Future Identity Research Articles

Redefining education and politics: On the paradoxical relation between two separate spheres

In this contribution to the Special Issue on the instrumentalisation of education, we focus on the relation between politics and education, as today there is a dominant discourse on rendering education subservient to the realisation of political aims. Rather than analysing the many ways in which such instrumentalisation takes place, we propose to develop an ontological account that articulates the basic attitude that a political and an educational engagement respectively demand. Our main source of inspiration was Arendt’s claim that education should be conceived of as an autonomous and separate sphere, that is, as being meaningful in and of itself, and without any need for an external justification (e.g. in political terms). Taking this standpoint further we will argue that the unique logic of education can be conceived of in terms of unconditional love for the present world. This affirmative attitude is precisely what makes education educational. Conversely, this calls for a redefinition of the logic that -- following Schmitt -- characterises the political, which we will show to be predicated upon a dialectical relation with the world that consists of an attitude of hate towards the present, in view of an ever deferred hoped-for ideal future. This leads us to reconsider the relation that education as an autonomous sphere of human life enters with politics. In order to theorise this kind relation we refer to the idea of pure means, introduced by Agamben .

FUTURE PSYCHOLOGISTS PROFESSIONAL SDENITY FORMATION

Abstract. The article is devoted to the professional identity mechanism formation features study of future psy-chologists during their studies in higher educational institutions (HEIs). Systematization of psychological knowledge about the development and formation of personality as a professional activity subject is extremely important. The author considers it expedient and perspective to supplement and expand this knowledge, aiming at improving and innovatively filling the higher education modern information educational space resources. After all, one of the key points of providing and receiving education is the creation of effective psychological conditions for the future professionals professional competence formation. Investigating the socio-professional adaptation of students of psychology, scientists pay special attention to the formation of their professional identity, as one of the most important factors in the future professionals professionalism and competitiveness formation. Despite the growing interest of researchers in professional identity, the question of forming the future practical psychologists professional identity remains open. Based on empirical and theo-retical research, the author attempted to identify features and stages of psychological aspects formation of professional identity in students of psychology, as well as to analyze the that determine the formation of personal and social identity in adolescence and early adulthood. Theoretical aspects of the relationship between professional identity and adaptation as a prerequisite for successful identification of a future psychologist are also analyzed. According to scientists, the iden-tity of a person is based on the culture with which he interacts, so there is an inseparable link between identity and socio-cultural environment. By the analogy, we can assume that professional identity develops in the interaction process with the professional environment, and this process begins at the stage of optation. The formed professional identity is the result of professional self-determination and adaptation complex processes, which is manifested in the awareness of the chosen profession and the professional community representative, ready to perform professional duties.

Ibrat, hasrat, or tahdid: Turkish modernity in the eyes of Iranian nationalist modernists in the Qajar-Pahlavi interregnum

ABSTRACT This study examines the ways in which various aspects of Turkish modernity, including gender reforms and nation-building, were reconstructed by the Berlin Circle, whose members were the ideologues of nationalist authoritarian modernization in Iran. To this end, I analyzed texts published between 1923 and 25 in Iranshahr and Nameye Farangestan, two important periodicals of the Berlin Circle. The results of this study show that while gender reforms were welcomed, longingly desired [hasrat], and upheld as a lesson [ibrat], Turkish nationalism was mostly perceived as a threat [tahdid]. This decentralized and horizontal view towards Turkish modernity suggests that its reconstructed image served to transfer and propagate different messages that implied the possibility of modernization reforms in an Islamic country like Iran and induced anxieties to push Iranian society to an imagined ideal future.

