Interview Series: Strategic Communication Perspectives in Global Media | Interviewer: Gökhan Çolak
Identity & Representation
How do you navigate and balance the different layers of your professional identity—as a CEO, a crisis communication expert, and a public figure? What key dynamics determine which aspect of your identity comes to the forefront in different contexts?
Balancing the different layers of my professional identity is less about choosing one over the other and more about consciously integrating them while staying anchored in purpose. At the core, my role as a CEO defines my responsibilities: I lead, make strategic decisions, and ensure short and long term impact. This perspective is always present, especially when navigating high stakes situations where business continuity is on the line. My identity as a crisis communication expert comes to the forefront in moments of uncertainty or reputational risk. In those contexts, precision, clarity, and timing become critical. I shift into a mode that prioritizes rapid assessment, stakeholder mapping, and message discipline, ensuring that every word and action supports stability and credibility.
As a public figure, I operate with an awareness that visibility amplifies both influence and accountability. Here, authenticity and consistency are key. It’s not just what I communicate, but how I embody values over time that shapes trust with broader audiences. The dynamic that determines which aspect leads is context: Urgency and risk level activate the crisis expert mindset, strategic direction and leadership decisions call forward the CEO mindset. Visibility and public engagement highlight the public figure and opinion. What ties them all together is a clear internal compass of my values, knowledge, experience, and a deep understanding of responsibility. Rather than seeing these roles as separate, I view them as complementary lenses that allow me to respond with both agility and integrity. Ultimately, the balance comes from being intentional: knowing when to support and empower, when to guide, and when to represent—and ensuring that all three are aligned in service of trust and the most professional service in our industry.
Image & Institutional Authority
How would you theorize the relationship between personal image and institutional authority? In high-visibility roles, how do individual representation and organizational credibility interact?
This relationship is not neutral, it’s a power exchange. In high visibility roles, your personal image doesn’t just reflect the institution, you actively compete with it for trust. The audience is constantly asking: Do I believe the system, or do I believe the person standing in front of me? And in many cases, they decide faster about the person than they ever will about the institution. Institutions don’t speak, people do. And when they do, they compress complexity into something emotionally legible. A single appearance, a single sentence, can either reinforce years of institutional credibility—or unravel it. So the interaction is not passive. It’s volatile.
When alignment is strong, personal image becomes an amplifier. It accelerates trust, humanizes authority, and makes the institution feel coherent and real. But when there’s even a slight gap (between what the institution claims and how the individual behaves) that gap becomes a fracture line. And in today’s environment, fracture lines don’t stay small. They scale instantly.
There’s also a strategic tension most leaders underestimate: the more visible and trusted the individual becomes, the more fragile the institution can become behind them. You can unintentionally centralize credibility in yourself, and that is a hidden risk. Because the moment you step back, the question becomes: Was the authority ever institutional, or was it always personal?
So the task is not to “balance” the two it’s to actively manage the transfer of trust. Sometimes you step forward and embody the institution, especially in moments of crisis, when people need clarity, not structure. But in moments of stability, you have to deliberately step back and let the institution carry the weight. That’s how you build resilience beyond personality. Because ultimately, if your presence is the only thing holding credibility together, you don’t have authority, you have dependency. And dependency is not leadership. It’s a liability.
Crisis Communication Theory
Do you approach crisis communication primarily as a process of perception management, or as the construction and reframing of reality? How can these two dimensions be balanced in practice?
Crisis communication is often framed as a choice: perception management or the construction of reality. I think this is dangerous. Because in a real crisis, perception is reality, at least in its immediate consequences. Markets react to it. Stakeholders make decisions based on it. Reputations rise or collapse because of it. So if you treat perception as something secondary, you’ve already lost control of the situation.
Crisis communication is not just about managing how reality is seen. It is about actively shaping what reality becomes next. Every statement, every silence, every framing choice sets direction. You are not just describing events, you are defining meaning, assigning responsibility, and opening or closing pathways for what happens after. In that sense, crisis communication is an act of leadership, not just messaging.
So the real challenge is how you operate in both dimensions at once, without losing credibility. If you focus only on perception management, you risk manipulation. You might stabilize the surface, but the underlying reality will eventually break through, and when it does, the trust deficit is far worse. If you focus only on “objective reality,” you risk irrelevance. Because »reality« that is not translated, framed, and understood might as well not exist in the public space.
The balance comes from discipline: You align narrative with facts, but you also recognize that facts don’t speak for themselves. You move fast on perception, but you anchor it in verifiable truth. You simplify, but you don’t distort. And most importantly, you understand timing. Early in a crisis, perception leads. People need clarity before they have complete information. Later, reality must catch up, and it must confirm what you signaled at the start. That’s where credibility is either built or destroyed. Because ultimately, crisis communication is not about choosing between perception and reality. It’s about closing the gap between them, fast enough to lead, and honestly enough to be believed.
Transparency & Strategic Boundaries
In moments of crisis, where should the boundary be drawn between transparency and strategic communication? How can organizations balance full disclosure with controlled messaging from both an ethical and operational standpoint?
Transparency is often treated as an absolute virtue in a crisis. It isn’t. Because the real question is not how much you disclose, but whether what you disclose is meaningful, responsible, and timely. Total transparency sounds principled, but in practice, it can be reckless. Incomplete data, unverified details, or prematurely shared information can escalate harm, create confusion, or even compromise legal and operational outcomes. On the other hand, overly controlled messaging, what people instinctively label as “spin”, erodes trust just as quickly. So the boundary is not fixed. It’s strategic, and it’s ethical. Transparency is about truthfulness. Strategic communication is about timing, framing, and impact.
You owe stakeholders the truth. Always. But you do not owe them chaos. In the early stages of a crisis, clarity matters more than completeness. People need to understand what is happening, what it means for them, and what is being done about it. That requires discipline, choosing what to say now, what to confirm later, and what must remain temporarily undisclosed for valid reasons, whether legal, security related, or operational.
The mistake organizations make is thinking that withholding information is the primary risk. It’s not. The real risk is misalignment, when what you say, what you know, and what eventually becomes public don’t match. That’s where trust collapses. Ethically, the line is crossed the moment communication becomes deceptive, when omission turns into manipulation, or when framing distorts responsibility. Strategically, the line is crossed when speed overrides accuracy, or when control overrides credibility. You should communicate early, but you signal uncertainty where it exists. You disclose facts, but you contextualize them so they are not misinterpreted. You protect sensitive information, but you explain why it cannot yet be shared. And most importantly, you treat communication as a sequence, not a single act. Transparency is not a dump of information, it’s a commitment to progressively reveal the truth as it becomes reliable. Because in a crisis, people don’t expect you to know everything immediately. But they do expect that whatever you say is true, and that tomorrow, it won’t contradict what you said today. That consistency, that integrity over time, is where transparency and strategy stop being in tension and start reinforcing each other.
Decision-Making Under Uncertainty
In environments defined by uncertainty and time pressure, what methodological or cognitive framework guides your decision-making process? How do you weigh data, intuition, and experience?
In a crisis, you are never choosing between a good option and a bad one. You are choosing between incomplete versions of risk, with limited time, imperfect data, and very real consequences. So the idea that decisions are purely datadriven is at least partialy a myth. Data is critical, but in a crisis, it is usualy late, partial, or contested. If you wait for full clarity, you are no longer leading, you are reacting.
You must first structure the unknown: You rapidly define what you know, what you don’t know, and what would change your decision if you knew it. That prevents paralysis and sharpens focus. Then anchor in principles, not just information, cause when data is unstable, principles become your decision making infrastructure. What do we protect first: people, reputation, continuity? If that hierarchy is clear, decisions become faster and more consistent. And integrate intuition. Intuition is compressed experience. It’s pattern recognition built over time. But it only works if it’s been trained in real environments, and if you are disciplined enough to question and use it under pressure.
