Thus in the workshops of Repubblica the readers give shape to new ideas: “Empathy is the key”

Spectators who become writers, who sit around a table to discuss the future of society and rights or how to face the new challenges of the world of work. At the Republic of Ideas the watchword is participation, because the future also passes through a new form of interaction with the public, for the first time the protagonist and not just the spectator of the meetings. A formula, that of the new workshops, born “looking at social networks”, explained the director of Repubblica Maurizio Molinari. “The strength of social networks is interaction, conversation” and the goal was to create “events that are not that one sits and listens, as one once watched television. Let’s make one speak, react and converse, like happens on social media. I think the key to knowledge today comes from conversation. “

Starting with the first meeting of the Writers’ Club, with Paolo di Paolo and Guido Bosticco, who talked about the “engine of desire”. Before the meeting, each person was given a notebook. Not to take notes – or not only – but to write a short story, starting with an incipit: “He had 5 minutes and only one wish to express. So he began to think …”. On paper, short stories have come to life, even very short – ten minutes available to aspiring authors – on the eternal theme of desire. Then, those who wished were able to read their story aloud. With Veronica Raimo – finalist at the 2022 Strega Prize – we talked about creative memory and how slippery the concept of ‘truth’ is in literary production. Participants were asked to put their own memory on paper, true or – even better – invented.

The “Town Hall” workshops are based on interaction and exchange of ideas. The model is the city assemblies of Anglo-Saxon countries. In the first appointment, after a dialogue between Carlo Bonini and Ilaria Cucchi on the subject of rights, the public was divided into various tables, representing different categories: institutions, law enforcement, media, intellectual elite. The question: imagine two different scenarios for 2028, one negative and one positive. And try to understand what was wrong and what, instead, was done right. And people responded with enthusiasm. “They are working hard, they are focused, motivated and involved”, explains Gabriele, one of the “facilitators” who assist the participants. “When it comes to complex issues, such as justice, rights, democratic participation, it can no longer be done without open discussion, without taking into account different perspectives. There is not only the truth of technicians and experts. What is innovative of these formats is that they create a space and an opportunity for dialogue. Thus an emotional involvement and a spirit of true participation is born. There is not only passive observation “.

Markers and large 4-meter-long blackboards are the tools available to try to imagine the evolution of the company in the coming years. The first meeting of the “Future Lab” was with the architect and urban planner Stefano Boeri and Riccardo Staglianò, who discussed the “forms of creative work”. After the dialogue, the audience, divided into groups – one for each professional category (teachers, press, small businesses) – while drawing, tried to answer some questions of the world of work of tomorrow. “It is an experiment to allow people to explore important themes together, themes for which there is not yet an answer, nor a precise co-understanding”, explains one of the facilitators who assisted the participants. “The question is: what needs are emerging in this category? In the transition between one generation and another, what new experiments will arise?”. And even in this case, the public responded enthusiastically.