Training Future Pharmacists for Professional Activity in the Process of Studying the Chemical Disciplines Block in the System of College and Medical Academy

The article reveals the essence of the concepts of «professional activity» and «training for professional activity» and approaches to their interpretation in modern scientific research. The general definition of «professional activity» is given; we define this notion in our study as a systematic human activity of a specialist in a particular field, who has special training, definite responsibilities and professional tasks should be performed to meet its own needs and to develop a socially significant product, or to provide high quality services. The purpose of the article is to substantiate the importance of students-pharmacists training for future professional activity during the study of the block of chemical disciplines at all stages of degree education in the system of college and medical academy. The authors` understanding of approaches in training for professional activity in the system of college and medical academy is shown; the professional activity is developed by the formation of chemical competence due to organization of chemical disciplines trainings which as much as possible model real industrial situations for a worker of pharmaceutical branch. The article presents some results of an anonymous questionnaire about organization of the chemical disciplines block distance learning in the educational platform «Moodle», they confirm the key role of a teacher in the educational process and recognize the prerogative of live communication over the virtual one. A number of measures have been identified to help to train future pharmacists for their professional activities, they include: adjusting the curriculum, adding professional topics to the curricula of chemical disciplines, adding a lot of laboratory and practical work lessons that simulate the professional activity of a pharmaceutical worker, expanding the base of tasks and situational tasks, coordination of the system of interdisciplinary relations, creation of information support didactic complex for the block of chemical disciplines training. There is emphasized the special role of information and communication technologies in the chemical disciplines block teaching while the pharmacists training for a professional activity. The directions of further researches are defined; they are directed on studying approaches to the organization and functioning of the home chemical laboratory which could be in use of talented students and its influence on a level of educational achievements in the chemical disciplines block learning, the formation of the future pharmaceutical branch workers professional identity and approaches to their choice of individual educational trajectories. The study used data from psychological and pedagogical sources and from scientific research. The comparative method of analysis is applied.

Common Identity as the Missing Element in the Construction of Regionalism in the South Caucasus [Güney Kafkasya’da Bölgeciliğin Kurulmasında Eksik Unsur Olan Ortak Kimliğin Tahlili

The understanding of the South Caucasus as a region is a relatively disputable concept. Despite their geographic proximity and common historical and cultural background, the three states of the region (Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia) do not perceive themselves in the context of a regional “South Caucasian” identity and do not make any attempts to pursue regional solutions to common problems or develop any economic cooperation on a regional, rather than a bilateral level of relations. Although several attempts were made to create integration projects throughout the history of the twentieth century, all of them failed due to the deep-rooted historical enmity, artificial character of the top-down integration and different visions of threat among the states of the region either during the years of independence in 1918-1920, the Soviet period or in the current days. This article will discuss to what extent the lack of common identity between nations became the main reason of the failure of integration in the South Caucasus and whether there is a potential for the establishment of common South Caucasian identity in the near future.

Projecting the self in aging: an exploratory study of self-defining future projections

ABSTRACTThe concept of “Self-Defining Future Projections” (SDFPs) has been recently introduced to better explore the link between future thinking and identity. To date, SDFPs have only been examined in young adults and it remains unknown how self-defining future thoughts evolve in aging. In this cross-sectional study, 43 young adults (age range = 19–28; mean age = 23.06) and 43 older adults (age range 60–80; mean age = 69.46) were asked to generate three SDFPs. Our results indicated that SDFPs were less specific in older adults compared to young adults, but there was no difference between the two groups concerning autobiographical reasoning. However, regarding subjective experience, older adults rated imagined future events as containing more sensory details and contextual information and reported a higher feeling of pre-experiencing the personal future. Additionally, older participants described future events that were more positive and less distant in the future, with fewer narratives about future achievements but more narratives describing leisure time, with a similar probability between the two groups that the event will occur in the future. Our study extends previous aging research and adds to the literature by better understanding how future event representations are formed in older adults.