Experience, in that sense, is what allows you to sense signal in noise. It tells you when something is escalating, even before the data fully confirms it. But here’s the critical tension: Data gives you justification, experience gives you orientation and intuition gives you speed. And in a crisis, speed matters, because delay is also a decision, just an unspoken one. So the balance is not equal weighting. It’s dynamic. Early in a crisis, intuition and experience often lead, because you don’t have the luxury of time. As the situation stabilizes, data must take a stronger and primary role, because decisions need to scale, align, and hold up under scrutiny.
But there’s one more layer that is often overlooked: decision visibility. In high stakes environments, it’s not enough to make the right decision, you have to make it understandable. Because if stakeholders cannot follow your reasoning, they won’t trust the outcome. So ultimately: Act before you are fully ready. Ground decisions in principles, not pressure. Continuously update your position as reality becomes clearer. Because in uncertainty, the goal is not perfect decisions. It’s decisions that remain defensible as the truth unfolds.
Rationality vs Intuition in Leadership
How do you position the relationship between rationality and intuition in leadership? Particularly in crisis situations, how should leaders balance analytical thinking with rapid, instinctive decision-making?
We often talk about rationality and intuition as if they are opposites. They’re not. They are two different speeds of thinking, and in leadership, especially in crisis, you need both operating at once. Rationality is structured. It’s analytical, deliberate, evidence based. It gives you defensibility. It allows your decisions to hold under scrutiny, internally, externally, and over time. Intuition, on the other hand, is fast. It’s immediate. It cuts through complexity before it’s fully articulated. And in high pressure situations, that speed is not a luxury, it’s a necessity. Because in a crisis, if you rely only on rationality, you will be too slow. And if you rely only on intuition, you will/could eventually be wrong. So the question is which one leads and when?
Early in a crisis, intuition often moves first. It signals that something is off before the data is complete. It allows you to act while others are still analyzing. But intuition without discipline is dangerous. It needs to be interrogated and pressure tested against facts, challenged by diverse perspectives, and translated into a decision that can be explained, not just felt. That’s where rationality comes in. Rational thinking doesn’t replace intuition, it stabilizes it. It turns instinct into strategy. It ensures that what feels right can also stand up to reality. But here’s the deeper point: intuition is not irrational.
It is pattern recognition built through experience. It is what allows leaders to recognize escalation, reputational risk, or stakeholder reaction before it fully materializes. And that means not all intuition is equal. Untrained intuition is bias. Trained intuition is expertise. So the real responsibility of leadership is to develop intuition that deserves to be trusted, and to build systems that prevent it from going unchecked. Because in the end, the balance is not static. You move fast, but you validate. You trust your instinct, but you make it explainable. You analyze, but you don’t hide behind analysis. And most importantly: you don’t confuse confidence with correctness. Because in crisis leadership, the goal is not to eliminate uncertainty. It’s to make decisions that are fast enough to matter and grounded enough to last.
Power: Structural vs Relational
Do you conceptualize power primarily as a structural position, or as a relational and contextual phenomenon? How does this perspective shape your leadership and communication strategies?
We tend to think of power as something you have. A title. A position. Authority defined by structure. But in practice, especially in crisis, that version of power is often the least reliable. Because structural power gives you permission to decide. It does not guarantee that others will follow. Real power is relational. It exists in how people respond to you, how much they trust you, and whether they are willing to act on your words, especially when the situation is unclear, uncomfortable, or high-risk. And that makes power inherently unstable. You can hold the highest position in an organization, and still lose influence in a moment if credibility fractures. At the same time, someone without formal authority can become highly influential if they are trusted, consistent, reliable and clear when it matters most.
So the challenge is how consciously you manage the gap between the two. Because leadership happens in that gap. Structural power sets the stage, it gives you access, visibility, and formal responsibility. But relational power determines whether your leadership actually works. And communication is the bridge between them. Every message you deliver either strengthens or weakens that bridge. It either reinforces trust, or introduces doubt.
Power is contextual. In a crisis, power shifts quickly. Stakeholders, employees, media, regulators, the publics, can all redefine the landscape in real time. Authority becomes negotiated, not assumed. So leadership is no longer about holding power. It’s about earning it continuously, in every interaction, under pressure, in full visibility.Because in the end, structural power may give you a voice. But relational power determines whether that voice is believed and whether it results in action.
Gender, Perception & Legitimacy
In the context of female leadership, how do you analyze the impact of physical appearance on professional legitimacy? What strategies have you developed to navigate or counter such perceptual biases?
When we talk about leadership, we like to believe it’s evaluated on competence. But it’s filtered (constantly) through perception. And for women in leadership, physical appearance remains one of the most persistent and least acknowledged filters of all. It shapes first impressions. It influences perceived authority. And, whether we like it or not, it still affects how legitimacy is granted, or withheld. The paradox is sharp: If you align too closely with traditional expectations of appearance, you risk being underestimated. If you deviate from them, you risk being judged as less credible, less “appropriate,” or less authoritative. So the margin for interpretation is narrower. And the scrutiny is higher. But here’s where I take a very clear position. The goal is not to escape perception. That’s impossible.
The goal is to strategically control what perception is anchored to. For me, it comes down to:
consistency of presence Over time, people recalibrate what they focus on. If your communication is precise, your decisions are coherent, and your behavior is aligned, attention shifts, from how you look to how you lead and operate.
clarity of voice Ambiguity invites projection. The clearer and more structured your communication, the less space there is for bias to fill in the gaps.
ownership, not avoidance Trying to minimize visibility rarely works, it often reinforces the very bias you’re trying to escape. Instead, I treat visibility as an asset. If you are seen, then be seen on your terms, with intention, coherence, and control over the narrative you project. So the objective is not just to succeed within existing perceptions. It’s to shift them. To expand what (moral) authority and profesionalism looks like. To normalize different expressions of leadership. And to make competence (not conformity) the dominant signal.
Because legitimacy should not be something women have to negotiate through appearance. But until that changes, the reality is this: You don’t ignore perception. You don’t submit to it. You outgrow it by making it irrelevant to the value you deliver.
Digital Media, Truth & Disinformation
How do you assess the erosion of the concept of ‘truth’ in the context of the rapid development of digital media and increasing disinformation, and how is this transformation reshaping the way the tension between ethics and pragmatism is managed in crisis communication?
We often say that truth is under pressure. I think that’s an understatement. What we are actually witnessing is not just the erosion of truth, but its fragmentation. Digital media hasn’t simply accelerated information. It has multiplied realities. Today, the question is no longer “What is true?”It’s “Which version of the truth gains traction and why?” Because in a hyper connected environment, visibility is no longer tied to accuracy. It’s tied to speed, emotion, and amplification. And that changes the rules fundamentally. Disinformation doesn’t win because it’s credible. It wins because it’s fast, simple, and emotionally compelling, which puts crisis communication in a very uncomfortable position. Because traditionally, ethics and pragmatism were seen as complementary: You tell the truth and you communicate it effectively. Today, that alignment is under strain. If you move too slowly in the name of accuracy, you lose the narrative. If you move too fast in the name of control, you risk compromising truth. So the tension is no longer theoretical. It’s operational: minute by minute, decision by decision.
