Keynote Address: Social Responsibility and Science Centres
by Stephen Lewis
A call to action for science centres
“We are on this planet to secure social justice and equality. I see no other reason for functioning. What you do at your centres makes it possible for people to understand the complex forces at work – whether scientific, technological, or intensely human.”
With those words, Stephen Lewis, one of the world’s foremost speakers on human rights, challenged the Congress to embark on a new path toward redesigning and reinventing science centres to reflect a greater social responsibility and to fulfil their potential for elevating human understanding and improving the human condition.
In an impassioned and inspiring talk, Lewis identified three specific areas of interest upon which science centres should focus their attention in order to “embrace science and the use of science within the realm of social responsibility and as the manifestation of social conscience.”
The first is climate change. Outlining recent calamitous events precipitated by global warming, he said the combination of hunger, drought, volatile climactic events, and disease have the potential to overwhelm if steps aren’t taken to reduce carbon emissions by as much as 90% by the year 2030. Lewis called the science around climate change indisputable and saw a role for science centres in making it accessible.
“It’s an extraordinary situation we are now facing as this combination of circumstances around climate change causes so much destabilization in the human condition, and the science centres bear the social responsibility of bringing to every exhibit you have the sense of interactivity, creating a recognition of the urgency in those who visit and an understanding of how these fascinating technological and scientific forces mesh.”
Lewis also saw a role for science centres in driving a better recognition and understanding of the complex interplay of issues in the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Although there have been great advances in terms of treatment, scientists continue to be disappointed in their search for a vaccine or an effective microbicide to prevent transmission. Even while one million people were enrolled in life-saving antiretroviral therapy in 2007, there were 2.5 million new infections. “And one of the unconscionable and inexplicable truths is that we have the capacity to stop many of these new infections using technology that is already well understood and available.”
Women and girls continue to be most vulnerable to the disease, accounting for 61% of those living with the virus in Africa, he said. “The work of empowering women, raising awareness in the communities, raising consciousness . . . thinking creatively of the use of science to make some of these realities vivid and searing in the eyes of the observer would make all the difference in the world.”
Finally, Lewis said, he was heartened by the many references in the Congress agenda to the Millennium Development Goals, which include cutting poverty in half, reducing infant and maternal mortality, preventing infectious disease, improving access to education, and promoting gender equality. “Some form of technology and scientific enquiry is rooted in each of these millennium goals,” he said.
Lewis acknowledged that he had no immediate concrete suggestions for particular program development that would drive science centres in their evolution toward becoming agents of social responsibility. But he expressed confidence in the experience, creativity and expertise of his audience. He also spoke of a fundamental hope that the daunting challenges he outlined could be met: “I draw hope from the people on the ground, incredible strength from the grassroots political level. . . . People in communities banding together, the community spirit, the sense of overcoming things at the grassroots are what drive the response. I’m exhilarated by what I see in the midst of all the horror. That’s what must drive us forward.”
- Download a PDF of April Dunford's (Director of Business Development, Nortel) opening remarks to this keynote.