Optimising Well-Being and Learning Through Participatory Processes and Practices: an International Comparative Analysis of Ten Groundwork Case-Studies in Schools

The paper presents a theory of participation in systems of learning that emerges from our evidence gathered through partnerships between schools and the academy. The theory identifies young people need to endorse common principles of participation to include and respect all. Educational leaders’ evidence informed intervention strategies can positively impact young people’s inclusive and respectful participation in the action-research. The theory of participation conceptualises young people’s need for opportunities to pursue their ambitions and interests. Leaders’ intervention strategies may develop young people’s participation in attaining target examination outcomes to achieve their ambitions. We then develop the theory of participation regarding young people pursuing independent interests and ambitions in association with the other, to enable them to be drivers of social change. To do this they need to understand their future identity as potential consumers, employees, employers, and entrepreneurs with Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) that challenge public corporations in a variety of ways. We theorise how young people are well situated to build capacity in Europe and globally using the social media networks they have already developed. Our evidence identified five participation principals of inclusion, respect, trust in the search for truth, constructive cross-cultural critique of alternative world views to arrive at a shared multicultural world view, and the generation of new knowledge to enable the re-imagining of new futures where young people are drivers of social change. From these principals we developed a theory of practice and four global standards as guidelines. First, a commitment to inclusionary partnerships and communities of practice. Second, distributed autonomy across stakeholders in the institution characterized by respect for individuals’ associated rights and responsibilities. Third, constructive cross-cultural criticism underpinned by trust in a search for truth, using different group’s constructed identity schema’s to develop a shared multicultural world view. Fourth, the generation of new knowledge through structures and mechanisms to optimize participation.

Royal Messianism and the Jerusalem Priesthood in the Gospel of Mark

This book is a slightly revised version of a doctoral thesis completed at the School of Divinity at the University of Edinburgh in 2016 under the supervision of Matthew Novenson. Bernardo Cho investigates how Jewish messianism from the mid-second century BC to the late first century AD envisaged the proper relation between the Israelite king and the Jerusalem priests in the ideal future, and then attempts to describe how the Gospel of Mark addresses this issue in depicting Jesus. Cho’s argument comprises two major sections. The first section is a synchronic analysis of how the Israelite king was expected to interact with the high priest in the ideal future (chs. 1–2). In the second part of this book, Cho offers a close reading of the passages in Mark that are relevant for his purposes (chs. 3–5).Chapter 1 examines important passages from the Dead Sea Scrolls under the headings “Davidic Branch” and “Prince of the Congregation” (4Q252, 4Q174, 4Q285, 4Q161, 1QM, and 1QSB) and the “Messiahs (or Messiah) of Aaron and Israel” (1QS, CD, 1QSa). Cho concludes that, despite the preeminence of the messiah of Aaron in cultic procedures, kingship and priesthood are regarded as complementary in the messiah texts from the Scrolls. Chapter 2 focuses on texts from the Pseudepigrapha including Ps. Sol. 17, the Son of Man in the Similitudes of Enoch, and the Messiah in 4 Ezra and 2 Baruch. Cho claims this literature also takes it for granted that the Jerusalem priesthood would occupy a prominent place in the messianic kingdom, as the end-time royal ruler would bring about the purification of Zion.Cho argues in ch. 3, against recent critics, that Mark portrays the messiahship of Jesus in royal terms. According to Cho, the Markan Jesus fulfills the role of a royal messiah—he is the Son of God in the pattern of Ps 2 and the Israelite king in the patterns of Pss 109 and 117. Jesus in Mark does not achieve his goal by means of military force, but he is nonetheless the royal messiah, the one who brings about the kingdom of God.Chapter 4 examines three relevant passages in Mark 1–10 in which Mark portrays Jesus’s stance toward the Jerusalem priesthood prior to his climactic arrival into the Holy City. Cho begins with a preliminary discussion on Jesus and the chief priests in Mark. He then examines the Baptism of John (1:1–8), the healing of the leper and the witness to the priests (1:40–44), and the example of King David and Abiatha the High Priest (2:23–28). Despite the paucity of direct references to the temple establishment in Mark 1–10, there is an aggregation of passages that evince the hope for the priests to recognize the authority of Jesus.Chapter 5 analyzes five key passages in which Jesus interacts with the temple rulers in Jerusalem (Mark 11:15–18; 11:27–33; 12:1–12; 14:55–64; 15:33–39). According to Cho, what motivates Jesus’s clash with the priestly leaders is not his rejection of the Israelite worship but rather their obstinate refusal to acknowledge him. Mark tells us that it is because the priests repudiate the royal messiah that they, along with the temple itself, are doomed to face divine judgment. The priests could have secured their place in that vision, but, by rejecting the royal messiah, they put themselves outside the kingdom.In the concluding chapter, Cho draws some implications for the study of Jewish messianism in Mark and suggests the reasons Mark depicts Jesus vis-à-vis the Jerusalem priesthood the way he does. The book contains a bibliography of primary and secondary sources, an index of references, and an index of authors.Cho demonstrates a scholarly command of Second Temple Judaism and Markan studies. He engages in detailed exegesis of multiple passages. Cho also provides notes on the textual criticism of a passage. All translations from the ancient sources are done by Cho unless otherwise indicated. Cho considers and evaluates alternative points of view in the exegesis of passages. Some of Cho’s interpretations seem forced to converge with his thesis. As the author readily admits, Ps. Sol. 17 does not mention the priests as ruling alongside the king (p. 68). Cho also seems to suggest there were priests from Jerusalem present during the ministry of John the Baptist (p. 121) even though none are mentioned in the narrative (cf. Mark 1:5). In the final analysis, the author makes a plausible case for his thesis that Mark is concerned with the relationship between Jesus and Jerusalem priests. This book is a valuable contribution to our understanding of both messianic expectations in Second Temple Judaism and the Christology of Mark’s Gospel.