The critical shift is that crisis communication is no longer just about delivering truth. It’s about making truth competitive. That means understanding the mechanics of attention, amplification, and belief, without surrendering to them. It means framing facts not only correctly but also resonantly. Because facts that don’t travel might as well not exist in the public space, but this is where the ethical line becomes sharper, not weaker. Because the temptation is real, to simplify too much, to over frame, to push narratives that win attention but stretch reality. And the moment you do that, you enter the same logic as disinformation, just with better intentions. That’s the trap. So the question becomes: how do you remain effective without becoming compromised? The answer is high discipline: Competing on clarity, not distortion. Competing on speed, but not at the expense of truth. Competing on relevance by connecting facts to what people actually care about.
And you must accept something difficult: You will not win every narrative battle. But if you lose credibility, you lose everything. Because in an environment where truth is contested, credibility becomes the last stable currency. And credibility is not built in the moment of crisis. It is built before and tested during. So this transformation is not just technological. It is deeply ethical. It forces leaders to decide, under pressure and in full visibility: Do you optimize for attention? Or do you anchor in integrity and find ways to make it visible? Because in the end, crisis communication is no longer just about protecting reputation. It’s about defending the conditions under which truth can still matter. And that is no longer just a professional responsibility. It’s a leadership one.
Future of Crisis Communication
How would you conceptualize the interplay between power, communication, and trust within a unified theoretical framework? From this perspective, what structural directions do you see for the future evolution of crisis communication, and what fundamental principle could be formulated to contribute to the academic literature?
From an analytical perspective, the interplay between power, communication, and trust can be conceptualized as a triadic, co/constitutive system, in which each element is conditioned by the others. Power, in this framework, is not treated solely as a structural attribute (position, hierarchy, institutional authority), but as a relational capacity to shape meaning and coordinate action under conditions of uncertainty. Communication functions as the operational mechanism through which this capacity is exercised, it is the medium that translates authority into influence. Trust, in turn, operates as the legitimizing currency of the system: it determines whether communicated meaning is accepted, contested, or rejected by relevant stakeholders.
Crucially, this relationship is dynamic rather than linear. Communication does not simply transmit power; it actively produces and redistributes it, while trust serves both as an outcome of prior interactions and as a precondition for future effectiveness. In this sense, trust can be understood as a form of deferred validation, a temporally extended evaluation of consistency between communicated claims and observable reality. Within crisis contexts, this triadic relationship becomes particularly visible and accelerated. Crises function as stress tests of systemic coherence, exposing misalignments between institutional claims (power), communicative practices, and stakeholder expectations (trust). When communication fails to align with either the realities of the situation or the perceived legitimacy of authority, trust deteriorates, and with it, the effective capacity to exercise power.
Building on this, we can conceptualize crisis communication as a process of dynamic alignment across three dimensions:
Epistemic alignment: the degree to which communication corresponds to verifiable reality (truth conditions).
Relational alignment: the degree to which communication resonates with stakeholder expectations, values, and perceptions (trust conditions).
Institutional alignment: the degree to which communication reflects and reinforces legitimate authority structures (power conditions).
Effective crisis communication occurs at the intersection of these three axes. Misalignment in any one dimension (factually correct but socially tone deaf communication, or strategically persuasive but factually weak messaging) produces instability in the overall system. From this theoretical standpoint, several structural shifts are likely to shape the future evolution of crisis communication:
From centralized authority to distributed credibility Digital media environments decentralize the production and validation of information. Authority is no longer monopolized by institutions but is continuously negotiated across networks. This implies a shift from control based to coordination based communication models.
From information asymmetry to transparency ecosystems The declining feasibility of information control necessitates a move toward structured transparency. where organizations design communication as an ongoing, staged process rather than episodic disclosure.
From message delivery to meaning competition Crisis communication increasingly operates within environments of competing narratives. The task is not only to provide accurate information but to ensure that it achieves interpretive dominance without compromising epistemic integrity.
From reactive to anticipatory communication systems The integration of data analytics, real-time monitoring, and scenario planning will shift crisis communication toward pre-emptive framing, where potential crises are partially shaped before they fully materialize.
The effectiveness of crisis communication is determined by the continuous alignment between communicated representations of reality, the relational expectations of stakeholders, and the perceived legitimacy of authority. Sustainable influence emerges not from the control of information, but from the capacity to maintain coherence across these dimensions over time. This principle emphasizes that credibility is neither static nor unidimensional. It is dynamically produced through the interaction of truth, perception, and authority, and can only be sustained through their ongoing alignment.
In this sense, the future of crisis communication lies not in refining isolated techniques, but in developing integrated systems of meaning management, where power, communication, and trust are understood as mutually constitutive elements of a single, evolving “structure”.
Merrimack College Professor of Media and Communication | Melissa Zimdars
Media and Reality: Critique of a New Era A Pr Carnet World Interview Series
1. Academic Background and Motivation
What initially motivated you to work in the field of media literacy and combating misinformation?
My primary field is Media Studies, and in the fall of 2016 I taught an Introduction to Media course that included working on media literacy. I created an in-class assignment to help students evaluate and identify different kinds of online media sources, from fake news and clickbait to satire and political reporting.
I posted that assignment online asking my peers for feedback and it went viral! However, when some news organizations picked up the story, my in-class assignment turned into a “fake news list”! I realized that if such a silly thing could be reported on so wrongly by reputable organizations, it’s going to be an uphill battle for them—for everyone, really—to responsibly engage with media.
Your project “List of Fake News Sites” gained significant public attention. Could you share the motivation behind it and the academic/social impacts it had afterward?
After my work went viral I tried really hard to make it a stand-alone resource or a more public-facing document to help people. I better defined terms, expanded the list of sources, and added tips for evaluating sources. A number of libraries added it to their collections as a resource. Eventually the document expanded to over a thousand different sources with the help of some awesome librarians, and it became a dataset for researchers to use when examining fake news and mis/disinformation sources and networks. Now, that dataset has been folded into other, larger datasets that are more consistently updated to help people analyze these kinds of sources.
Personally, I’ve turned more toward understanding how people engage with mis/disinformation, how it travels from fringe to mainstream social media platforms, how hands-off rules and regulations by both platforms and governments enable its spread, and how reputable news organizations sometimes play a role in amplifying and laundering it for wider audiences.
2. Fake News, Disinformation, and Digital Media
After the 2016 US presidential elections, the term “fake news” became widely discussed. Do you think this term still holds meaning today, or has it become diluted?
I never found ‘fake news’ to be particularly helpful. In Media Studies, we previously used the term to talk about satire and other comedic forms of news. But around 2016 it became a kind of catchall for problematic content rather than a specific kind of quickly produced false content that mimicked the style of news. Now, non-satirical ‘fake news’ is typically considered a kind of mis/disinformation alongside things like political propaganda, pink slime websites (political sites that look like local news sources), and other types of sources that primarily produce content to persuade rather than to inform.
How does the decline in trust toward traditional media and the rise of social media as a primary news source affect efforts to combat disinformation?
Declining trust (in media, in government institutions, in health and science information and systems, and so much more) is a huge problem, especially among people who identify with the political right.
Whether people trust a source of information is deeply connected to their own political beliefs, and rightwing media figures and organizations within the United States have spent decades undermining and vilifying legacy media institutions while simultaneously building up their own incredibly robust and lucrative rightwing media system. Their system is incredibly insular, repeating the same talking points over and over, regardless of their accuracy, across articles, podcasts, websites, and social media accounts or platforms, creating what is called a propaganda feedback loop. If anyone in that system pushes back and challenges a talking point, they are then also deemed to be untrustworthy and risk losing their credibility with rightwing audiences.
So, basically, we have a situation in the United States where there are two media worlds. One of those worlds connects to legacy media organizations and the other serves the political right and is deeply connected to the Trump administration. Engaging in one means distrusting the other, so trying to reach people who engage the latter with accurate information is unlikely to work because they are very unlikely to trust it.
3. Media Literacy and the Future of Education
In your view, how can media literacy education be made more accessible not just for students, but for the general public as well? Are there any initiatives you find particularly effective?
We definitely need to incorporate media literacy much earlier in our educational systems, but outside of accessible public resources and library events, I’m honestly not sure. I’ve actually become pretty cynical in this area. Media literacy is necessary but it’s not a solution. We really need an overhaul of our media and social media systems: more public service journalism, less profit-motivated and rage-enhancing social media platforms, regulations and policies surrounding AI and the slop it churns out, structural changes to our political institutions and systems, actual political consequences for public figures who repeatedly lie, and so much more. We need to fix fundamental aspects of our media environments before we can fully depend on people to successfully navigate them.
What role should academics, journalists, and content creators play in fostering media criticism? How important are interdisciplinary collaborations in advancing critical media literacy?
Academics and educators obviously play a critical role in helping students develop critical thinking skills and media literacy. Journalists and content creators can and should do more in helping remove the barriers that people face when they have to practice or use those skills when navigating media environments. That means creating news or content with integrity and responsibly and quickly correcting mistakes. But journalists and creators can only do so much as individuals working within and via broken systems. It’s ultimately the organizations and platforms that need to do a lot of the fundamental work.
For example, it would be helpful if news organizations did away with mis/disinformation-spreading sponsored content that litter their own websites in the form of “chumboxes.”
4. Gender and Digital Representations
From the perspective of feminist media studies, what are your observations on the representation of women on digital platforms? How do these representations intersect with the production of misinformation?
We’ve seen a huge amount of political propaganda in the U.S., including mis/disinformation, that is deeply sexist, racist, and xenophobic. For example, anti-abortion mis/disinformation frequently underpins anti-abortion policies across many states. Anti-abortion policies also connect to growing resentment that many young men feel over the gains that women have made in education and in the workforce, and that resentment is manifesting in social media content and propaganda arguing that a woman’s “true” role is to be in the home raising children. Political influencers and propagandists convince young men that the past was better for them, legitimizing their grievances, blaming the gains of women for whatever they feel like they do not have, and inspiring their support of regressive policies that try to exert more control over women’s lives. And the propagandists spewing this nonsense, who are usually but not exclusively men, somehow receive fawning profiles rather than criticism in outlets like The New York Times and applause rather than condemnation for the highest figures in the United States government.
5. Future Outlook
What are your predictions for the next five years regarding media consumption, content production, and access to information? How should we prepare for these changes?
I think things are going to get much worse over the next five years. Public media in the U.S. is being further stripped of funding alongside research into mis/disinformation, legacy media organizations are laundering extremist political information and governmental actions to the general public, social media platforms and search engines are integrating “AI” into everything at a breakneck speed despite its propensity to hallucinate and churn out slop. Thus, our already “enshittified” media environments are on track to become even moreso. There isn’t much any of us can do as individuals since we do not own the means of media production and distribution, but we can be more mindful of how we use social media, particularly in terms of what we might post or reshare and how much time we spend endlessly scrolling. We can and should directly support news organizations that are doing good work, that are holding people in positions of power accountable. Ultimately, we can and should continue to work toward making our media environments better while teaching people how to best navigate them despite the road before us being long and likely quite bumpy.
Starting Your Journalism Career and Sources of Inspiration
What experiences or events in your life had the greatest impact on your decision to start a career in journalism? What motivated you the most when you decided to pursue this field?
I loved writing and I wanted to have a job that allowed me to write as much as I could. But also at that time I was in high school and my History professor asked us to start being aware of the news because Colombia was living a historic moment: the State was going to sign the peace agreement with one of the oldest guerrillas of our country.
I wanted to be a reporter of peace and that somehow encouraged me to pursue my career in journalism.
During your time at Javeriana University studying Social Communication and Literature, what were the most important academic or personal lessons that shaped your journalism career?
Well in the university I started to actually feel disappointed about journalism. I felt journalism in Colombia was struggling, most outlets were financed by large corporations with a lot of political interests. And I saw little to no space to do journalism in a creative way.
So I started to see myself writing fiction and poetry. But I knew I wouldn’t make a living with just my creative writing because I wasn’t still prepared to publish my literary work. However, literature for sure opened my horizons and made me ask myself questions about the form and how the aesthetic part of writing can also be challenged in journalism.
Work on Social Issues and Its Impact
How did your personal passion for critical societal issues such as climate change, health, and gender inequality develop? How did working on these issues affect your career as a journalist?
I think it developed at a very early stage and it was because of two things: my older sister and my high school. My sister was studying Environmental Engineering and wanted to focus her studies in the social part of the environment. She planted a seed of multiple questions in my brain and since that moment I started to care a lot about climate change and the environment. It is also because I come from a country that is mega-biodiverse and I have always loved the nature that surrounded me.
My high school had a class of gender and literature where I started to be more aware about gender inequality and social justice. So when I started my studies in the university, I already had in me an objective of contributing to social justice in whatever I chose to work on in my life. Then, I guess that my studies also guided me through that path, I read a lot of gender, reception, literary and communications theory, as well as philosophy.
What methods have you used to make an impact with your stories on these topics? Particularly in gender equality, what were the biggest challenges you faced when covering such sensitive issues?
I started covering gender as a freelance in a small digital outlet and I tried to talk about topics that I did not see anywhere else at the moment: life feminist motherhood or menstrual disorders. But later, when I worked at Mutante I learn about the power of engagement journalism and how this method can actually amplify the impact of journalistic stories, because they are being useful and interpellating a particular type of person who was seeking for that information.
Now, if we talk about challenges, I would say that finding sources and accessing information. A lot of people experienced the topics I was covering, but they did not want to talk and it is because of social stigmas. Then large corporations, like fertility clinics, like to stay on the safe side, so they rather answer in a polite but incomplete way than respond to your questions.
International Experience and Your Journalism Perspective
How did your experience with the United Nations Environment Programme and the Colombian Consulate in New York transform your approach to journalism? What kind of global perspective did these international platforms offer you?
These experiences changed my approach in journalism significantly. The Consulate helped me connect with the Colombian immigrant community and the needs they had. I was not very aware of the way the community is living and the geopolitical relations behind massive immigration.
Then, UNEP was a place to understand international treaties, public hearings and the international environmental agenda. It helped me to see climate change in a global way, meaning that it showed me the relations of power behind greenhouse gas emissions, food waste and renewable energies. It wasn’t only UNEP as an institution, but the people who were there. Most people were from the Global North and had that kind of approach to the climate emergency, but the Global South has a knowledge that has not been appreciated but is essential for the survival of humanity.
While studying in New York, how did interacting with different cultures shape your understanding of journalism? How do you compare your experiences with the media landscape in Colombia to the global perspective you gained?
In NYC I’ve been covering particularly Latinx communities, and that means I am very exposed to multiple cultures, because Latinxs are not a monolith. So I’ve connected with Peruvians, Mexicans, Hondurans, Venezuelans, Ecuadorians, and of course Colombians. This has showed me that we are very similar, but our national histories are different and that crafts our paths heterogeneously. I see how Latinx people are all classified in the same box, but our culture and life experiences are utterly different. However, there is for sure something that unites us: our region has suffered oppression and colonialism even later than we started being “free nations”.
This approach contrasted with the media landscape in Colombia because in Colombia we mostly cover the national context, and when we cover the international it usually is from the same few countries that call our attention.
