Connexity - Geoff Mulgan

Connexity: Responsibility, Freedom, Business and Power in the New Century (Revised Edition)

'Freedom allows us to realise our potential, to live life to the full, to imagine and create...' (page 1)

• When we have no restrictions we discover new things. 
• Do artists have a responsibility to use this freedom to do good? Or in a situation where freedom is not granted, should art be used as a means to battle against this?

[Speaking about nineteenth century communications systems] '... are founded around ideologies of freedom - of free expression and free speech.' (page 3)

• Modern communication methods work alongside the concept of freedom - this could be argued against in terms of privacy. 
• In general though, technological developments have aided free speech and sharing of ideas, especially the internet. 

'To be meaningful, freedom entails being able to leave the family or the community, to act against its interests." (page 4)

• This quote suggests that for something to have meaning it must oppose something and put forward an argument, therefore it must have an opinion. 

'John Stuart Mill declared that only harm to others justifies the restraint of freedom. This has never been an easy idea to turn into practice, since it begs the questions of what counts as harm.' (page 6/7)

• This is a basic system of punishment. As we question what 'harm' is, we reach topics such as discrimination and political correctness. 
• In relation to social responsibility, where is the boundary between standing up for what you believe in and not causing offence to others?

'faced with complexity it is easier to focus on a simple mission, or a few measurable outputs and to disregard everything else.' (page 10)

• Changing the world through art is unlikely although not impossible. I like the idea that smaller, simple missions can be tackled as a sort of step by step process to something bigger.
• In relation to social responsibility, this quote suggests that it is not a big feat to make a change. A Making a difference through art on any scale will in some way contribute to the bettering of society. 
• For example, working on a visual campaign to increase recycling in your local area won't change the world over night but it is a small, manageable step towards making positive changes in the environment. 

'But there is also an oral dimension, in that a more connected world brings with it a moral duty to consider the effects we have on others, and a need for moral fluency that goes beyond simply learning codes of right and wrong by rote. For moral as well as practical reasons we even have to think in a different way, understanding the world as made up of complex systems rather than linear relationships, ecologies rather than machines.' (page 11)

• I think this is about understanding that it is not a straight forward process and to make a difference in society, you have to understand its structure to some extent. This could relate back to the ideas of social status but also understanding that people have varying ideas of what would be a positive change to society. 

'Reciprocity, the idea of give and take, of the golden mean, is the most important idea for a developed democratic society, and it should underpin our social morality.' (page 14)

• I think that this quote is saying that out social morality should be a to and fro transaction between the artist and society. The concept of giving back suggests something has been given to you in the first place. 
• This links to the argument raised in the Benetton essay about social responsibility being a gimmick. It could be argued that maybe it isn't a gimmick if it is a give and take relationship meaning that it is okay to gain from what you give. 

Connexity: interdependence and interrelationship between and among individuals, machines, and the global communications network.