PENINGKATAN LEARNING ORGANIZATION MELALUI KEPEMIMPINAN TRANSFORMASIONAL DAN EFIKASI DIRI GURU SMP SWASTA BUDDHIS SE-PROVINSI BANTEN

IMPROVEMENT OF LEARNING ORGANIZATION THROUGH TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP AND EFICATION OF TEACHER OF BUDDHIS PRIVATE SCHOOL BANTEN PROVINCEThe purpose of this study was to find that learning organization can be improved by examining the relationship of learning organization, transformational leadership and self-efficacy. This research was conducted with a quantitative approach by using correlational statistical methods to determine whether transformational leadership and self-efficacy have a positive relationship with learning organization. Sampling in this study was using proportional random sampling technique with the taro yamane formula. The data collection to measuring instruments was a questionnaire. The results were continually analyzed by using the SITOREM methods in order to derive recommendations and determine the order of priority improvements that need to be made. This research was conducted on Buddhist Private Middle School teachers in Banten Province with a study population of 145 and a sample of 107 teachers. The results showed that there was a positive relationship between transformational leadership and learning organization with a relationship strength of ry1 = 0,530 and there was a positive relationship between self-efficacy and learning organization with a strength of ry2 = 0,477. This shows that learning organizations can be improved through the development of transformational leadership and self-efficacy. Sitorem’s analysis results showed that in the components of transformational leadership, self-efficacy and learning organization were found 10 indicators that need to be improved, namely: 1) Individualized consideration, 2) Confidence in understanding his / her abilities, 3) commitment and determination of everyone in the organization, 4) Systematic thinking patterns, 5) Individual Skills, 6) Organizational team attitude, 7) Make generalizations, 8) A conception of an ideal future, 9) A vision which agreed upon by all members of the organization and 10) Maturity.

Retention challenges for indigenous Peruvian college students on Beca 18 scholarship and strategies to improve their experiences and academic success

ABSTRACT This paper analyzes challenges indigenous Peruvian college students face in completing their studies, based on field research that included interviews with Peruvian higher education leaders, administrators, researchers, and faculty, and a review of published research. Since 2012, the government of Peru has sponsored Beca 18, a comprehensive scholarship designed to attract and support students from underrepresented populations, namely impoverished and largely indigenous communities. While the program has provided opportunities to thousands of students from all provinces, the struggles they have mirror those of other indigenous students around the world, including discrimination, unpreparedness, and attrition. The analysis pinpoints areas in which lessons from international scholarship and success strategies with other indigenous populations may enhance the success of the Beca 18 scholarship program and the experiences of its students. It discusses the critical role higher education institutions play in developing future leaders through future identity formation.

