PRECARIOUSNESS AND SUFFERING: BEYOND PUBLISHING

In a country like Brazil, keeping hope alive is itself a revolutionary act.

Paulo Freire

The word “hope”, echoed from the speeches of Paulo Freire, is very present in this year of celebration of his centenary. However, how “to hope” in such difficult times due, among other aspects, to a pandemic that caused the loss of more than 600,000 lives? How to experience grief and plan for the future?

Our editorials have long been drawing lines that tangent the importance of producing quality knowledge and disseminating this material in vehicles that drive the ever-increasing reach of science.We are openly defenders of research ethics and authors' right to publish their constructions built with commitment, dedication and love. On this side, our commitment, dedication, and passion for what we do and believehave made a place based on the relationship of respect, trust, and empathy between authors and the editorial board.It was, therefore, on thesebases that the PsicologiaemEstudoJournal (Psychology in Study) can achieve recognition in high national and international indices without ever charging any submission cost to our authors.

Weare proud of what we have achieved to reach with effort, difficulty and help. However, this editorial was not designed to address the achievements and lights of this path - unfortunately, not. We wrote this editorial to unveil a reality that currently haunts us. We are part of a Public University located in the heart of society,whichestablishes strong ties with it, so we feel the setbacks that this same society also feels.

We are shrouded in a kind of twilight, where hatred and offenses want to confront scientific knowledge and grounded analyses, where the neoliberal interests of private organizations co-opt the state´s power. There exists a cloud of lack of future perspectives hanging over us. Precariousness, flexibilization, outsourcing, informality, work platforms are discourses and expressions that are already part of our daily lives and seem to no longer scare us. In this sense, How long will we have to do more with less? How long to dry, what is dry? How long will we have to be resilient, unworthy meritocrats and self-entrepreneurs, taking full responsibility for everything? How long will we be meeting a demand arising from Labor Reforms, Social Security Reforms, Constitutional Amendment Proposal on Writs of Payment (PECsdos Precatórios), with which we disagree?

All of this also spills over into the publishing routine of this and several other Brazilian journals. Here, we highlight the significant and severe cuts in funding in recent years, directed to the Humanities and Social Sciences field. This model placed us in an intense degradation of working conditions, lack of staff, and precarious resources from development and financing agencies. It seems to expose an unwillingness to dedicateitself to the public rather than to theinterests of large private groups.

These general lines, outlined and unburdenedhere, may explain why our publications’ history has significantly reduced in number this last year (action performed with great painon the part of its editors). As if this were not enough, we still have on our trackchargesregarding the number of articles published, which can qualify the journal. We wonder, What kind of evaluation will this be? What productivity society, without pandemic or crisis, is being quantified?

Despite seeming to be a thing of the past and even an unnecessary luxury, investing in knowledge and science in our country is much more than publishing in stratified scientific journals - they are just the beautiful roof of a house. The foundation of the entire construction process of this work is in the investment in education and health, a path from which we deviated. The recent health crisis has only unveiled a reality that has been (de)constructed for some time.

The valorization of science, of scientific knowledge, has never been more necessary, considering the defense of obscurantism, of ignorance to historically elaborated knowledge. In this sense, the articles published in our journal work against the emptying of expertise. Readers find, in this volume, a discussion of themes necessary to understand the human formation, the psyche, in interface with the posed reality.

Thus, we resume Paulo Freire's speech.May we be revolutionaries in favor of the socialization of scientific and artistic knowledge!!!

Have a good reading.

November 2021

Referência:

• Freire, P. Num país como o Brasil, manter a esperança viva é em si um ato revolucionário. Recuperado de: Recuperado de: https://www.pensador.com/frase/MTgxOTI0Mw/ acessado em 10/11/2021.
  » https://www.pensador.com/frase/MTgxOTI0Mw/

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  07 Jan 2022
• Date of issue
  2021