Against Despair: Mapping a Strategy of Hope (Part Two)

The second part of a summer meditation detailing ten points to reclaim hope as a strategy.

In the first part of this text, I set up a cliffhanger: how do we recognize a collective worth joining, or forming? And once we are part of a collective, how do we maintain it and realise its potential?

To answer these questions, I argue that a methodology of hope is needed. First, to recognize processes that constantly open the way to the world of crouching springs, and then a strategy to form communities and alliances to face great dangers and threats and give an unlikely opportunity to the world of crouching springs to (be)come ours.

Attention

The first principle of this methodology is attention. Not simply noticing, but a disposition of the soul, as Simone Weil puts it, a willingness to be awakened and altered. This sort of attention requires first that one is emptied of prejudgements, of listening just to be able to answer back. As the American writer David Foster Wallace argued in this commencement speech “This is Water” we often sleepwalk through life, tuned out, on autopilot. Hope begins with snapping out of that trance.

The second aspect of attention is the willingness to wait: waiting for relationships to mature, for words to be considered, for time to unfold. In Spanish, the word esperar means both to wait and to hope. This overlap is not accidental. It is with a proper disposition to be attentive that we can remain open and listen to the sound of whispers of change. Those whispers which, if we nurture and support, will reach high decibels.

Elucitading power

A second methodological component of hope is to elucidate the different facets of power.
The Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza argued in his Ethics that power can be understood in two ways. In Latin, power could be expressed as potere and potentia. This distinction is crucial. Potere refers to controlling, dominating power, the kind that subjugates. Returning to Tolkien’s allegory, this is the type of power embodied in the desire to dominate and centralize authority, as with the One Ring. This is the type of power that Foucault mainly warned us about and who spent his lifetime revealing all of its hidden mechanisms and expressions.

But fortunately, there is another form of power – potentia – which refers to the capacity to actualize potential, both one’s own and others’. Potentia flourishes when others also flourish. It is the power of co-creation, of nurturing potential, of mutual elevation. Contrary to potere, potentia does not seek submission but elevation. The realization of another’s potential does not threaten our own. It strengthens it. It is the energy of fellowship and solidarity, the power that grows in collective flourishing. Thus, understanding this duality is essential for a methodology of hope: not all power is corrosive. Some power enables, uplifts, and builds.

Recognizing potentia allows us to identify and align with forces that grow community and courage, rather than fear and control.

Searching for care

A third methodological component of hope is to search for care, where it exists and by whom it is practiced. Some would argue that the opposite of hope is hopelessness. However, I argue instead that its opposite is not hopelessness, but security. The etymology of security from the Latin sine cura — “without care” — represents a turning inward, away from others, away from risk.

And this brings us to a very important paradox: those who make their best efforts to play it safe, not to risk, not to fight for what’s right, to safeguard themselves, will end up losing everything, for they have stopped caring. And here lies an important paradox: those who strive above all to be safe, to avoid risk, to protect themselves from change or discomfort, end up losing everything, not because of external threat, but because they cease to care. They build trenches, walls, and moats to sever themselves from others, overrun by fear. The desire for security isolates them from the vital connections that make hope possible.

Caring, on the other hand, needs to extend a hand to the fringes of the unknown, of the risk of not being reciprocated, the risk of rejection, of vulnerability, of entering into solidarity with the weak and the excluded.

Caring, on the other hand, requires exposure and risk. It stretches a hand to the margins, to those who may not reciprocate, to those who carry wounds and weakness. Caring is inherently hopeful. It is only through hope that we take what is good in society and choose to defend it. Not because it guarantees success, but because it deserves care. As Foucault once said to a young interviewer shortly before his death, it is in defending what is good that we resist the cynical pull of despair. As Borges reminds us: “Love is the only thing keeping us from repetition.” Only through love and care can we break free of the gramophone effect, the grooves of history that endlessly repeat suffering and submission.

A strategy of hope

Now, it is necessary to explore hope as a strategy. I distilled a glimpse of a strategy of hope by reflecting on my research in Mexico, where three rural communities – Temacapulín, Acasico and Palmarejo – were able to face and win against a coalition of actors with more resources, tools, and power. From that experience I identified ten principles for any collective seeking to turn hope into change.

First, it is necessary to understand that even powerful persons need to act in alliance. If even the powerful requires coalitions to advance their interests, so too must the resisting, usually weaker, actors. Much harm has been done by popular stories summoning the need to change through “The One”: Harry Potter, Neo, Superman, etc. Although it is true that leaders are sometimes needed to stir thought and the spirit, nothing can be done without the support of the community behind them.Too much reliance on a leader will only lead to disappointment and frustration. Excessive faith in singular figures leads to collapse. On the contrary, the best inheritance of a leader is the offspring and decentralization of initiatives and collectives joined by a common vision.

Second, choose your alliances wisely. It can be hard to realize before joining which type of alliance is a collective of people. Perhaps Spinoza can help in this matter by categorizing alliances that are driven by the will to potere and the will of potentia. When alliances are driven by what Spinoza called sad passions — where secrecy, gossip, and power plays are common, and members treat each other with jealousy, self-righteousness, envy, and suspicion — we can read these as signs of ill-fated alliances. Sad passions drain collective energy. Whereas alliances driven by joyful passion, in which members treat each other as ends in themselves with a genuine joy of seeing each other blossom, are signals of alliances brimming with potential. These collectives are marked by affirmation, not fear.