Observations on Appropriate Technology Application in Indigenous Community Using System Dynamics Modelling

It is possible to develop a well-sustained society by balancing social, technical, and environmental concerns at the community level. Indigenous governance methods provide enormous prospects for developing well-sustained societies. A limitation is the knowledge gap and lack of interest from dominant cultures. With the application of appropriate technology in development, it is possible for Indigenous communities to adjust technology to their uses and transfer their accumulated knowledge to the development of infrastructure and mechanisms for production incorporating cultural value. Activating such talents within the Indigenous community is important for enabling them to achieve their ideal future. Using participatory design methods, Indigenous people can be brought into the development planning to understand the key variables that limit and influence technology development. System dynamic modelling can be adapted to simulate these new attributes and develop plans and objectives based on outcomes from the model. An example is shown around a case study for community development in Papua, Indonesia. This research is to establish a long-term development plan for all stakeholders, while preserving the value of the Indigenous culture. An analysis of Indigenous social behavioral patterns toward development provides an idea of social-constructive values, which will allow Indigenous community to develop self-sustainable and independent communities.

Naming and the reconstruction of female identity in Bette-Obudu

This study suggests a theoretical connection between Bette given maiden name at birth, which tends to circumscribe the child’s psyche in the exclusive cast of future wife or mother; and the resultant personal identity of the adult woman in compliance or deviance. Using French feminist psychoanalytical critical theory which perceives sex roles and gender as patriarchal cultural constructs through the agency of language, the study rearticulates Bette-Obudu female names as ‘embodied’ signifiers that may have future identity consequences on the name-bearers in the contemporary world of multi-tasking. Using a purposive sample of 74 maiden names from the five Bette speaking communities, I argue, using qualitative ethnographic analysis, that these manipulative naming practices (re)construct the girl-child’s self-concept and self-image in some future time; finding further that a combination of neo-colonial religions, the 21st-century marriage institution and cultural traditions among Bette people may be contributory to name mutations and the creation of deviance. Significantly, female naming tradition among Bette people tends to ‘pre-fix’ the girl-child along patriarchal designs, thereby making the contemporary Bette woman appear marginal to other concerns of postmodern imperatives.

Identity Research That Engages Contextual Forces to Reduce Socioeconomic Disparities in Education

A growing amount of psychological research contributes to the understanding of complex social issues, including socioeconomic disparities in academic outcomes. At a basic level, several studies demonstrate the ways that socioeconomic resources and opportunities shape the identities of students during adolescence and young adulthood, particularly emphasizing how they imagine their lives in the future. These future identities, in turn, affect how students engage in school tasks and respond to academic difficulty. The implications of these basic insights connecting socioeconomic resources, identity, and academic outcomes are most meaningful when considered within various levels of social-contextual influence that surround students. A collection of studies demonstrates how peers, parents, teachers, and educational institutions as a whole can be targeted and leveraged to support student identities and outcomes. This deepened engagement with various levels of context can complement and advance the existing emphasis on individual-level intervention as a strategy to contribute to the progress of psychological science toward greater influence and significance.

New Host Record of Formicococcus polysperes Williams (Hemiptera: Pseudococcidae): An Emerging Pest of Taro Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott from India

The mealybug Formicococcus polysperes Williams (Hemiptera: Pseudococcidae) was reported for the first time attacking rhizomes of Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott from Nagaland state, India. In initial infestation, the tender rhizomes were observed to be covered with whitish powdery mass of mealybugs. In severe infestation, the entire underground portions of the plant were covered with mealybugs along with the black sooty mould in patches on plant parts. The infected plants showed symptoms of yellowing and withering of leaves accompanied with underdeveloped rhizomes which eventually dried prematurely. Results on survey of fields and a nearby storage facility revealed up to 52% crop loss due to its infestation. Among the eighteen genotype screened against F. polysperes, none of the genotype was found to be tolerant as average number of mealybug population ranged between 310 and 588 per rhizome (30–40 g weight). In this paper, we describe the damage symptoms, results of host screening and the diagnostic morphological characteristics of F. polysperes to facilitate its quick and reliable identity in future.

