Hierarchies – inspired by D&G campaign, postproduction Luminita Molico
by Luminita Molico
Assuming the period starting after the end of the Cold War as postmodern, Lupton (1999 pp.11-2) states that the status quo is dominated by a constant reevaluation of established thought and deconstruction of tradition. Further citing Giddens 1990; Massumi 1993; Lash and Urry 1994; Featherstoe 1995; Lupton (1999 pp.11-2) identifies postmodernity as an era dominated by uncertainty and ambivalence towards ‘change and flux, cultural fragmentation and the breakdown of norms and traditions’. This period—Lupton (1999 pp.11-2) claims—is also chracterized by the compression of time and space or an escalation in human, goods and services circulation leaving the individual in an expanding state of ‘uncertainty, complexity, ambivalence and disorder, a growing distrust of social institutions of traditional authorities’. As a result, decissions of individuals are questioned and defined as a root cause of disasters thus laying grounds for the concept of risk as a dominant feature of the decision making process. (Lupton, 1999 pp.11-2)
It is in this context that distributed and non-linear hierarchical organizational models are challenging traditional working environments suggesting alternatives for the future of the ‘liquid’ society (Bauman, 2007).