Third, in all alliances, each member has a small or large roles, but all are crucial in the long-term process of the struggle of bringing about the world of crouching springs. It is an enormous mistake to undervalue small, invisible roles: each member of an alliance has a role, and each role is essential. Some take to the streets, others calculate, speak, negotiate, or maintain internal care. Simone Weil reminds us that the smallest attention is the highest expression of love. French philosopher, Badiou states the four utmost human dimensions where humans can exert critical changes: Art, Science, Politics and Love. Anyone exercising in one of these dimensions is playing a crucial role in any alliance for change.

Fourth, connected to points two and three, is the importance of exercising solidarity. Not one role is more important than the other, and the initiatives of a member of the community are embedded with unknown potential. Exercising solidarity means to support one another to allow for personal fulfillment and flourishing.

Fifth, the temporality of the actions that each alliance carries out has to be understood as a slow process that takes years, even decades of resistance. it is crucial to understand that this work takes time. The constant interaction and incorporation of new allies produce learning, shifting perspectives, and immaterial capital. Hope as a strategy is a long game. Its tempo is patience (“esperar para la esperanza“), what German philosopher Hanna Arendt calls “radical patience”. Alliances must build mechanisms to sustain themselves over years or decades without burning out. This includes rotating responsibilities, creating rituals of renewal, and celebrating incremental progress, so that the long arc of transformation does not exhaust those carrying it.

Sixth, that alliances will always at some point suffer setbacks, betrayals and moments of desolation. The worst thing is feeling alone in the struggle. Badiou’s “fidelity” is key here: continuing despite disillusion. Sometimes, true hope lies not in immediate action, but in holding space for thought and disorientation.

Seventh, there are critical moments, where abrupt and unexpected ruptures occur, where change comes like a dam bursting from a small crack. These breakouts are windows of opportunity that should not be missed, because it is impossible to know when they may return, so it is necessary to have a clear strategy on how to grab and take advantage of those windows of opportunity. These ruptures are kairos, moments of radical opportunity. Nietzsche calls them “untimely”, times when destiny stutters. Preparedness is key. We must be faithful to ruptures, to the radical moments when something new becomes possible, even if the odds seem stacked.

Eighth, alliances must be able to manage difficult decisions and have the capacity to recognize mistakes and internal strife. In other words, be ready to face internal conflicts and make a body full of (healed) scars. There is no easy solution, but the capacity to mobilize the spoken and written word in an agonistic and forward-looking manner is key. Conflict is like dirty dishes. Ignore it, and it piles up into paralysis. Face it, and the kitchen lives.

Ninth, German philosopher Ernst Bloch argued that hope is not passive daydreaming but an anticipatory consciousness, an active imagination that rehearses the possibilities of a better world before they exist. This “concrete utopia” is not a fixed blueprint, but a mental workshop where potential futures are visualized, debated, and emotionally inhabited. Therefore, alliances should create spaces — through art, storytelling, simulations, and role-plays — where members can practice the future they want to build. This strengthens resolve, clarifies shared goals, and inoculates against the paralysis of not knowing “what comes next” when small victories are achieved.

Tenth, in the end, the greatest danger is not the crumbling world itself, but the cynicism that convinces us it cannot be otherwise. Jewish survivor of Nazi concentration camps, Viktor Frankl, reminds us that suffering, when shared, can become a source of unity and collective resilience. Thus, alliances should create deliberate practices for sharing stories of hardship. Not to dwell in victimhood, but to weave them into the group’s collective identity. This turns pain into a resource for empathy, trust, and mutual commitment.

Saving power: grace and fidelity

This text has aimed to reclaim hope. Not as naive optimism, but as a rigorous philosophical and practical concern, essential in turbulent and dark times.

Where gravity pulls down, grace lifts. A crucial road to grace is through fidelity. Fidelity to a project, a collective, a spark of the possible. As Badiou writes, the imperative is to continue, not to let oneself be discouraged. From this fidelity, friendship s born. As the German poet Hölderlin beautifully put it: “Wo aber Gefahr ist, wächst das Rettende auch” (Where danger is growing, the saving power is growing too). From a personal communication with Christoph Kastelbauer, a German linguist, I learnt that the German word Rettende is not meant religiously. Instead, it has a social meaning. When someone or something outside your community is threatening you, people around you, who are not close to you, will become saviours in case of danger.

Hope, then, is not just a feeling or abstraction. It is a discipline. A daily return to fidelity. To continue walking with others when all paths seem blocked, to nurture what remains hidden beneath the ice. In this world weighed down by gravity — of despair, control, and survivalism — hope is a counterweight, a counter-conduct. It does not erase danger, but insists that danger is not the final word.

Hope as a strategy means choosing care over calculation. Attention over efficiency. Friendship over fear. It is slow. It is fragile. Let us listen, then, for the world of crouching springs, hidden, latent, dormant beneath the ice and fire of our age. And when we hear its whispers, let us respond not alone, but together as it is the only thing that has ever changed anything.

 

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