Imagine the (im)possible
These days, when the reality of the era of humanity we have been called to live through far exceeds, and is worse than, the worst scenarios we thought possible regarding the genocidal impunity of the State of Israel against Palestine, are precisely when the (im)possible are in dispute. And this is shown to us by the people of Palestine themselves and the determination of the Global Sumud Flotilla, which, as I write this article, and despite the illegal detention of part of that flotilla, continues its course toward Gaza to break Israel's murderous siege. We need the impossible, now more than ever.
The complex reality, full of falsehoods, cynical, hypocritical, and obscenely false narratives that justify and legitimize inhuman levels of violence throughout the world, leads us to the need, not to escape, but to confront, understand, and unmask. Because it is from these presents that the seeds of possible futures are sown, ones that are being stolen from us in abundance on all sides, but which, nevertheless, we want as our own, possible and desirable, socially and ecologically just. That is why the dispute over the imaginaries that sustain the world in which we live and the world we want to build is so important. The ideas with which we think determine the possibilities we are capable of imagining, which is why it is so urgent to broaden our perspective and subvert the dominant narratives of the present.
On October 2 and 3, the UIB's Office for Development Cooperation and Solidarity (OCDS) held the conference "Actuem ara! Climate emergency in the age of disinformation." For two days, the university campus and the Teatre del Mar became spaces for analysis, reflection, and action in the face of the climate emergency. One of these valuable initiatives aims to connect academic knowledge, eco-social activism, and creativity, and thus forge alliances and imagine collective alternatives to address global challenges.
Capitalist modernity has offered us a package of seemingly indisputable ideas: economic growth as the engine of well-being, linear and unlimited progress, individuality as the ultimate expression of freedom, blind faith in technology, and the promise that we can decouple development and ecological destruction. These myths have shaped, and still do, institutions, public policies, and social expectations. But today they are revealed to be traps that lead us to collapse and barbarism.
Critical ecofeminism teaches us that these ideas are not neutral, but rather respond to a logic of domination, the construction of power, and the logic of privilege, legitimizing the exercise of the multiple oppressions, exploitations, violence, injustices, and ecological imbalances that have led us to this unprecedented and ecological crisis. Some speak of a crisis of civilization. Modern reason, as Val Plumwood described it, has been built on hierarchical dualisms: culture/nature, man/woman, production/reproduction, civilization/safeguarding. This way of thinking legitimizes the exploitation of the natural environment and of people considered inferior or invisible. We thus reproduce and legitimize a form of structural violence that penetrates all spheres of life, as is becoming more palpable and evident to us every day.
The dispute over thought is, at the same time, a dispute over narrative. What reality do we live in and what reality do they want us to believe we live in? If we focus, for example, on the ecological crisis that threatens survival, large corporations, institutions, and even many international organizations deploy strategies of greenwashing and socialwashing that greenwash the same predatory model. We are sold false solutions: electric cars to maintain mass mobility, carbon markets to perpetuate the privileges of the most polluting, renewable megaprojects that repeat the extractivist logic. We talk about energy transition, but the core of the problem is often left intact: a system based on accumulation and exploitation.
The result is a hegemonic narrative that oscillates between denial of the problem and paralyzing fatalism. We are either told that everything is under control thanks to technology, or that there is nothing to be done in the face of the magnitude of the crisis. In both cases, the message is the same: do not question the established order as we hurtle toward collapse.
But this is where we need to turn around and challenge the possibilities. Collapse is not a sudden apocalypse, but a process of loss of complexity, a point of no return, this is true. But when everything falls, everything that must be born remains to be done. Therefore, the question is not whether collapse will come, because it is already here; the construction of the world as we have understood it in recent decades is collapsing. The question, therefore, is how we navigate it and what imaginaries we propose during and after. Faced with the inevitable dystopias that confront us, we must reclaim desirable ecotopias and emancipatory utopias. Imagining different futures is not an escape from reality but a fundamental political tool. Ecosocial imaginaries allow us to project ways of life that center care, interdependence, the sovereignty of peoples, and a respectful relationship with nature. We are not talking about going back or falling into idealized nostalgia, but about building new horizons based on other values: community, cooperation, voluntary simplicity, diversity, and social justice.
Today, faced with the grotesque and horrific reality that they are trying to impose on us, we find ourselves at a historic crossroads: either we give up contesting the imaginary and accept a dystopian future dictated by the psychopaths who rule the world, or we dare to imagine and build other horizons. To resist—and to build a global alliance of peoples (may I add)—is to exist. This is the motto of the upcoming October 5th rally for Palestine. Now more than ever, utopias are not a luxury, but a vital necessity. Because only if we can imagine better worlds will we have the collective strength to make them possible. Palestine shows us the way.