Cortazar once said that for him, living in France wasn’t a way to be apart from Argentina, it was actually a tool allowing him to see his country as a whole with perspective and distance. And I feel very much like that.
Digital Media and the Future of Journalism
How do the innovative approaches brought by working in digital media shape the evolution of journalism? What do you think about the impact of digital transformation on media content and audience engagement?
The innovative approaches brought by digital media have fundamentally reshaped journalism, not just in how stories are told, but in how communities are included in the storytelling process. Jeff Jarvis, in A Journalism of Belief and Belonging, argues that journalism’s role isn’t just to inform, but to “build bridges among communities” and “make strangers less strange.” That belief has been central to my work as a journalist who constantly thinks in engagement as an essential part of this craft.
Digital transformation has also allowed journalism to build trust in new ways. When we treat engagement not as a strategy to reach more people, but as a practice to foster community, we deepen the public’s relationship with journalism.
Did your experience at Mutante contribute to establishing your expertise in digital media? What are your thoughts on the impact of digital platforms on the future of journalism?
Digital transformation has opened up new ways to move beyond one-way communication and instead create dynamic, participatory spaces for dialogue. At Mutante I experienced firsthand how digital tools can be used not only to distribute content, but to actively listen to communities and co-create journalism with them. We built our editorial agenda around the real informational needs of our audience, using digital platforms to host conversation communities—safe spaces where people affected by issues like fatphobia or gender inequality could connect, share experiences, and help shape coverage.
This shift has had a profound impact on media content and audience engagement. Stories are no longer just produced for people—they’re created with them. Content becomes more relevant, empathetic, and actionable when it emerges from the lived experiences of the communities it aims to serve. For example, through engagement strategies like newsletters with high open rates, explainer content, and social media conversations, we were able to make complex topics like climate displacement or mental health more accessible and urgent.
Challenges and Opportunities as a Female Journalist
What have been the biggest challenges you’ve faced as a female journalist? How have you overcome these challenges, and how have they influenced your journalism practice?
One of the biggest challenges I’ve faced as a female journalist is navigating the intersection of economic precarity, immigration status, and gendered expectations—especially as a Latina, immigrant woman working in the U.S.
Feminist journalism isn’t just about telling stories—it’s about interrogating the systems that shape people’s lives. At La Papaya, a feminist publication I co-founded, and later at Mutante, I embraced a kind of reporting rooted in radical care, tenderness, and community.
These challenges didn’t just shape what I report on—they shaped how I report. I learned to approach journalism as a tool for both inquiry and empowerment, one that must offer not only critique but pathways for action. At Mutante, this meant pairing investigative stories with community dialogues and support networks. In New York, it’s meant spotlighting immigrant communities through stories that resist reduction to labor or struggle—showing instead how they build joy, resilience, and systems of mutual support.
Ultimately, the challenges I’ve faced have taught me that journalism must make space for both vulnerability and resistance. They’ve pushed me to tell stories that go beyond exposing injustice to also enable hope, healing, and transformation.
What are your thoughts on how women are represented in the media? What steps should be taken within the industry to make more women visible in journalism?
Women are often represented in the media through narrow, stereotypical lenses—either as victims or as exceptional figures who’ve “overcome” adversity, rarely with the full complexity of their identities, contributions, and struggles. This lack of nuance not only flattens our stories, but reinforces systems that make women—especially immigrants, and working-class women—invisible unless their pain is deemed newsworthy.
As a feminist journalist, I believe the problem isn’t just who tells the story, but who gets to be seen as a source of knowledge and power. At outlets like La Papaya and Mutante, I worked to challenge those dynamics by co-creating journalism with women who are usually excluded from traditional narratives—whether they were survivors of obstetric violence, informal workers, or community leaders.
To make more women visible in journalism, the industry needs to go beyond diversifying newsrooms. It needs to value and invest in alternative storytelling methods that center care, collaboration, and community engagement. That includes hiring more women—especially women from marginalized backgrounds—not just as reporters, but as editors, decision-makers, and strategists. It also means rethinking what we consider “newsworthy,” and creating space for stories rooted in lived experience, emotion, and collective knowledge.
Vision for the Future and Career Goals
How do you plan to shape your journalism career in the future? Are there specific projects you’d like to be involved in, and what kind of societal changes do you hope to contribute to through these projects?
I plan to shape my journalism career around the core belief that information is a tool for dignity and transformation—especially for those who have historically been excluded from mainstream narratives. My goal is to create journalism that starts by asking communities what they need, and that turns information into a pathway toward action and justice.
One project I hope to develop is a bilingual, hyperlocal resource hub for Latinx and immigrant communities in New York. Resources exist in the U.S.—like free clinics, subsidized food markets, and language classes— but information about them is fragmented, inaccessible, or simply not reaching the people who need it most.
More broadly, I want to be part of initiatives that challenge dominant narratives about Latinx and immigrant communities—stories that move beyond deficit framing and instead highlight resilience, contributions, and systems of mutual aid. Through community engagement, investigative reporting, and narrative storytelling, I hope to contribute to a media landscape that empowers rather than marginalizes, and that pushes for policies rooted in equity and care.
How do you think the experiences you’ve gained in journalism have transformed into a service to society? What is your personal mission in journalism in both the short and long term?
My experiences in journalism have taught me that storytelling is not just a profession—it’s a public service. From reporting on reproductive justice in Colombia to covering immigrant canners and nostalgia-driven plays in Queens, my work has always aimed to dignify lives often ignored by mainstream media. These stories are not just content—they are windows into systems, tools for empowerment, and sometimes, lifelines.
Living in New York as a Latina immigrant radically reshaped my understanding of identity, visibility, and structural inequality. For the first time, I saw myself racialized—as just another “Hispanic” or “Latina”—in a system that often treats our communities as statistics rather than individuals. This shift fueled a deeper commitment to what Eduardo Galeano called los nadie—the nobodies who don’t appear in history books, who are denied voice, name, and presence. My journalism now strives to rewrite that narrative.
In the short term, my mission is to continue building journalism that centers community needs, provides practical resources, and opens space for dialogue and participation. In the long term, I want to contribute to transforming newsrooms—structurally and culturally—so that they truly reflect the diversity of the people they serve. That includes advocating for more Latinx journalists in leadership roles, creating mentorship pipelines, and championing forms of storytelling that embrace care, complexity, and co-creation.
In your opinion, what is one of the biggest transformations of the journalism profession in the digital age?
I’m still relatively new to the business of news, but I would say the expectation of coming right out of school and landing up immediately on a masthead. Freelance reporting has become such a large part of getting your foot in the door at certain publications It also allows you a freedom to go after stories you might not always get to at a large news organization. It makes a career trajectory sometimes feel less certain, but also allows for more independence in the media landscape.
How do you evaluate the impact of social media on news consumption? What are its advantages and disadvantages compared to traditional journalism?
I used to be more cynical about the fact that a large portion of people get their news from social media. However, after seeing the work of people like Bisan Owda and Motaz Azaiza and their on the ground and award winning reporting from Gaza, I’ve realized how much citizen journalism can not only inform but also tap into communities in a way that traditional media may not always be able to. Even if their coverage is not in traditional news media outlets, they show a tenacity and kindness to the communities they report on that inspires me as an early career journalist.
Readers’ trust in news sources has been shaken. How can we rebuild the credibility of journalism in the digital age?
I think so much of the reason reader’s trust in news sources has been shaken is because there is still a lot of mystery to the business of journalism and how we actually do our jobs. I’ve learned so much about investigative journalism through reading She Said by Meghan Twohey and Jodi Kantor on how they broke the Harvey Weinstein story at The New York Times and really getting a look into their reporting process. I think transparency into our journeys with certain stories can really help build trust and relatability with the public.
