Late nineteenth-century African American political thought crystallized around the tensions between survival, accommodation, and activism. Booker T. Washington responded to pervasive racial violence and social exclusion by advocating radical individualism and moderation as tools for Black uplift. Washington emphasized vocational training, economic self-sufficiency, and strategic alliances with white elites. In contrast, W. E. B. Du Bois argued that structural change and political agitation were necessary to contest entrenched inequality. Readers can now compare these two approaches, understanding how Washington sought pragmatic, incremental gains while Du Bois pursued systemic, ideological, and organizational transformations through civic leadership and the NAACP. These contrasting strategies illustrate the spectrum of political thought available to African Americans under Jim Crow. Beyond Washington and Du Bois, thinkers like T. Thomas Fortune, Ida B. Wells, Anna Julia Cooper, and Lucy Parsons expanded the scope of African American political theory by integrating class, gender, labor, and epistemological concerns in their analysis. Fortune emphasized the material roots of racial inequality and the politics of property and labor, teaching readers to analyze oppression through economic and spatial frameworks. Wells foregrounded truthfulness and the antilynching movement, demonstrating how moral exposure and narrative could confront white supremacist violence. Cooper introduced a standpoint theory that centered Black women’s perspectives, while Parsons advanced anarchist and collective approaches linking joy, labor, and autonomy. Together, these thinkers reveal to readers that resistance requires diverse strategies, extending beyond individual uplift to systemic critique and community solidarity.

This chapter studies how Mark Twain moved the representation of climate control from the intra-diegetic plot to the extra-diegetic level of authorial narration in The American Claimant (1892). Drawing on the nascent practice of large-scale climate control by business-minded engineers such as Edward Powers and Robert Dyrenforth, backed by the US government, Twain granted the reader of his proto-modernist novel climatic agency at the same time that the influential mapmaker and publisher Levi Walter Yaggy was granting climatic agency to US pupils through his interactive representation of the planet in his Geographical Study (1887) and Portfolio (1893). Making anthropogenic climate change a narrative form, the chapter concludes that Twain’s proto-modernist work shows how fiction prescribes our understanding of climate, but also how the notion of climate control influenced his fiction: the novel’s universe becomes susceptible to readerly change, providing a proto-modernist challenge to the stable diegetic confines of the realist novel.

The widely accepted “AI Race” narrative, which pits the US against rivals like China, is a flawed metaphor that actively harms thoughtful AI development and policy. This chapter deconstructs the “race” by showing it lacks a clear finish line or coherent definition of “winning,” unlike historical contests such as the space race or the Manhattan Project. The narrative is based on three shaky assumptions: that innovation inherently equals progress, that generative AI is already capable of near-term, large-scale usefulness, and that the “winner” will control global AI values. Critically, these flawed premises trigger predictable, problematic policy reactions, including unlimited corporate and governmental spending, indefinite delays on necessary regulation, and hasty, thoughtless deployment. By prioritizing speed and raw capability over genuine utility, the “AI race” risks squandering resources on unreliable systems and undermining public trust. The chapter concludes that the real challenge lies in human coordination, not computation, and calls for abandoning the race framework in favor of a wise, goal-oriented approach that serves human needs over corporate interests.

Asylums’ adoption of printing and periodical publishing from the late 1830s was related to two major developments on both sides of the Atlantic: the growing accessibility of print and printing presses and the spread of the moral treatment of insanity. As the periodical press permeated daily life, and printing equipment became cheaper and easier to use, the introduction of presses into asylums was a practical move. The presses served multiple purposes: recreational, therapeutic, as well as administrative. This chapter identifies various factors that contributed to the introduction of printing in asylums and addresses concerns about the exploitation of patients’ labour hidden behind the theory of moral therapeutics. It also reflects on the symbolic meaning of the press, its association with civilizational progress, and the influence of such ideas on the early adoption of periodical publishing in America and Scotland. While presses were almost never bought solely for patients’ benefits, they offered novel opportunities for inmates to exercise initiative and agency as partners in the development of early psychiatry, as well as civilization.

The Romantic Self is constituted by otherness, by relations that are in constant transformation. In the preceding pages, this issue has been addressed with a particular focus on the relationship between the self and nature. In this part of the book, we shall see that the same applies to the relationship between the self and history: the I cannot separate herself from, or impose herself on, the historical conditions in which she emerges; rather, these are part of the Romantic Self. In this chapter, in particular, I will show that the ‘defective’ essence of the Romantic Self hinders her to impose her sovereign will on the development of historical events. This is reflected in her incapacity to bring into unity the fragmentation of the modern age (described by Friedrich Schlegel through an opposition to the ancient epoch) and in the impossibility to interpret history as a manifestation of human progress. The absence of a unitary line in history challenges the hermeneutics of the present, too: on this, Schlegel’s genealogical perspective wants to give a solution.

This chapter explores the construction of Twa as global development subjects within the Rwandan context and asks how they position themselves within that landscape, formed by the intersection of the global development narrative and Rwanda’s unity and reconciliation agenda. This chapter interrogates the state’s development narrative in the context of the global development discourse and examines its ability to offer a believable and accessible vision of progress. The Twa in our study push back against the de-politicising effect of development and its processes, whereby the emphasis is placed on the individual and their mind-set. However, they do so not to emphasise their ethnic apartness but to assert their right to the attributes of Rwandanness, notably land. Their answer is thus not to refuse to participate in the modern Rwanda but actively to seek it by demanding equal care.

