Though every year seems to bring its own theme of revolution and social change, arguably 2014 can best be spent sewing our past hopes into our future aspirations. Perhaps it is time to put our current conception of “revolution” to rest, to build a new, more lasting, understanding of the idea.
Since crossing into the age of majority, and being an avid news follower, I have found myself repeatedly misguided by a feeling of intrigue and anticipation. In 2008, the feeling first grew as the stock market tumbled. Surely, outrage at the incompetence of the financial industry would spur shocking and sudden civil unrest.
As we entered 2009, the full scope of the global recession became clear. As banks around the world clamoured for government bailouts, I became nervous that a global revolution must be imminent. But something strange happened, and the revolution didn’t come. Populations worldwide had been devastated by the recession, losing pensions, forced to take pay cuts, and paying higher taxes. But though I checked diligently every day, though I felt so sure that we were on the cusp of disaster, the revolution didn’t come.
In 2010 I found new reason to anticipate change, only to have the expectations dissipate as quickly as they arose. I watched in Toronto as protestors set up camp outside the G20 meetings, only to find myself disgusted by the results. Citizens and police officers alike found new ways to degrade both themselves and our city, and the meetings passed with dignitaries blissfully ignorant to the broken Starbucks windows and burning police cars outside. 2011 proved equally unsettling. By then, the Arab Spring had engulfed the Middle East, and change seemed unavoidable. By the middle of the year, Occupy Wall Street had become the much subdued Western version of the same revolution. However, for as real as both first seemed, their realities proved hollow. Syria has descended into a devastating civil war, many north African countries are engaged in regional conflicts with radical Islamic factions, and across Asia, massive economic inequality has proven the breeding ground for fanaticism and radicalism. In the Western world, “Occupy” is yesterday’s news, as regulations have been slow to take hold and economic inequality continues.
By 2012, feeling burnt out by the disappointment of my false predictions, I could watch with only feigned interest as the protests against the Keystone pipeline picked up. Then a new movement took hold, the First Nations-led “Idle No More,” but though I was hopeful, I found myself unable to become attached to the series of events. Besides, both seemed small in scale compared to the last few years, and if those global attempts at revolutions had failed, these efforts seemed doomed to as well. I began to feel as if any momentum picked up in the last few years had been lost. The tide had turned, and revolution simply wasn’t coming. In 2013, that feeling was only confirmed. The year was dominated by headlines about a return to economic competence and the permeation of social media and self-exposure; feel good stories to help us forget ongoing conflicts and global issues.
However, the issues were not forgotten, and movements in favour of widespread social change continue to brew. Of the more celebrity faces spurring these movements, Russell Brand seemed to frame the issues with an eloquence only a British accent can provide, in a series of interviews popularized through social media. Though his plea is passionate and endearing, it led me to what feels to be the polar opposite of his intended message. Brandt spoke of tearing down our current structures, and ending the current system of power distribution. After so many cynical years, I would have thought these messages would have resonated with me, but they did not. Instead I felt even more embittered, and was fairly glad to know I would soon be leaving 2013 behind.
As I enter 2014, I find myself much less cynical, with a renewed hope brought on by the level of understanding only the recognition of past mistakes can truly generate. I realize now that I was anticipating the wrong revolution, and the one I was right to have expected has indeed been underway for years. The wrong revolution is the sudden one. It has a cool name, a trendy cause, an outburst of popular support matched by a saturating two weeks in the news. It is exciting, fun, full of hope and promise, and ultimately doomed to fail. It is doomed, in part, because the world is not suited to it. There are simply too many issues, too many competing concerns and interests, for any one event to so entirely dominate our conscious as to precipitate any massive or destructive social changes. Populations at large want these revolutions to succeed, but they cannot invest in them, as there is also so much to be lost. And herein lies the truth of the real revolution, the slow-burning one that, if you watch the news as avidly as I do, you may miss altogether.
The revolution I’ve come to notice is the revolution of progress, and it is powerful and long lasting. The fruits of its labour are already among us. Human rights standards are more rigidly supported and maintained than at any point in history, the standard of living in many developing countries is at an all-time high, global economic relations are now more closely tied to societal goals and programs than ever before, and the environmental movement is seeing real, tangible industry progress from the US, to Dubai, to Hong Kong. Though all these signs of progress can be matched by a hundred examples of continued problems and failures, they still help fill in a larger picture.
On a whole, societies are continuing to progress, towards democracy, towards independence, towards a better life. Perhaps 2014 will best be spent not in pursuit of a new theme, but in maintaining past progress, and ensuring it continues. For all the problems we have in the world, many of us are still unwilling to participate in the romanticized destructive revolution some still claim is necessary. It would seem the greater desire is not to remove our current structures and institutions, but rather to continue improving them. New uses of technology, and improved means of global communication, make it all the more likely such improvements can feasibly be achieved. An improving global economy, despite all its flaws, can continue to foster prosperity with proper oversight, regulation, and management. The movement is slow, but vigilant citizens have a greater chance than ever to ensure positive, lasting progress. Revolution likely isn’t coming in the way I once thought, but now I truly believe that is a good thing. The best revolution we can hope for is not one that destroys, but rather one that builds on the progress we have already made, and that revolution is well under way.