Also, so many people feel that journalism and journalists only exist in cities, and really only in the biggest cities at that. So many incredible leaders are working to bring quality journalism to rural and local areas where reporters are going out of their way to reach forgotten communities. I think these publications and initiatives in news deserts can help demystify the work of journalists, and maybe even bring more people with different perspectives to the profession!
What do you think about the impact of algorithms and personalized news feeds on journalism?
I mainly think that algorithmic bias is just something that more people need to be aware of and how it’s affecting the ways we communicate with one another. The amount of times I hear someone give a hot take they think no one has heard before, meanwhile it’s verbatim from something that was in the latest episode of Subway Takes! These algorithms really can make you feel like we’re all living the same existence, being fed the same content. I think encouraging a healthy dose of skepticism about why you are being shown a certain video is something we should be teaching more of.
Journalism, Writing and Artificial Intelligence
How do you interpret the impact of artificial intelligence on the news production and content creation process in journalism?
I feel like most journalists I speak to are still relatively skeptical about relying too heavily on AI – not only for its intelligence impact, but also of that on the environment. That being said, it is being more heavily integrated into all aspects of our business, from hiring to even processing data for stories. Everyone is able to draw their own line, but for me, I always want my creativity to lead the way in my writing process.
What do you think about the use of artificial intelligence-supported tools (ChatGPT, automatic news writing software, etc.) in journalism?
I try to look at AI as a tool that you learn how to use in order to not get left behind. What that often looks like for me is using Otter or Descript to transcribe interviews, or sometimes entering a story I wrote into Chat GPT to help with making a concise pitch to a publication by pulling out the main ideas. Still, I don’t think it has the capability to truly replace journalists, as so much of our work is connecting with people on a human level.
What do you think about the ethical dimensions of AI-supported content? How should the boundary between artificial intelligence writing and human journalism be protected?
While I think that AI can be a tool that we use to make some of the organization process of writing easier, I am wary about ever letting it actually write stories or content for us. It may be able to imitate styles of famous writers or publications, but I don’t think it can ever substitute for intellectual curiosity that is required in human journalism. In my masters program, we’ve learned about AI and how to use it for certain projects, but we still have strict rules about using it to write entire stories. I think news organizations ought to have similar guidelines, and many already do.
Do you think artificial intelligence is a tool that makes journalists’ jobs easier, or is it a threat that changes the nature of the profession?
I think we as journalists need to learn how to use it as a tool so that it doesn’t change the nature of our profession. Sorry if that’s a cop out 🙂 In one of our classes, a friend and I drafted an AI tool called ManiFFFest (the three f’s are For the Freelance Frontier) that would help freelancers figure out where to pitch a story they were working on. The idea was to have the app do the work of pitching, emailing follow ups, etc while you get back to focusing on writing and reporting. Obviously it’s a big dream, but I think AI tools for journalists need to have the real people in mind from their inception.
The Future of Journalism and Writing
What are the biggest challenges for young people who want to be journalists and writers today?
I think one of the layover effects of algorithms and the isolation forced by the Covid-19 pandemic is that it can be harder to develop a unique voice. Weirdly, I think you learn more about what you actually think and your own opinions when you’re in a group with others, discussing ideas and how your opinions may differ. Developing a real sense of community with other writers or creatives is one of the best ways to find your own perspective, which is so critical to stand out in a crowded field.
How will journalism develop in the future? What skills should the new generation of journalists have?
I think in order to survive, journalism needs to embrace diversity in its hiring and perspectives that it promotes. We are in a political climate where tools that fueled segregation are being implemented disturbingly fast. As an industry we need to be prepared to protect the many gains that we have made in being more inclusive of different voices. As a member of the new generation of journalists, I’m trying to develop my skills in adapting to periods of crisis and uncertainty. To me, this means building up your own skills outside of a traditional job and potentially creating your own avenues to success.
How do you evaluate the rise of independent journalism and alternative media platforms?
I’m really curious to see how Substacks from established journalists may totally shift the media landscape in the next five to ten years. What may have started as ways for writers to express their own opinions have become some of the leaders on breaking details from stories that news organizations may not be reporting. Will these Substacks become mini news rooms of their own, breaking news before others can get to it?
I’m also interested to see what happens in the podcast space next. Audio journalism is one of my major interests as I think it can tell stories and engage more listeners in editorial content than ever before. After their crucial influence on the 2024 Presidential election, I’m curious to see if podcasts become even more prominent in delivering news or potentially dwindle from over exposure.
In your opinion, what will be the most important technological developments that shape the future of journalism and writing?
If there is anything that AI could do to really be a net positive in the future, it would be some kind of tool to assist with media literacy, especially for young people. The cutting of funds to the arts and humanities really worries me in terms of the long term effects it will have on dissemination of information and encouragement of creativity. If we teach skills to people at a young age on how to think more critically not just about what they see on the news, but also asking them what they thought of the movie they watched or the song they just listened to, already we are developing smarter individuals who might go on to give new perspectives to the media landscape.
Mouri-san, we know you as an experimental sound artist, but could you tell us more about yourself? Who is Katsura Mouri?
I am a musician and sound artist who performs using toy turntables as musical instruments.
Rather than engaging in conventional turntablism techniques such as scratching or beat juggling, I amplify the hum noise produced by the turntable and perform with it as if it were a musical instrument. This hum noise can be modified through effects processors to create ambient tones or timbres resembling those of a guitar.
In addition to utilizing hum noise, I also amplify sounds picked up by the cartridge, following an approach similar to John Cage’s Cartridge Music. Furthermore, I incorporate circuit bending techniques that manipulate the internal circuitry of the turntable to generate sound.
In recent years, I have also been engaged in the creation of three-dimensional artworks and sound installations that incorporate turntables.
You recently visited Istanbul for Noise Istanbul. Could you share your experience of performing at the Noise Istanbul festival? How did the festival’s atmosphere and audience influence your approach to performance? Additionally, how did you find Istanbul in terms of its cultural and artistic energy? As an experimental sound artist, did you find anything particularly inspiring?
The festival venue was located in the new city district, lined with sophisticated shopping streets. It was a magnificent concert hall housed in a modern European-style building.
I was quite surprised by the number of young people in the festival audience. Some were leaning forward, listening intently, and I could tell that they were genuinely enjoying the music.
At a previous festival where I performed, I was influenced by the audience’s energy, which led to a highly energetic performance on my part. This time, since the audience was deeply engaged in the music, my performance became more focused on sound. While it was not perfect, I believe I was able to deliver a solid performance.
Istanbul was a fascinating city where European and Asian cultures seamlessly merged. One of the most memorable experiences for me was visiting the Blue Mosque. Its beauty and grandeur far exceeded my imagination, and I was instantly captivated. Inside the mosque, some people sat quietly in meditation while others prayed, creating an atmosphere of tranquility that contrasted sharply with the bustling streets outside.
Although the architectural form, scale, and color palette were entirely different, the sense of sacredness and the slow passage of time reminded me of Japanese Zen temples. I once created a three-dimensional artwork based on the theme of Zen, and I feel that my visit to the mosque might inspire me when I next work on a Zen-themed piece.
I found Istanbul to be a remarkable city that embraces and coexists with diverse cultures, including both historical heritage and modern urban life.
A short walk from the city center led to places where one could enjoy nature, and the presence of numerous travelers from around the world reminded me of Kyoto, where I live. This sense of familiarity gave me a strong feeling of connection to the city.
Experimental music often challenges conventional norms. What drives you to continue working in this niche genre? Through your work, what do you hope to communicate or achieve?