From Shattered Goals to Meaning in Life: Life Crafting in Times of the COVID-19 Pandemic

The novel COVID-19 pandemic has created an extraordinary situation for our generation, with many countries being on lockdown. With this new situation comes many psychological challenges, not only for health care workers and people suffering from COVID-19, but also for the general population. Adapting to the new situation can be demanding. Experts have suggested that emotions during this situation are very similar to grief, and people experience emptiness and sadness about the loss of their normal lives, which can even lead to a loss of meaning in life. In this paper, we argue that life crafting could offer a way to help people cope with the situation and renew their sense of meaning. A life crafting intervention is based on theoretical insights from multiple areas of research, like positive psychology, expressive writing, and the salutogenesis framework. Life-crafting interventions help people find meaning in life by focusing on their ideal future, and helping them set goals, make concrete plans to achieve those goals and overcome obstacles. Since having a clear purpose or meaning in life has been shown to have many benefits, we propose that it can also help people to cope with the psychological effects of the pandemic. A life-crafting intervention can offer people a chance to evaluate their goals in a time of uncertainty and rediscover meaning in life to guide them through these difficult times.

Estratégias cimarronas para narrar a negritude no século XIX em "Autobiografía" de Juan Francisco Manzano (Cuba, 1835) e "Úrsula" (Brasil, 1859)

This reflection will analyze the strategies used by two Latin American black writers to present the theme of blackness in the 19th century. On one side, the autobiography written by the cuban Juan Francisco Manzano (1835), the only autobiography text that shows one Latin American semiliterate slave black man that nar-rates your life in exchange for your liberty. On the other side the narrative written by Maria Firmina dos Reis, a free black woman considered the first female novelist in Brazil: Úrsula (1859), an abolitionist text whose main characters are white, surprises by giving voice to the slave people, who narrate their memories in Africa and are aware of their condition. Theoretical references will be used about the novel as a form of projection of an ideal future (Sommer, 2004), abolitionist texts as thesis novel (Jeffers, 2013), mask of speechlessness (Kilomba, 2019) and cimarronagem’s pedagogy (Mendes, 2019) intending to revise the Latin American literary canon in an inclusion proposal the two narratives to mandatory readings in the Litera-ture studies in the Latin American universities.

Constructing the Ideal Future in Foreign Military Media Discourses of The World War II Period

The major objective of the paper is to establish functions of modeling the ideal future in the British, American and French military media discourses of World War II period. The authors argue that military media discourse is a hybrid type that combines the components of military, political, military-political, and media discourses whose concentration and interpenetration can vary greatly. The military media discourse is a mode of organizing knowledge, ideas, or experience of war that are rooted in the media and influenced by historical, geopolitical, social, and cultural context. The approach taken in this study is a mixed methodology of linguistic political prognostics that integrates fundamentals of philosophy, future studies, cognitive linguistics, and political linguistics. The samples from the digitized archives of the UK, the USA, and France (24 695 samples) are investigated through a number of methods: corpus, descriptive, cognitive and discourse analyses, cultural, metaphorical modeling, and comparative analyses. Being a basic value of military media discourse, the ideal future is determined by its nature: the idea of a better world inherent in human nature is intensified in transformative moments, war being one of them; representing the present, the media model both the past and the future. The ideal future integrates the key features of utopia and prognosis differing from them in certain specific characteristics. Its basic functions are prognostic, constructive, modeling, critical, provocative, and visualizing ones that complement one another in con-structing an ideal projection of the postwar world and the future of the USSR as a geopolitical ally of Great Britain, the USA, and France.

