Doha is the rising city of the Gulf and the wider Middle East region in many respects, above all through its ambitious support of education.

The World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) marks the peak of this support every other year. Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, Chairperson of Qatar Foundation for Education, Science, and Community Development, initiated WISE, a member of Qatar Foundation, in 2009.

The 2017 WISE Summit, “Co-Exist, Co-Create: Learning to Live and Work Together”, by bringing together 3,000 global experts across the world and in more than 50 sessions, cultivated a rich environment in the form of a global spectacle emanating from Doha, Qatar.  

Looking back, we believe that the impact of WISE should not be only understood with respect to its educational focus. 

Social Imaginaries

Social imaginaries refer to the ways people imagine their collective social life, as famous philosopher Charles Taylor defined. WISE 2017 made it clear that education is central to envision future collective imaginaries that will affect young generations. More importantly, what are the social imaginaries awaiting us and why they are pivotal in building sustainable futures? Education is an embedded process and “co-existing/co-creating” as WISE theme emphasized this year envisioned dynamics and trajectories for building and innovating our social imaginaries. Thereby, the influence of WISE transcends beyond the realm of education and it is intrinsically connected to the collective imaginaries of contemporary societies. A vision which sees educators and schools not only as delivering information but paving the road for nation-building and innovative ways to solve problems beyond their own borders. 

Why is this so timely and urgent?

One primary reason is that social imaginaries are crucial in reviving social fabric and in enabling collective intelligence and action. However, as WISE 2017 revealed in diverse ways, we are experiencing the fierce challenges and deceptions of living in a post-truth world.

Post-Truth World

In her inauguration speech, Her Highness underlined that co-existence is at the core of solutions to address common challenges. These challenges are closely linked to the vitality of social imaginaries and what is at stake now is global social imaginaries.

More specifically, Her Highness mentioned “Education that drives progress, sooner or later, faces varying challenges at different levels; be it political, media-related, cultural or technological”.

These challenges, we believe, clearly illustrate the embedded nature of education and without internalizing this aspect, efforts to promote co-existence and defining future social imaginaries is less likely to happen. Patrick Awuah the 2017 recipient of the WISE Prize for Education stressed the importance of putting effort into building the new young leaders of Africa who are committed to acting ethically and building their communities.

Shedding light on the characteristics, challenges and impediments of the post-truth world, WISE 2017 informed us about the global challenges towards building social imaginaries for the future, which are under extreme risk and in jeopardy. 

M. Evren Tok

Assistant Professor

Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU)