in some form. For whatever reasons, in so many cases what is narrowly accepted is only what currently exists. We maintain that the development of ideas can help to overcome such blockages in thought.

We believe there’s a need to develop ideas collectively to solve the problems we face in common. For instance, some of us wish to answer the dogma that there is no alternative by further realizing HOW another world is possible. This needs to be a collective effort because no single person has all the answers or can anticipate all of the obstacles to freedom.

Hence we wish to discourage the kind of celebritism that ends up pervading most circles. This must be done by a commitment to encouraging two-way discussion. Often today what passes for conferring at conferences and panels is at best an external connection of ideas. This takes the form both of people hawking their wares —- selling their ideas or themselves like so many commodities —- or what amounts to the same thing —- they speak about political identities in very dogmatic ways —- anarchists are like this, Marxists like that.  Such situations are anathema to a real engagement of perspectives.  We need to get behind personalities and preconceptions and seriously discuss ideas, seriously work out differences.

If we tend to stress differences, it is because we don’t believe differences should be ignored, disregarded, downplayed or, worse, suppressed in the name of unity or in favor of merely stressing our commonality. This prevents the forward movement of ideas and of action, and likely causes backward movement. It’s always worth reminding ourselves, and not just during women’s history month, that the women’s liberation movement came out of just such an internal critique of the radical movement.

Hence we are not for mere diversity, where different perspectives sit side by side or talk past one another. We are for promoting pluralism by which we mean that all perspectives are given hearing, engaged and debated. Such a pluralism requires real dialogue rather than simply repeating taken-for-granted conclusions. We should welcome challenges to our assumptions. These will force us to justify our perspectives, as well as reveal and help overcome limitations, which can only strengthen our movements.

To promote this pluralism, we feel it necessary to break down, to whatever extent possible in this society, the barriers erected by bourgeois society. Some of these barriers include the racist, sexist, homophobic, classist, hierarchical, and authoritarian behavior that pervades most institutions in capitalist society, including educational ones. As much as possible we need to break down the barrier between mental and manual labor which perpetuates class society. By doing this we work to unite practice and theory.

This cannot be done so long as there is a separation between education and politics. Nor can it be accomplished in a situation in which education is commodified, where all there is is a marketplace of ideas that people choose like they do their lifestyles and fashions -—where all that drives us is our desires and consumer mentality—where our only goal is our own edification. We do not view this school as a service organization as other schools are but as a tool for social transformation that requires the active participation of all involved.

As long as education is restricted by the commodity form, we will never be able to conceive of an alternative to this inhuman society. The development of ideas necessary for fundamental social transformation requires difficult mental labor and will only come at the end of a long process of dialogue and collaboration. We therefore hope you will play an active role in making this project a success and get more involved.

Joshua Howard
New SPACE Organizing Committee