Life Crafting as a Way to Find Purpose and Meaning in Life.

Having a purpose in life is one of the most fundamental human needs. However, for most people, finding their purpose in life is not obvious. Modern life has a way of distracting people from their true goals and many people find it hard to define their purpose in life. Especially at younger ages, people are searching for meaning in life, but this has been found to be unrelated to actually finding meaning. Oftentimes, people experience pressure to have a “perfect” life and show the world how well they are doing, instead of following up on their deep-felt values and passions. Consequently, people may need a more structured way of finding meaning, e.g., via an intervention. In this paper, we discuss evidence-based ways of finding purpose, via a process that we call “life crafting.” This process fits within positive psychology and the salutogenesis framework – an approach focusing on factors that support human health and well-being, instead of factors that cause disease. This process ideally starts with an intervention that entails a combination of reflecting on one’s values, passions and goals, best possible self, goal attainment plans, and other positive psychology intervention techniques. Important elements of such an intervention are: (1) discovering values and passion, (2) reflecting on current and desired competencies and habits, (3) reflecting on present and future social life, (4) reflecting on a possible future career, (5) writing about the ideal future, (6) writing down specific goal attainment and “if-then” plans, and (7) making public commitments to the goals set. Prior research has shown that personal goal setting and goal attainment plans help people gain a direction or a sense of purpose in life. Research findings from the field of positive psychology, such as salutogenesis, implementation intentions, value congruence, broaden-and-build, and goal-setting literature, can help in building a comprehensive evidence-based life-crafting intervention. This intervention can aid individuals to find a purpose in life, while at the same time ensuring that they make concrete plans to work toward this purpose. The idea is that life crafting enables individuals to take control of their life in order to optimize performance and happiness.

"The Most Trustworthy Coin"

Bitcoin is an innovative technological network, a new, non-governmental currency, and a worldwide group of users. In other words, Bitcoin is a complex sociotechnical system with a complex set of risks and challenges for anyone using it. We investigated how everyday users of Bitcoin develop trust in Bitcoin on one of the largest online communities devoted to Bitcoin: the Reddit.com r/bitcoin forum. Using qualitative content analysis, we examined how trust in Bitcoin develops based on contributions to this community. On r/bitcoin, trust in Bitcoin is driven by a pervasive ideology we call the "True Bitcoiner" ideology. This ideological viewpoint in centered on the interpretation of Bitcoin as functionally "trustless" and risk-free. Despite widespread evidence of emerging individual and system-level risks with using Bitcoin, participants continue to maintain this ideological perspective. This ideology consists of three primary beliefs: viewing Bitcoin's technology as more trustworthy than its people; rejecting 'corrupt' social hierarchies related to money; and the importance of accumulating or 'HODLing' quantities of Bitcoin as a strategy to create an ideal future. We conclude that this "True Bitcoiner" ideology is maintained despite contradictory evidence in the world because it allows participants to more easily interpret Bitcoin and make decisions by reducing perceived risk and uncertainty in the system. The role of this ideology on r/bitcoin demonstrates an expanded conceptualization of how trust is created and socially-mediated in socio-technical contexts.

A sustainable future for mining by 2030? Insights from an expert focus group

“What do you think the Mine of 2030 will be like?”Animated by this question, The University of Queensland’s Sustainable Minerals Institute 2018 Master Class on “Mining and Society in the 21st Century” developed a vision of an ideal future for the mining industry in 2030. Discussions explored the means to accelerate the industry’s current trajectory towards greater sustainability. The class included doctoral students and academic researchers from diverse cultural backgrounds whose mining-focused work spans a broad range of disciplines. This paper distils the outcomes of the discussions and propose actions into a framework that centres on the interface between mining companies, governments and host communities. We argue that there are several concrete actions that the mining industry should adopt immediately to promote trust between stakeholders and strengthen the industry’s contribution to achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.