As many may already know, experimental music has been shaped by legendary artists such as Pierre Schaeffer, a pioneer of musique concrète, and John Cage, who explored the full potential of experimental sound and influenced countless artists. I, too, have been deeply inspired by them.
I find great joy in exploring how to innovate new and unconventional sounds. Of course, coming up with groundbreaking innovations like John Cage is no easy feat. However, even achieving small innovations brings me immense satisfaction, and that serves as my motivation.
Additionally, when an audience resonates with my work, I feel a profound sense of happiness, which also fuels my drive.
I do not create my works with the intention of conveying a specific message to others. I am simply doing what I love.
There is no set goal or destination in my artistic practice—I am not striving to achieve something specific. I am simply in pursuit of what is fun and interesting.Moving forward, I want to continue exploring the possibilities of the turntable.
What led you to choose experimental music and turntablism as your primary means of expression? Were there any specific moments or influences that shaped this decision?
When I was 19, I was a rather unconventional DJ—so much so that no one could dance to my sets. In fact, some audience members even left the venue.
Around that time, I started working part-time at Parallax Records in Kyoto, where I met a group of people with whom I formed an ensemble that performed with records simultaneously. Rather than following a typical DJ style, we experimented by striking the turntable cartridge, generating scratch noises, and exploring alternative ways to perform with turntables.
After the group disbanded, I found it difficult to transport two Technics SL-1200 turntables and a large collection of records to live venues on my own. This led me to start using toy turntables, which were lightweight and easy to carry. At the same time, I had grown tired of the conventional DJ setup, where the turntables were placed on a table.
Coincidentally, I was really into Jimmy Page at the time, which inspired me to develop a performance style where I held the turntable like a guitarist rather than using it in a traditional DJ manner.
In the collaborative album Various Histories, you explore the fusion of sound textures and soundscapes. Through this collaboration, what have you learned about your artistic identity and the possibilities of experimental music?
For tracks 1 through 4 on this album, I edited and restructured the recordings of our improvised performances. Not just for this project, but in all my works, I compose through a process of re-editing recorded sound. When improvisation is recorded, both the good and the bad elements are captured. By extracting only the best parts and reassembling them, the result can be an entirely new and extraordinary piece that surpasses the original recording.
This album was created by selectively reconstructing the most compelling elements—such as the mechanical noises from Tim Olive’s magnetic pickups, the scratch noises from prepared records, and the drones produced by turntables.
Much like how John Cage used environmental sounds as musical material, I find excitement in treating noise and sound itself as raw material, reconfiguring it with creative intent to transform it into something even greater. Just as environmental sounds are limitless in variation, I see infinite possibilities in the sonic textures and noise generated by musical instruments.
In today’s cultural landscape, why do you think experimental music is important? Do you see it as a means of pushing boundaries, expressing individuality, or responding to social change?
Experimental musicians are, by nature, already highly individualistic simply by constantly challenging new ideas. It goes without saying that experimental music has expanded cultural boundaries—figures like Merce Cunningham and John Cage, who applied chance operations to performance, are prime examples.
However, I believe that not only experimental music but also all forms of culture and art—including visual arts, design, architecture, media, dance, and fashion—are equally important. Engaging with and understanding a wide range of artistic and cultural fields broadens one’s perspective far more than focusing on a single discipline. To adapt to social change, we must be able to respond quickly and flexibly to shifting environments. Understanding experimental music may help eliminate preconceived notions and biases, allowing for a more agile response to various changes.
Recently, emerging technologies such as AI and virtual reality have been gaining attention. AI-driven music production and VR concerts are expanding the possibilities of the future. While it is uncertain how experimental music will be utilized and evolve, I am excited about the transformations that will come with technological advancements. I, too, am eager to continue exploring new challenges in the future.
Interviewer: Academician, Author and Pr Carnet Editor Semay Buket Şahin
Dear Barry, how would you define philosophy? In your opinion, is philosophy a part of science, or is it a discipline that goes hand in hand with science?
Defining philosophy is a philosophical question itself, so any answer presumes something about philosophy, and tends towards circularity. In terms of etymology it means love of wisdom, but one major philosopher, Hegel said that complete philosophy is what becomes wisdom. Despite the etymology, we might also think of philosophy as something different from wisdom, as philosophy is a form of inquiry, while wisdom presumes a state of mind, or a way of being, in which the thinker is identical with wisdom and passes it on rather than engaging in inquiry. If philosophy is related to science, is maybe the science of sciences, then that turns philosophy into essentially epistemology, the philosophy of knowledge, which is a branch of philosophy, so that philosophy is something within philosophy.
If philosophy is not knowledge the obvious alternative is that it is a form of deductive reasoning about abstract principles which tells us something about the structure of reality, which may be a kind of knowledge, but is not the same as the gaining of knowledge in specific science, and is not even the same as the most general form of science. Another possibility is the phenomenological approach in which philosophy reveals some kind of essential reality which is not covered by the scientific pursuit of knowledge or deductive reasoning. Alternatively, returning to Hegel we mighty regard it as the practice of a particular reason which is ‘speculative’ (recognises that identity is also always difference) and dialectical (proceeds through negation of particular universals from an absolute perspective).
This is just a sketch of some of the contours of any debate about what philosophy is. Despite what some philosophers have hoped, philosophy cannot realistically be regarded as just the most general form of scientific method, or the results of a method of abstract reasoning which might be deductive or speculative, or as an access to a kind of pre-theoretical grasp of the cosmos preceding epistemology, metaphysics, logic and speculation. Some have regard philosophy as a form of clarification of problems using the tools of logic or linguistic concepts, but clarification is not the same as resolution. All the approaches mentioned, and others, can be regarded as legitimate parts of philosophy, but if we thinking about what philosophy in its most general sense, I believe it must be something do with the search for universality in explanation and definitions, which always runs into tension between singularity and universality, parts and wholes, particularity and the absolute, subjectivity and objectivity, fragmentary ideas and complete system. This is a list that can be constantly extended. The point is that philosophy is what explores the gaps, inconsistencies, paradoxes and contradictions which emerge in trying to resolve the oppositions just listed. I particularly like Kierkegaard’s suggestion that paradox is the passion of thought, and believe it can be adopted without assuming anything much of what makes up Kierkegaard’s philosophy.
According to your book chapter “Tragedy, Myth, and Liberty in Interstate Theory” in Liberty and Security in an Anarchical World Vol- I how does your polycentric model of sovereignty address the challenges posed by modern globalized conflicts, particularly those involving non-state actors?
A polycentric approach to sovereignty recognises inevitable realities, with regard to the competitive, changeable and localisable nature of institutions designed by humans. While it seems just about possible to have a kind of large centralised imperial nation, these depend on the existence of external threats or anxieties about the external world, which give some basis to a very vigorous exercise of hard power within state boundaries. We might hope for more peace and stronger international institutions, but it seems to be structurally impossible to have a unified global sovereign which either rules in a centralised way or has a coherent structure of devolved sovereignties covering the whole world.
The first option is always going to be disturbed by localised resistance and power competition at the sub-global level. Even if in some way, it is possible to have very integrated uniform sovereignty actglobal level, we are clearly far from such a situation. It could only emerge in a long term way in the far future. This possibility seems to be me to be very abstract, and in reality there could never be a global community possessing a sufficiently dense consensus on interests and principles, to make anything possible more than a very limited form of global sovereignty, which would be in a kind of shifting unstable balance with the sovereignty of nations or the partially shared sovereignty of blocs of nations. Even small nations face periodic challenges to inner sovereignty from the sharper forms of citizen dissent or various kinds of flows of information, population movements economic activity which spill over national boundaries. Completely self-contained sovereignty of nations is impossible as is a completed integrated global sovereignty.
