"Never doubt that a small group of people can change the world.
It's actually the only thing that's ever worked.”
Margaret Mead, cultural anthropologist active during the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 70s
Power in our conversations
There is power in our conversations at work or over coffee. If we spread thoughts about freedom, equality, tolerance, equality, empathy and human efficiency or convince someone of the rightness of this, it affects people's knowledge and opinions. Some of these people you talk to may pass your thoughts on and so the virtuous circle begins. Your and your friends' political thoughts and conversations are meaningful. Change the world by having fun and meaningful political conversations.
At university I found out that whatever we do, many others are doing the same thing. So you are not alone in your fight for freedom, empathy and solidarity. I have personally experienced how this is true. What I fought for myself one day, has come up on the agenda a few years later. Examples of such things are my views that architecture should be more classically beautiful, my views that the left should become more popular and more focused on structural environmental solutions or my belief in hydrogen as an environmentally friendly energy preserver.
A few outliers can make an impact
The social psychologist Solomon Asch showed in experiments from the 1950s that participants in a group often adapt to the majority. This happens even if the majority is wrong. But if only one or two people express a different opinion, the participants can question the majority.
Psychologist Muzafer Sherif's study in the 1930s showed that people in a group tend to conform to the group's norms. But small changes in these conversations can cause the entire group to change their behavior and opinions.
Other researchers in fields such as social psychology, sociology and communication have also investigated how the influence between the majority and the minority. Examples of such scholars include Serge Moscovici, Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann, and Everett Rogers.
The people back you up
Should low-rent tenancies be protected or not? The consensus in many parties is that rents should be allowed to rise unhindered in the form of market rents. Some think that environmental solutions should be structural with a focus on new energy and a more circular use of resources. Others think that we should save the climate more individually. The focus here is on people changing their lifestyles. The emphasis is not as much on system change.
Power often leans more towards individual solutions. In “ The Shock Doctrine, ” Naomi Klein argues that the climate crisis and environmental issues cannot be solved within the framework of the existing economic system and thus for a more structural solution. Klein does not stand on the side of traditional power on environmental issues.
But large parts of the population only have a certain amount of money and a certain amount of energy . People behave worse if welfare decreases and stress at work or school increases. Therefore, many grassroots conversations are behind proposals to defend the environment in a way that defends the right to a good life.
An odd bird that paved the way in the United States
Now Joe Biden is leading the way for the IRA ; a green transition of the economy . The EU may have to reluctantly follow suit if Europe is not to lose its industries. It was, among others, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who inspired the IRA and these green transitions. Alexandria is an American politician and a socialist member of the Democrats in the United States. She became famous in 2018 when she won a surprising victory against an established Democratic candidate in the primary election for Congress in New York. Ocasio-Cortez is an activist for social justice and environmental issues and has become a symbol of a new generation of progressive politicians who are challenging the establishment. Grassroots conversations matter.
Ocasio-Cortez is an example of how people can gain power by mobilizing the grassroots, using social media and challenging established political structures. By engaging young voters and people previously not active in politics, she has succeeded in creating a movement for change and becoming an influential voice in the national debate on social and environmental issues.
If you and a few of us dare to defend the needs of the people, the individual and the environment against power, then history and social psychology show that we have greater opportunities to influence than we might think.
The more well-thought-out your opinions and well-read you are about social development, the more power your conversations have. One truth defeats a thousand lies.