Knowledge Resistance

It would be fascinating, though probably impossible, to write a history of make-work – to explore when and in what circumstances ‘idleness’ first came to be seen as a problem, or even a sin. I’m not aware that anyone has actually tried to do this.¹² But all evidence we have indicates that the modern form of make-work that Patrick and Brendan [two people who contributed working experiences, amongst many, to the author] are complaining about is historically new. This is in part because most people who have ever existed have assumed that normal human work patterns take the form of periodic intense bursts of energy, followed by relaxation, followed by slowly picking up again toward another intense bout. This is what farming is like, for instance; all-hands-on-deck mobilisation around planting and harvest, but otherwise, whole seasons taken up largely by minding and mending things, minor projects, and puttering around. But even daily tasks, or projects such as building a house or preparing for a feast, tend to take roughly this form. In other words, the traditional student’s pattern of lackadaisical study leading up to intense cramming before exams and then slacking off again – I like to refer to it as ‘punctuated hysteria’ is typical of how human beings have always tended to go about necessary tasks if no one forces them to act otherwise.¹³ Some students may engage in cartoonishly exaggerated versions of this pattern.¹⁴ But good students figure out how to get the pace roughly right. Not only is it what humans will do if left to their own devices, but there is no reason to believe that forcing them to act otherwise is likely to cause greater efficiency or productivity. Often it will have precisely the opposite effect.

Denial as strategic ignorance takes place when an individual or organisation refuses to recognise the availability of knowledge that would entail undesired responsibility. When an organisation is in denial, it may ignore or be unable to acknowledge information even when individuals within or outside the organisation try to bring it to attention. The situation that Steve Rayner uses in his article on uncomfortable knowledge is when the UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology published a House of Lords report identifying that public confidence in science was low. The report stated that this low confidence was problematic. The Minister for Science and Innovation made the premature assumption that the lack of confidence was rooted in a low level of scientific knowledge among the public. As a consequence of this assumption, a large, five-year research programme was launched to investigate the public perception of science more closely. It turned out, however, that the public had very high confidence in scientists and engineers. Around 85 per cent of the public agreed with the description that these professionals contribute to society in very valuable ways. Instead, it was people’s confidence in government ministers and civil servants that was very low. The public confidence was particularly low in ministers and civil servants responsible for ensuring food and other types of public safety. The civil servants, as individuals recognised this result and believed it to be valid. However, the Minister – and thus the ministry as an organisation – denied the results. The Minister took the position of denial by refusing to change his original view that the UK was permeated by an anti-science culture and a public knowledge deficit in science.¹⁷ If he had admitted the validity of the new findings – to himself and others – he would have learned that he and his ministry were responsible for the low confidence in science. He would have been forced to recognise his responsibility not just to improve the public perception of science but also to change the ministry itself in order to regain public trust in science.

People and organisations exert strategic ignorance to avoid blame for not following such a linear, predefined procedure. By extension, people avoid acting. They stay passive in order not to face the question of what they have been doing specifically and why their explorations ‘fail’ every time. However, ‘failure’ is the wrong term, the sociologists imply. Not finding anything interesting or relevant is many times part of the nature of such nonlinear explorations. Avoiding blame can be seen as a benefit of ignorance and thus a reason for knowledge resistance. The message from Gross and Bleicher is that recognising our ignorance – and allowing for ignorance – may have huge benefits when facing problems, such as contaminated water and land. Unknowns will always exist. Acknowledging and accepting them increases the potential to act and discover both new problems and solutions, these scholars maintain.²⁴ They add an additional twist: ‘we also address the possibility to creatively use and manufacture specified forms of ignorance’.²⁵ The lesson is that we should not just admit and accept ignorance, but also the state of ignorance as such. This would open up new opportunities for searching unrestrictedly for problems and their causes, as well as solutions.