Interview about ALICE - EN - Boaventura de Sousa Santos
Boaventura de Sousa Santos - Interview on ALICE (Full)
2012-09-27

Boaventura De Sousa Santos answers questions about the ALICE Project. Coimbra 16 February 2012. List of Questions: - Could you please make a short introduction about ALICE? Why ALICE? - What elements, tools, procedures and approaches do you envision as strengthening the voices of the South? - Your work is very well known all around the world and your experience has matured within and outside the academia. How do you think the prestigious advanced grant from the European Research Council will contribute to develop your theoretical framework and define new reach? - ALICE emerges as a point of departure and an entry point in the investigations of CES. An entry point given the many challenges that have been incipient from the investigations developed out of three decades of research work at CES and a place of departure, as it accepts the challenges in order to turn them into practice. The question is: where did ALICE come from and where is it heading? - On the basis of the proposal of investigation of ALICE are the epistemologies of the South. Kindly explain what constitutes the Epistemologies of the South? - ALICE promotes ecology of knowledges and brings to the fore precisely that diversity of knowledges at a time in which the idea that there are no alternatives prevails; there is a saturation of alternatives. What are your expectations in relation to the manner in which political institutions and centres of power shall participate in this project or receive the results of this project? - There is a very suggestive and interesting metaphor that identifies ALICE. It is that of the mirrors and the unexpected lessons. What's the meaning of this metaphor? - A fundamental premise of ALICE is that the Global North (always used to impose and to teach), now can and must learn from the South. If you had to identify the most relevant lesson or lessons for the Global North, which ones would they be? - How does ALICE position itself before the challenge of an alternative and counter hegemonic globalization?