(*This op-ed was originally published on November 2th 2019 in Spanish in the Chilean online newspaper Ciperchile. It was written in the context of the current social and political crisis in Chile).

In recent days, various newspapers, media columns and statements have been published, where universities and research centers (for example, the School of Economics of the Universidad Católica or the joint statement of FONDAP centers) have made a mea culpa, admitting that academics have failed to effectively communicate the country’s social realities to the political class, or to offer specific and sustainable solutions.

There is no doubt that the social sciences have a degree of complicity in an unequal system in Chile that has seen conflicts and partial solutions to structural problems in areas as diverse as housing, education, job insecurity, lack of recognition of indigenous peoples, and the so-called ‘zones of environmental sacrifice’, among others. Most social scientists have failed to take a firm public stand on any of these issues or, even worse, have agreed to study them from a distance, with a focus on publication in prestigious journals rather than on the issue being studied.

We must accept with humility that those of us working in the social sciences have not been up to the challenge of the problems in Chile.

However, it would be naive to think that academia by itself can solve the problems facing the country, which partly stem from technocratic solutions or strategies that look good on paper, or even as progressive policies, but bare little or no relation to the real experiences and social customs of Chileans.

And here we face another problem: the disconnect between academia and the public sector. This stems, of course, from the tendency of academics to publish research that is usually difficult to translate into sectoral strategies, macro-analysis or input data.

But it is also linked to the lack of validation of certain types of research by decision-makers and the limited field of expertise of some academics.

Many social scientists have long been studying the complex social reality of suffering and uncertainty that afflicts the vast majority of Chileans from the point of view of their everyday experiences, and the survival and coping strategies used by Chileans living in different territories of the country.

For academics who strive to understand these different realities, and know firsthand the effort involved in developing and sharing the type of knowledge that emerges, for example, from long-term immersion in a territory, the only mea culpa is not having dared to go beyond our own circles, raise our voices and enter into dialogue with public opinion, public policies and legislators.

Now, in line with the socioeconomic segregation that afflicts Chile, we find ourselves in a scenario of radical disconnect between those who design and implement the policies and those, who in one way or another, are aware of the daily realities of different communities. And, we believe, part of the problem is related to the notion of social science, evidence and, above all, of academic expertise in Chile.

At present, scientific knowledge is stratified according to short-term notions of immediate utility or transfer to allow adjustments in social policies and programs. Economic studies — usually of the theoretical and technical type — are, for example, more recognized than psychological or anthropological studies, and quantitative data is often used without being supported by the qualitative analysis that is needed to explain the realities behind the figures.

Despite the well-known difficulties of using surveys as predictors of social behaviour, they are still the main tools used by decision-makers who do not come from the social sciences. In these surveys, results that are statistically significant are given far greater weight than any theoretical or qualitative analysis, leaving little room for triangulation, especially when it comes to venturing beyond thematic hyper-specialization in the social sciences.

Yet, from our perspective, it is precisely the human realities behind the numbers that offer important clues. An example from our research can be found in the field of crime and fear. Every so often, results of crime victimization surveys emerge that, quite rightly, generate immediate responses from the government of the day, which generally announces tougher security measures. However, there is little discussion about why, regardless of whether victimization figures rise or fall, the perception of fear remains high among Chileans (despite hints about the role of the media), and even less about the social effects of certain policies in specific territories. Ethnographic research indicates that, in the low-middle socioeconomic strata, the fear of crime is combined with a fear of stigmatization, which implies being perceived as (potential) criminals and ‘flaites’ [Chilean slang for a poor trashy person], and that participation in neighbourhood safety activities, among others, can be understood as a way to avoid such stigmatization between peers. However, in this case a public policy based on a simple interpretation of the numbers would fail to consider how the feeling of ‘fear’ is differentiated in a classist and highly stratified society.

Similarly, the importing and simplification of so-called participatory methodologies, for example, can give the illusion of connection with people’s everyday life in local settings, since the timelines and methods for these processes usually exceed those required for decision-making.

Even in the best cases, these approaches are unlikely to generate a deeper understanding of the practices and experiences which give rise to social and cultural feelings, values and problems, while simultaneously run the risk of being used as instruments to legitimize political and economic action.

