Theory, Policy & PracticeRESEARCH in Antice EDUCATION icv syne egret eoe (SSAGE Leaving the future behind Sam Sellar ‘Th Unveriyof Queer, Ase Abstract “This article puts forward the provocation tha optimism has bacome a trap for educa- tonal research. Ie fe argued that optim underpin the imple model of madera educational thought, which is oriented toward the ature and wants it to be beter However: optimism can become a trap when ic encourages investment in promises about te benefits of edveation cat cannot be realized for al. As more and more people invest in education to ‘get ahead’ thelr optimism contributes to decreasing the value of credentials and thus undermines the promised benefits. Edvctional ‘essarchere contre ta thie hind hermes the dawinant medal of madern educational ‘thought is itherendy optimistic. However, pessimism offers an inherenty unpromising slkerative, n'a time of economic, environmental, and technological dlruption, thie aie the concept of disaster might provoke lines of thought that go beyond the skernative between optiniem or pessimiem. The writing: of Lauren Berane. Maurice Blanchot. and Giles Deleuze provide the theoretical framing for the argument. The arile concludes that i optimism hat lured educational thought and rataech into 2 ‘rap, then fe may be time to give up on ‘the fuure’ In order to get out Keywords affect, disaster, education, future, optimism, chought end, prsiely, ofall progres. (Blanchot, 1998: 63) Introduction Rather than speculate on a possible future for educational research, this article asks: Is educational research possible without the future? Can educational reeeareh Corresponding author: Sam Ser, The Uva of Quentin Brisbine QLD, 472 Aura Ear amslieoqadvas Soler 3 leave the future behind? To do so would not mean refusing the direction of time, but rather abandoning ‘the future’ as a psychological attitude with a relatively bret history. As a hopeful disposition toward a time to come, the Future has provided a busi for modern educational thought: education is oriented by desire for progress. Indeed, thinking education without affirming the Future brings educational thought {o its limit. This article wil suggast that iti time for edtiqnal reannehare ta begin thinking this init ‘The limit of educational thought can be found at its hepinning. Fuery system af thought faces the challenge of where to begin, but traces of common sense inevitably stain even the cleanest of slates” For example, Descartes’ begin ning—cogito ergo sun—assumes that everyone naturally knows what it means to think (Deleuze, 1998) {Conceptual philosophical thought hes a its implicit presupposition a pre-piloso- Dic and natural Image of thought, borrowed from the re element of common sense, According to this image, thought his an afinity with the true; formally possess the cue and matenally wants the tre (Deleuze, 1994 31), ‘The problem of beginning is not exclusive to philosophy. Modern educational ‘thought arguably has @ natural image, according to which education is assumed 0 aun an affinity with ptimiem: nfeational thought wants the funure and it wants it ta be better. ‘Klas Mollenhauer’s (2014) reflections on the Bilding tradition provide some insight into this image of educational thought. Mollenhauer proposes thatthe fist ‘question educators must ask i: Why do we want children at all” (8). His prov sional answer is that ‘I have children because T want to perpetuate the (perhaps very litle) goodness in my lif’ (8). Educating the next genertion assumes that“ ‘would lke human history to continue, and my own actions are clearly oriented by thio affirmation of the Future’ (8). The implicit and wrthonos snl of eave thought is unavoidably optimistic. "Knowledge blooms end withers along with our felings’ (Ciocan, 2012. 147) [Educational knowledge has bloomed with optimism, but this has produced a frac tile and vulncrable monoculture. When conftouted with the possibility that things are not getting better, educational research of all stripes resorts to prescribing more Uf the same i greater doses; we nee Beer KNOWIedgE ABOUT NOW Co Make thiNgs better. The strated space of educational ideas reverberates with ‘an old hope's bier echo” (Berlant, 2016: 414). Leaving the future behind brings educational thought to the limit ofthis space and raises the question of escape, The entrapment of educational thought Optimism can become a trap for educational thought when itis aligned to norma. tive belles about ine purposes of education and What i desirable as a good ie Affect is subtly interwoven into the creation and maintenance of our sense of who ‘we are, how we belong with others, and what gives hfe meaning. Affect can this4 Research in Edveation 96(1) powerfully align with social norms to produce a visoeral sense of how one should think and act. ‘The story of how our attachment to reproducing the ineligibility ofthe work neges| fective forces int ine with normative elim i alo the sry of Hera mje fin’ fantasies of individual and colctive sovereignty, the public and private, the ‘pest ation to the fature andthe distribution of seabiitn that diipine the Imaginary of what the good if is and how proper people act. (Beant, 2011: 52-53) ‘The airmation of the future with which educational thinking begins encourages the alignment of optimistic dispositions and normative belie about the role of| education in relation to opportunity in democratic, capitalist societies. Optimism is 1 powerful affective force, coded