Social justice and action research: can we collaboratively create a new social movement with social justice at the centre?

Ideas about social justice are influenced by the ontological and epistemological assumptions of the worldview in which they are located. Since the seventeenth century, the dominant worldview in the western hemisphere has been shaped by the separatist and deterministic principles of classical Newtonian science. During the twentieth century, with the advent of quantum physics, these principles have been contested from within science itself, indicating that the universe may instead be inter-relational, entangled and participatory. A historical investigation demonstrates how, despite findings from modern science, the Newtonian worldview has become deeply embedded in the western psyche, including in neoliberal politics, education, and educational research. As a counter-narrative, an alternative worldview is proposed, which is grounded in the ontological assumption of a participatory consciousness, with implications for ethics and social justice. Supporting a call for the creation of a new story which negates the prevailing neoliberal narrative, I look at ways in which advocates of social justice can, using an integration of first, second and third person approaches to action research, collaboratively initiate a new social movement, with intellectual depth, and with social justice at its centre.