The field of social science, which is focused on understanding people’s motivations and analyzing their daily experiences, has faced adverse conditions in Chile for decades.

One reason for this is the segregation and de facto stratification of the different types of knowledge and methodologies mentioned above, along with, for example, lesser funding for this type of research, which is considered ‘cheaper’ to perform and therefore less important.

Another very important factor, which is an obstacle for research in the social sciences in general, is the neoliberalization of universities, where the quality of academics is measured more by the quantity of papers published in prestigious journals than by their quality or by the generation of real impact.

This particularly affects young researchers, who are pressured to focus on rapid production rather than serious analysis. As collateral damage, this may result in the emergence of excessive competition between peers with the risk that necessary collaboration between colleagues is compromised.

In addition, there is little recognition of efforts to work with populations in local settings or to experiment with alternative ways of generating and disseminating knowledge, for example in collaboration with the artistic world.

Finally, we see how basic research— where social scientists develop research projects in their own areas of interest — continues to lose ground in the face of a utilitarian logic that requires academics to focus on strategic research (where issues are defined in ministries and public agencies), which is intended to be directly applicable to public policies or transferable to technological development. The risk is that when the initial problems and questions are defined a priori by political (or corporate) interests, academic autonomy is restricted and the possibilities of generating new knowledge diminish, especially in areas that require an inductive approach.

In the current scenario, as Chileans have begun to rethink their country, it is also time to reflect on the conditions of research in the social sciences and what kind of ‘data’ can best contribute to an informed debate.

To begin with, and based on our experience as researchers, we propose three elements to consider:

A slow social science: We must start to value and develop a slow social science approach that is able to identify the heterogeneous and contradictory practices of the different social realities in the country, which are anchored in the daily lives of its citizens.

Instead of ‘explaining’ findings and evaluating people as subjects, we must strive to understand their different points of view. We must include the different interpretations of their daily realities as another input in the analysis.

For example, this may involve participating in assemblies and in ‘alternative’ forms of data generation. But it goes beyond that — it implies a vision and theoretical framework where knowledge is generated by immersion in the multiple realities of the various communities that make up Chile.

In other words, we must write about and analyze our society based on a ‘bottom-up’ approach that considers how the State is comprised of different realities, incorporating the experiences of immigrants, indigenous people, the middle classes, and even the so-called ‘bubbles’ of the elite. But this type of social science often takes time. It is not done with a few phone calls as part of a survey, but rather through the continuous work of asking people questions about their social reality, and only then analyzing the observations and generating proposals.

An autonomous social science: To strengthen the field of social science it is important to safeguard its independence and autonomy because, without independent studies, there can be no new and socially legitimized knowledge.

In this regard, it is essential that research questions should not be subordinated to the thermometer of public opinion, corporate interests or the immediate priorities of the government of the day.

Each researcher has the ethical imperative to maintain their autonomy, but this also implies changing the structural and institutional conditions under which we work as social scientists. For example, we must improve the situation of job insecurity facing too many young researchers — and those who are not so young anymore. We must develop new forms of performance evaluation that reward quality and contributions beyond the quantity of publications in prestigious journals. In other words, we must develop and reward intellectual abilities over academic careers.

A committed social science: Beyond the recent mea culpas, which have understandably been made in the heat of the moment, we need a social science and academics committed to working with people, communities, social organizations, NGOs and local governments.

To this end, it is necessary to establish direct links between academics and the social fabric of the different settings where they carry out their research, to avoid an extractive or utilitarian approach to information gathering, but with a sense of reciprocity and real interest in meeting and collaborating with local people. It should not be about repeating fashionable slogans, conducting studies based on the requests of the communities with which we work, or becoming spokespeople for people and groups that have shown in recent days that they are fully qualified to speak for themselves.

On the contrary, as academics, we must contribute our knowledge and expertise to develop a social science that is committed to open debate and creating a better society.

Ultimately, when we work together based on knowledge generated from in-depth studies, and when we raise questions from unconventional perspectives, the hope remains that the debate can be pushed a little further forward for the good of all.

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