Those aiming for political change often highlight our constrained capacity to imagine alternatives. This limited imagination is seen as a major barrier to the radical responses needed to meet global challenges, from climate breakdown, to widening inequality, to technological disruption.
But one potential contributor to this limitation has been rarely highlighted: how current methods and theories employed by civil society may be counterproductive to their aims, by inherently restricting political potential and possibility. Increasing use of Artificial Intelligence models which default to conventional theories and methodologies only reinforce the risk of this outcome.
When the tools themselves encode the logic of the status quo, advocacy and political efforts for change may end up reinforcing the very power structures we seek to challenge. Tools that Trap Us is a platform for those that wish to work together to prevent that.
