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Every person mistakes the limits of their field of vision for the limits of the world

This July, Durban played host to their second International AIDS conference. This is the biggest and most publicised of the HIV conferences, with the likes of Elton John and Prince Harry showing up to support the cause. This meeting is not really recognised for its pure scientific nature, but is regarded in our lab as something everyone should attend at least once. The goal of the meeting is really to bring social issues to the fore: interventions, activism and policy to improve the lives of those affected. Ultimately for basic scientists, it’s about gaining a wider perspective about the work we do, the impact we make and to motivate us to work harder to lighten the burden South Africa has borne for so many years. But the world of activism, especially celebrity activism, is also a world that could learn from science.

Charlize Theron spoke at the conference saying several things that upset me. The media raved about her speech saying she certainly didn’t sugarcoat anything – as if we don’t know how bad the epidemic is already. I think one of the things that upset me most was this, “The real reason we haven’t beaten the epidemic boils down to one simple fact: We value some lives more than others.” I do not deny that this is a very real issue in the world today; but I truly don’t agree that this is why we haven’t beaten the epidemic. It is easy to get swept up in this statement and feel some guilt as a privileged and fairly happy PhD student who lives life with a clean bill of health (apart from sleep deprivation), but I am worried that a statement like this really works against scientists.

There are legitimate and horrifying biological challenges that we face with this formidable foe. HIV adapts so rapidly our immune systems can’t keep up. About 20% of people develop amazing antibodies that can target 90% of the circulating virus but because this only happens 3 years after infection, this doesn’t help the person at all. We have had 6 HIV vaccine trials, none of which have done any better than 31% protection. The virus integrates into the person’s DNA, which makes a complete cure very difficult. We have cured one man by completely irradiating him twice and nearly killing him and we have thought we cured one baby by giving it ARVs in the first hours of its life (it has since rebounded), with little knowledge about how it will affect it over life. Please understand that the dearth of progress is not for lack of trying or because scientists are secretly plotting against adolescent women.

We simply have not figured it out yet.  Even with incredible education, support and dedication by some truly wonderful people in this country, there continues to be a barrage of infections. While social behaviours and injustices definitely help spread the disease, the ONLY thing that will stop it is a vaccine or a cure. It sounds noble to try and reinvent social interactions (a goal that must be pursued in our lifetime) but this is not what brings about a real-world cure to a horrible disease. Polio swept the world several times throughout history. Do you know when they stopped it? When they found a vaccine! (Read about other diseases defeated by vaccines here.)

The second thing that bothered me in Charlize’s talk, “I know this because AIDS does not discriminate on its own. It has no biological preference for black bodies, for women’s bodies, for gay bodies, for youth or for the poor. It doesn’t single out the vulnerable, the oppressed, or the abused.” This isn’t true: the disease does discriminate. Women are biologically more likely than men to contract the disease (read this link for an in-depth analysis and click here for a simplified version), and routes of transmission make gay men in particular vulnerable to infection. I understand what she is trying to say, but to a scientist these statements are incorrect and are once again, making the point that AIDS is only a social disease. People will never perceive themselves to be in a socially-constructed high-risk category. Many of the people I know own cars that they drive every day (a truly high-risk activity!) and not one of them wears a crash helmet.

Charlize later went on to say that we “have all the tools to end HIV.” And we don’t. The fact is education and empowerment doesn’t work completely. We need an intervention that people will not have to think about. How seriously do you worry about Pertussis every day or dying from Mumps? Everyone has access to these vaccines and that is what we need to do for AIDS. I agree completely with Baron Peter Piot (a researcher from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine) when he spoke at the same conference, “We need to stop saying that we have the tools to end the HIV and AIDs epidemic, until we have a cure or a vaccine- then we can say that.”

I wouldn’t want any young person to listen to Charlize Theron’s speech and assume that there is any lack of urgency in the scientific field because the disease is not prevalent in the white upper class. We are facing a terrible enemy and while we know a lot about it, it keeps coming up with clever ways to evade our advances. The world could always do with improvement. Young girls should think they are better than their relationships and can go on to live an HIV-free life. I applaud people trying to change this. Ultimately though, scientists are dedicated to making a vaccine for everyone. It, much like ARVs, will shape the lives of people much more quickly than changing social perceptions can. It would be easier if we could just give an injection that would bridge the social divide, but then again, I am a scientist looking out of scientist goggles, with potentially limited eyesight.

Posted on by Odi · 2 Comments

A Social Scientist’s Lab

When I think of a laboratory, it conjures images of pipettes and burners with complex mathematical equations written on a board. My laboratory, however, as a political scientist, has little to do with Bunsen burners and more do with measuring political heat. Very few people, outside the social sciences, understand how social science research is conducted and often liken it to tea leaf reading.

Research in the social science, particularly in politics and international relations, is really dynamic. There is an adage that ‘a week is a long time in politics’. A political leader can move from a hero to a villain and back again within a few days. Because of this dynamism, the work of the social scientist is important because their job is not only to analyse current state of affairs but also pick up on issues that could be arising soon. The social scientist should be able to direct policymakers to areas that that need attention and draw in the expertise other disciplines to meet the societal need.

Conducting social sciences is further complicated by the plethora of techniques and approaches to draw from. A number of analysts prefer more traditional quantitative approaches that they ‘borrow’ from the natural sciences. Alternatively, they may decide to use more qualitative approaches. I fall in the school of thought that purely scientific approaches are not always appropriate to examine social issues. For instance, research into political psychology would require a more experimental approach to political science but examining government decision-making needs a more holistic view. If you think about it, statistics presents a state of affairs but can’t help you predict how a leader, or government would respond to that state of affairs. There are so many  structural and relational power dynamics that affect decision making that statistics can only be a part of the overall picture. The only way to fully understand, and to an extent predict, possible future scenarios, is to understand the internal and external environment that  guide governmental and political decision-making. This exploration has to make use of international legal instruments, historical decisions making and being able to read shifts in the social environment.

The political scientist also has to draw on important skills that can’t be taught in a lecture hall, such as relationship building and listening skills. Listening goes beyond hearing what is said but includes being able to pick up to what the speaker is truly trying to convey. Many times, as it is with politicians and bureaucrats. The words that they use often have dual meaning or are a signal of something larger. A gruesome example is from the 1994 Rwanda genocide, there was a lot of rhetoric in the media about cockroaches needing to be exterminated. Tapping into relationship networks and listening carefully helps social scientists do their jobs better which can help, in some instances, save lives.

So what does my dream political science and international relations ‘laboratory’ look like? Aesthetically, it would be a cross between Olivia Pope’s apartment and office on the hit TV Show Scandal; basically it would be the love-child of comfort and function. The bookshelves would contain archive material, policy documents, newspapers and transcripts of interviews with experts in my field as well as others related to my subject matter. The living room would have a smart TV that would allow me to access the Internet as well as be linked to news sites around the world. The beauty of a smart TV is that is also does away with the need for a phone because communication is possible via Internet call applications such as Skype. There would also be a blue-tooth enabled keyboard so that I can type from the comfort of my couch when I need to. The only non-negotiable item that I would like is a feature wall with a magnetic glass white board. I prefer glass to regular white boards because they are easier to keep clean and, importantly, they are difficult to photograph. I often use paper or a white board to sketch my ideas or plot out concept relationships so having a stylish whiteboard would be great. Though, I must mention that I recently discovered new mind-mapping software that actually helps with mapping out key ideas (I plan on writing a review once I have fully mastered the program).

Ultimately, I don’t believe that your best social, or political, analysis comes from solely from facts and figures but also requires a good amount of intuition … and a comfy chair to sit on whilst you write.