in the language of positive psychology as motiv- tation, grt or resilience, and is promoted by politicians and policy makers as & ‘motor for ‘getting ahead” through investment in education. The affective dynamics of educational optimism operate across policy and practice (Moore and Clarke, 2016) Educational opportunity has become the primary lure in the polis of aspiration and self-motivation for educational success has become a prominent governance strategy. Raco (2009) argues that ‘ihe aspiration to “better ones” fm material and cnmmodified terms i¢ presented as a manual sense of order of something that reflects the innate desires of human beings’ (439). This “natural tendency is leveraged hy what Rrown (200) calls the opportunity harein: the promise made by governments that more learning will equal more earning. However, as Brown et al. (2010) argue, if everyone pursues the same educational strategies in pursuit of social mobility then nobody wins. ‘The opportunity bargin has not extended individual (Feedom but has Jed to a0 opportunity trap that forces people to spend more time, effort, and money on av ‘estat may ave tenia purpose nan attempt fll e's opportunites. The teapis that ifeveryone adopts the sae tactics, suchas petting a bachelor’s depres ot working longer hours compres the boss, noone secures an advantage. (12) “The opportunity hargain hecomes an opportunity rap when the promise that education will make things beter meets reality of education as a positional good that dervee its value from scarcity. Education ie prsonted ar the best opportunity {or social mobility, but pursuing this opportunity undermines possibilts for social mobility. The opportunity tap is a double bind. [Optimism is crust when it takes shape as an affecvely stunning double bind: a binding to fantasies that block the satisfaction they ofr, ad a binding to the pom ‘ae of optimism ar such thatthe Fantasies have come to represen. (Beran, 2011: 51) ‘When large numbers of people pursue the promise of opportunity through edu- ‘cation their eollostive initiative oan provent the object of their dosies being ‘reached, but this promise has become embedded in the social contract and the collective imaginary a8 @ source of optimism in itself. Even when they sense that Selar 15 4 particular promise is unlikely to be kept, peopl cling to optimism, to hope that study and hard work will ead to something beter, because it feels too uncomfort- able to let go. ‘The opportunity trap is also a trap for educational researchers. Many academics in education departments have achieved social mobility through education and their subjectvities are shaped by a commitment to paying this opportunity for- ‘ward, While the reproductive infrastructure of education has long been recognized by sociologists of education, the role that the optimism of educational researchers play in tightening the double bind of the opportunity trap has been given less consideration. Even when the opportunity trap is acknowledged, education research generally remains attached to the promise of optimism as such. This is the timit created by the image of educational thought. Educational research contributes tothe opportunity trap tothe extent that it promises, perhaps unavoid- ably, that education can be an opportunity for everyone. ‘The opportunity trap is now doubled atthe level of educational research by the introduction of impact as a measure of research quality. Research assessments in the UK and Australia link judgments of research quality to the demonstration of| ity benefit. Ina field such as education, such measures promise new recognition for applied studies that make a difference in schools and communities. However, the lished by the polities of aspiration. Making a difference has come to mean making things etter according to the dominant image of educational thought. And, as Brown (2003) argues, ‘There isa high degree of collusion with the rhetoric of “learning is eurning” within the educational establishment, as schools, colleges and universities wy to pursue their own positional advantage in the competition for students, resourees and reputational capital’ (162). ‘A tap isa diagram of foroes within an environment. As Singleton (2014) writes, «trap funotions hazed on ‘tho ability to conn effete from the world by Hentifying and manipulating its extant tendencies, rather than imposing form on it by the application of force alonc' (Singleton, 2014: SOO) A tap isa diagram of desi, and the opportunity trap models the affirmation ofthe future from which educational thought begins. Optimism is a tendency that is manipulated by the opportunity trap to bind people to the promises of education ata time when faith in the politics of aspinaion i falc Thinking disaster Many in wealthy nations are not hopeful about their ewonomic futures, The 2015 Global Attitudes Survey conducted by the Pew Research Centar shows that 64% of | people in advanced economies beliove that thor children will be worse off faaa- ally than ther parents. With the aftereffects of the 2008 financial crisis lingering Sind austerity ot biting i sou plas, fas tau all Ff peuple surveyed felt hat the current economy is good, that their children will be beter off or that theirIs Research in Education 96()) national economy will improve inthe nea future (Pew Research Cente, 2015). The ‘opportunity bargain is being made with increasingly skeptical citizens. ‘And the economy is not the only problem. Scientists predict