How would rationalistic and homogenizing tendencies of transnational institutions might accommodate the need for global responses to issues like climate change and pandemics? What are your thoughts about that?
Rationalistic and homogenising tendencies in international institutions provide for some basis for international al action on climate change and pandemics. The rationalising and homogenising tendencies also create problems. A single centre trying to impose a unique approach for the whole world will not allow for the benefits of localised experimentation, comparison of solutions, and full debate of polices. Realistically national governments will be a necessary location for information gathering, policy formation and actions.
There may be some grouping of this as in the European Union , but even this is not an exercise of fully integrated sovereignty commanding a cross-European administration. In reality it is based on compromise between elects of European decision making and what nations agree. It is very clear that global co-ordination cannot go any further than this model and is likely to be less. The facts of climate change and the conditions for future pandemics don’t tell us what the best solutions are. These are fields which include unpredictable feedback, at the natural level enhanced by collective human action producing its own feedback. We can’t know in advance what the best possible solution is. We don’t know what the best solution is for different parts of the world given different conditions. There is no perfect solution there is just a variety of trade offs between various actions with various consequences outside the fields of climate and pandemic control. We cannot possibly have perfect knowledge of how to compare the results of a multitude of trade offs in a variety of possible feedback loops. Even if we did have a perfect rational solution based on perfect knowledge of the future, we would still not be able to perfectly control the politics about which kinds of costs populations are likely to tolerate. Some global co-ordination is desirable but we should not deceive us that there can bear perfect global coordination on perfect solutions.
Do you think that if we had adopted the Roman educational system of the Septem Artes Liberales, regardless of race or religion, we could have achieved a more civilized, globalized, and intellectually advanced society today?
The Septem Artes Liberales combine a quadrivium of astronomy, geometry, arithmetic and music with a trivium of rhetoric, grammar and logic. Whatever merits this may have had for the ancient, medieval and early modern worlds, it is not an adequate way of defining basic knowledge for the present. It certainly never produced I can’t right now say how this compares with classical education in southern, central and eastern Asia, which is the obvious point of comparison. It maybe worked in the Roman Empire, then Catholic (later Catholic and Protestant) Europe for providing some common understanding, but it has never been a global model and chant be now.
There is an issue now of global communications, travel and economic flows, which does make the issue of a broad global consensus on the basics of education relevant for present times. That is not the same as arguing that a rigid seven-fold structure can be universally applied. A broad universal education at pre-university level should presumably include mathematics and some high quality of understanding of your own language. This requires some study of literature and history.
The greatest understanding comes from doing something like this one more language, some study of at last one foreign language should be part of any education core, which also serves needs of communication. A well shaped education core should really introduce everyone to the starting elements of all major sciences, natural and social, which means physics chemistry, geography, biology, psychology, sociology and economics. For contemporary life, we should probably add communications studies and information technology. Philosophy provides a way of thinking about foundations and connections between these ares of knowledge. It is rather difficult to study before 16. Before 16, I favour studies of values and critical reasoning. Ideally this should absorb and replace classes specifically devoted to religion, which can be best studied in a critical and comparative environment. Increasing globalization suggests more elements of comparative studies in these areas where applicable. So I don’t have anything as compact as seven areas of study. What I have suggested above covers 14 areas (before getting into foreign languages), so that is a doubling of the old septet. How this is worked out in practice will inevitably vary between global regions, countries and even within countries, allowing for different circumstances along with the benefits of experimentation and comparison.
There is no way of studying all 14 of these things simultaneously throughout the years of compulsory schooling. Schooling should introduced all of them to all students at some point. Constant study is necessary for mathematics and any foreign language (at least one, and in some multi-lingual countries this can be complicate by requirements to study more than one language of that nation). This should be combined with constant study of at least one area of natural science and one area of social science, along with national literature and history (preferably with comparative elements for both). That makes a core sextet, though of a more variable kind than the classical septet. At sixteen this can be joined by philosophy, as once you start to study any field in any real depth, philosophical questions do arise, so that would make a septet, though at this point maybe some choice should be allowed regarding whether to study both social science and natural science.
Six subjects enough for pre-university study and maybe that could drop further in the final year of pre-university study. All countries of the world following something like this patterns probably a prerequisite for properly educated people throughout a global community, equipped to cope with life in any part of the world.
What would you like to say about philosophy education in Turkey? How would you interpret it in terms of language, culture, and history? Do you think Latin and Ancient Greek education should be introduced at earlier stages in Turkey to support the development of free thought?
It is difficult for me to generalize about philosophy education in Turkey. I understand there is less of it at high school level than there used to be which is unfortunate. As with other countries, I favour making classical languages more available as subjects of school study, but it is not possible to make this compulsory. Experimentation in schooling should be allowed in which some schools could specialize in offering classical languages. I certainly think there should be far more departments in this area in Turkish universities, though equally there should be more departments concerned with ancient languages and literatures of the Near East and Asia, as this is the obvious major alternative to the Graeco-Roman-western tradition. None of these traditions should be seen as isolated and self-contained. The complete study of the history of liberty certainly requires some awareness of ancient history and texts, but I don’t think we can make liberty as a way of thinking influencing education too dependent on study of ancient sources. Some element of this is necessary in philosophy and some other humanities, but in general, liberty has to appear through education in emphasis on the development of individuality of a kind which is free thinking, critical and responsible. Some element of classics in the world of education is a significant part of this, but it cannot be the full story. Philosophy has to be understood primarily in terms of a cross-national tradition across centuries in which nations have greatly changed, so it cannot possibly be understood in terms of national tradition or culture or history. Good philosophy in any country depends on having an internationalized and comparative sense of tradition, culture and history.
What types of research can be conducted in the field of philosophy today? What are the studies you have undertaken in relation to philosophy? Do you believe that alternative learning methodologies can be developed in this field?
I don’t have a strong view about new ways of learning philosophy. I teach in fairly old fashioned ways without much resort to tech ology in the class. Philosophy is inevitably affected by new forms of technology and communication, but I can’t see this changing the core. Different instructors can have different views about use of technology. This should be let opt individual choice. In the end all philosophy education has to be directed towards philosophical texts and forms of reasoning which are not obviously greatly changed by technology. I studied most aspects of western philosophical tradition as an undergraduate, making a special effort to study Continental European Philosophy after Kant since this could only be studied as an option (elective), not as part of the core courses. In my postgraduate work, I was very oriented towards Continental Philosophy and its relationship with literary studies.
I also developed interests in political theory, during that time, as an area of academic writing, though I have always read in that area anyway. There are some other things I came across then to do with philosophers who have a very literary aspect to their work, who still interest me, particularly Giambattista Vico and Michel de Montaigne. There was a period in which I was concerned with Wittgenstein, along with connections between Continental and Analytical Philosophy (that is philosophy very oriented towards science, logic, and conceptual analysis). Though that is till of some interest to me, it is not an area where I aim to write much anymore. I have been interested for some time on Foucault and theories of liberty, but have been slow to really consolidate my writing in that area and getting it published. Something similar applies to Vico’s contribution to thinking about philosophy as the philosophy of the human world, in which history and literature are central.
I am aiming to make progress in these projects, along with other writing commitments, which currently include work on Foucault’s view of seventeenth thought. Recently I have published on philosophy and literature and Derrida’s ethics. I aim to keep working on ethics as well as philosophy and literature. I have thoughts about tragedy related to both fields and that may express itself in future writing.
Interviewer: Academician, Author and Pr Carnet Editor Semay Buket Şahin
prcarnetworld.com 