Bizcuits | Activists: Guiding us down Desire Paths

Leanda Lee

Desire paths are tracks worn by the wishes and feet of those gone before. As explained in an article in last week’s Guardian, they very often run contrary to design and planning.  These are the pathways that take you where you desire via a route that you prefer, regardless of the designs of authorities or blueprints of urban planners.

These are the pathways curtailed by signs demanding “keep off the grass”, or by fences and chains along bounded routes. It takes a little courage to follow even well-worn paths, and an adventurous spirit to create them. Desire paths are more frequently being taken seriously as “a way for city dwellers to ‘write back’ to city planners, giving feedback with their feet”. Citizens’ desires are being heeded in both concrete and metaphoric form.

Activists – people who campaign for and make change happen – beat those metaphoric pathways for the rest of a community. They are about making reform and improvement in our circumstances.  Activists view their environments critically; they question what the rest of us take for granted and do not assume that existing modes of behaviour and the actions of those we rely upon are necessarily beneficial for everyone. They take the risk of beating new pathways alongside the established ones, upsetting the status quo.

It is activists’ persistent voices over time that can sway the authority figures – the more powerful designers of our social, economic and political systems – to listen and then change those systems. Then it becomes easier for the rest of us laggards to walk the new paths we truly desire but have no energy, conviction or time to traverse alone.

Much of the inertia for any positive change lies in the existing system. As an example, on social media this week there has been campaign to put pressure on supermarkets to reduce plastic packaging on fresh produce.  Currently, even if shoppers want to buy “naked” produce, they cannot work around the system. Each bundle of fruit and vegetables must be placed in a separate bag for weighing and pricing with a bar-coded sticker at the produce weigh station before it can be purchased at the checkout. To change this practice would require a complete revamp of the weigh and price-tagging method so that it could be done at the point of payment, thus removing the necessity for enclosed packaging. This system, as are all waste and pollution problems, is a design choice.

There are always solutions to problems raised by activists, but the required systems-design changes and the sunk-cost in legacy systems is often too great to make these viable in the short term. This is why we need the persistence of activists walking the talk, leading us down desired pathways.

Activism is claiming a higher profile in Macau of late. Yesterday we met Joe Chan on the Times’ front page, an environmental activist and president of the Macau Green Students Union, talking about the state of plastic-pollution in Macau.  Last Thursday, Scott Chiang and Alin Lam were fined for their “action” against the demolition of Hotel Estoril. Such is the value of activism that The International School has a new program to encourage it.  Their “Activist-in-Resident’ initiative is not about causing trouble, which is often how activists are portrayed as they destabilise the status quo and question authority, but it is about recognising a need, “to problem solve, think critically, and make positive changes in our global community.”

Desire paths will continue to be beaten by those prepared to go off designated roads and forge new ways. Rather than suppress the unwanted voices or cut-off access to alternative routes and new destinations, our community will benefit by taking advantage of the energy and enthusiasm of new active voices with their visions of a better Macau.