The renewal of the social and cultural environment

Abstract

The word renewal connotes the wish to replace the old and outworn-to start afresh. The resulting imagery, value judgments and conceptualizations lead easily to an emphasis on structures stripped of their history and torn out of their continuing process. They also lead to a discussion of social change in the rhetoric of revolution. The pressure from various contemporary youth cultures, as well as that from other groups, makes it difficult for education to insist calmly and confidently that any significant renewal of society must conserve existing values and social institutions while resourcefully and effectively changing them. To the existential revolutionaries-those for whom revolutionary action is a form of psychodrama or ritualistic combat without serious program-a combination of conservation with effective change is an absurdity. From those with reformist objectives, determined to join Rudi Dutschke's long march through the institutions, the most charitable response will be the accusation of co-optation by the establishment. But it should be obvious that the quality of the social environment is apt to be renewed if citizens directly and effectively participate in social, economic and politial processes. Nevertheless, existing values and institutions must be conserved as they change: indeed, they must be conserved and secured in order that they may change. These assertions are prelude to a consideration of the characteristics of the social surround as it affects individual fulfillment, competence, meaning, effectiveness and gratification. Too frequently, ecological problems are discussed not in biosocial terms but in terms of the biophysical interrelations between organisms and their environment.