This reading reiterated concepts fresh in my mind from last semester - existentialism, phenomenology and Heidegger. It is this school of thought that has potentially caused me to struggle so much with the idea of entirely virtual future scenarios. This reading however, allowed me to bridge the gap a little between existentialism, the phenomenological approach and imagining future scenarios. It is the 'politicization' of existentialism from this reading that i found particularly helpful.
The collective act, the act in solidarity, permitted groups to act in accordance with collective choices in the face of repression by powers exerted by those whose authority is to be resisted (p. 95).
This idea of Sartre's, when re-imagined in the current context of social media begins to suggest that a dramatic shift in power is a plausible future scenario. It was interesting to see the overlap of this reading and what we had discussed as a group - we had been considering an increase in individualism and this combined with Debord's interesting prediction that media would become a future driving force of capitalist economy (after railroads and motor cars prior), led me to think that the potential for social media platforms to have major power in our future is quite high. I would assume that what we know as social media today will continue to evolve and become increasingly sophisticated before it reaches a rivaled level of driving force (to the media, motorcar & railroad). It also leads the imagination to consider how powerful this may be when considering it in relation to the huge percentage of world population in developing countries having access to social media, increasing their ability to 'act in solidarity'. The change could be immense.
I think i will enjoy finding out more about the 'Situationist International'.
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