environmental disaster precipitated by a changing climate (Scranton, 2015) and Silicon Valley forecasts social crises precipitated by technological development that will dramat- ically econfiure demand for humaa labor (Brvniofson and Meer. 2014) or. in ‘more speculative repstrs, even reverse the prevailing dominance of humans over ‘machines. In each case, we are presented with a future that i likely to he worse than the present; indeed, if we take the thought experiments opened up by these Scenarios to their limit we are confronted with thinking the possibility of what Thacker (2011: 5) calls the ‘world-withoutus' ‘the subtraction of the human from the world’ ‘While the futures predicted by scientists in Nature of imagined in Hollywood films may not come to pas, we are still confronted with thinking disaster in Various forms. And while stories of apocalypse are not unique to our times, the current conjunction of scientific narratives concerning climate change and technological change, na context of ongoing economic crisis, ceates conditions in which deeply ingrained optimism is placed in question. However, dzacter presents an opportune ity Tor thought. This opportunity does not depend on the disaster actually happen- ing, but on the poccibilty that it um become an sbjuct of thug that Woes st simply fuel hope fora scientific fx that will usher in utopia or the schadenfreude of| hope for eollapoe. Blanchot (1995: 5) writes that ‘the disaster... snot the advent (which i proper to what comes to pass): it docs aot happen. And thus I cauuot ever happen upon this thought, except without knowing, without appropriating any knowledge’. The isaster, for Blanchot, isnot a catastrophic actual event, but rather a state of being separated from the sta (the decline which characterizes disorientation when the Tink wih fontaue fous wut hig cut). Bu ane disaster Ip nota stale Of Dad fortune. For Blanchot, the disaster is neutral, outside the distinctions that orient thought toward the ight or the dark: "Let us not entrust ourselves to failure. That would only be to indulge nostalgia for success’ (12). The disaster is the radical ‘hauge produced by w passivity beyond sucoess oF failure; to fail without fa (11), ‘Thinking the disaster offers an altemative beyond the alternative between opti= rnism ana pessimism Leaving the future behind ‘The disaster opens a crack through which dhe future could be 1ft behind. The future as a psychological catogory is a construction of a particular time and place: ‘he future is not an obvious concept... The rise of the myth of the future is rooted in modern capitalism, in the experience ofthe expansion of the coum” (Berarul, 2011; 17-18). This mytn is faltering withthe economies that it has grown, and the promise ofa better future, through intensification of investment Selar 7 in education, can be seen as an attempt to keep kicking the ean down the road. For many, however, the future no longor appears asa choice oa collective con- scious action, but is a kind of unavoidable catastrophe that we cannot oppose in Any way” (Berardi, 2011: 226), But cis eatastrophe could bea disaster for thought ‘that produces radical change, a change premised on no change rather than ‘making 1 dlforce’ for the bettor Optimism is the orthodox. image of educational thought and itis diagrammed in the opportunity trap, which limits this thought toa future that ean be alin. The opportunity trap is both a constraint on people's material lives and a constraint on how education can be thought There are thus historical aad eouveplual reasons for ‘wanting to escape from this trap. Singleton (2014: 504) argues that {ia trap isto ‘be escaped by anything other than luck... the escapee ise must change the thing that eseapes the trap is not the thing that was eaught in it. One possibilty for ‘seaping the opportunity trap is by questioning the daminant image according to & line of thought that ‘subtracts hope from the equation’ (Niedzviecki, 2015: 259) ‘The disster brings eucatioual thought co its limit, confronting it with a future that cannot be affirmed and the possibilty that human history may not continue. But this constraint on educational thought also holds possibilities for anew wey of ‘thinking education, The thought of the disaster isa radical disorientation and pessivity of dhought. The disaster Is beyond the altematwve between affirming & better future or affirming collapse. But what comes after ‘the future”? Berardi (2011) points to “a reversal ofthe energetic subjectivation that animates the reve- lutionary theories of the twentieth century, and the opening of an implosive theory of subversion, based on depression and exhaustion’ (138) If optimism has led us into the trap, then it may be time to give up in order to get out Declaration of confiting interests ‘The author(s) declared no potential conics of interest with respect to the research, author Ship, andor pubiaton of thie atce Funding ‘The authors) received no ancl support for the research, authorship, References Berard F (2011) After the Fatwe. dinburgh & Oakland, CA: AK Pes Bernt 1 2011) Crue Optimism. Durham & London: Dake University ress, Berlant 1 (2016) The commons: Infastrucures for troubling times, Enviroment and ‘Planing D: Soctery and Space 34 395-419 Blanchot M (1995) The Writing of the Disver, Lincoln and London: Univesity of Brown P (2003) The opportunity trap: Education and employment in global economy. 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