Ancient theories of human diversity and identity strongly influenced most modern forms of scientific racism, including eugenics, tropicalism, craniometry, environmental theories of human development, social evolutionary theories, and theories connecting ‘race’ and intelligence. This chapter explores three of these areas of influence: (1) environmental determinism; (2) models of evolution and the ‘progress’ of civilisations; and (3) population management schemes linked to eugenic thinking. These ideas spread throughout Europe as part of the Enlightenment project to classify everything and throughout much of the globe under the influence of European imperialism and colonialism culminating in the Nazi eugenics program. But this chapter focuses on developments in the United States, the country that pioneered the colour-based bioracism that still dominates contemporary racist thinking between 1870 and 1930, the years when the ‘science of man’ became academic and political dogma.

Intertwined with romanticism and his communist political stance, Neruda expresses in multiple lines an ecocritical stance. Animals, landscapes, and the critique of the ideology of progress are found throughout his poetry. This chapter seeks to highlight his contribution within a broad conception of “environmental history.”

Idealized views of China were challenged by other Enlightenment thinkers, such as Montesquieu, who represented the aristocratic opposition to absolutism and saw China as an example of extreme despotism. These contrasting views on China in the early eighteenth century reflected conflicts between absolutist monarchs and the aristocracy. The idealized portrayal of China as a model for Europe, championed in Voltaire’s writings, gained ground with the rise of absolutist states. The debate about China and the dominance of the idealizing view among early Enlightenment thinkers eventually gave way to widespread disdain for China in the late Enlightenment, seen in the works of Diderot, Kant, Hegel, and others. This late eighteenth-century contempt for China was linked to Europe’s growing confidence stemming from renewed economic and geopolitical expansion, as well as the rise of the bourgeoisie as the new patrons of intellectual pursuits. Under the idea of Europe as a progressive continent, all ancient civilizations – including China and Christianity – were attacked as stagnant, superstitious, and obstacles to human reason and progress.

Chapter 1, “Introduction,” welcomes you to day 1 of your new life as an upgrader. In this introduction we not only provide an overview of the book’s thesis for better problem solving and more effective technological advancement, we start to draw out the contours of what it means to be an Upgrader. This loosely nit cohort of changemakers has rejected both the inadequacy of the status quo and the destructiveness of innovation. Here, you’ll begin to learn what it means to solve some of the most urgent problems facing our society today through the lens of upgrades. We’ll also begin to provide examples of ways that innovations have fallen flat, or blown up completely, in the past. Crucially, upgraders aren’t just backseat drivers in the journey of social change, they are forward looking experts who are often able to see the dangers of pending innovations before they occur. In your life as an upgrader, you’ll not only be able to avoid these missteps yourself, but you’ll be able to see the innovation traps so many others are poised to fall into.

Chapter 5 focuses on two biographical compilations of Afro-Argentines who are considered role models for the community. These biographies not only present a written portrait of each individual but also include a corresponding visual portrait, a feature that enriches the compilations. They were an attempt to construct an Afro-Argentine memory and imaginary, and the construction of this collective memory implied affection, bonds of proximity, and even intimacy The inclusion of portraits shows how important images were to the promoters of the publication in their role as mentors of the community. On the one hand, the inclusion of engravings was a way of complying with the precepts of progress and civilization, given the growing development of illustrated publications at the time. On the other hand, the possibility of seeing and recognizing the faces of notable people implied an affective dimension of which Afro-Porteño intellectuals were aware. This was because, in addition to being individuals who enjoyed a certain prestige (to a greater or lesser extent) not only within the group but also in the rest of Buenos Aires society, the members of the community were in almost daily contact with them and their relatives, often as friends.

Chapter 6 focuses on the careers of four artists of African descent in the Rio de la Plata: Fermín Gayoso, Rosendo Mendizábal, Juan Blanco de Aguirre, and Bernardino Posadas. They work in different historical contexts, from the colonial era to the end of the nineteenth century. The first was enslaved and was active in the early nineteenth century. Therefore, his trajectory differs from the rest. Mendizábal, on the other hand, was not only a painter but also a politician, maintaining ties to the Buenos Aires elite of the 1850s and 1860s. The historical and social context was quite different for Juan Blanco de Aguirre and Bernardino Posadas. These artists were active in the last quarter of the century, when the project of a racially and culturally homogeneous nation implemented by the dominant groups was in full swing. The analysis undertaken in this chapter provides a glimpse of the situation of Afro-Porteño intellectuals and especially of the few artists of whom we have information, as well as the tensions generated by the educational and promotion projects in which they were involved.

This chapter traces debates on progress and social justice as of the late 1980s. The critique of a medical marketplace, the perceived need to challenge an autonomy-based notion of progress, and a certain sociopolitical optimism all contributed to reimagining medical progress by placing left-wing sensibilities front and center. The rise of the health model underpinning this view of progress emphasized nonhealth factors – including income, education, and housing – that influence the health of communities. Effectively, the idea of health progress lost its narrower “medical” focus and became associated with ambitious projects for achieving social equality. But here too, a single-minded commitment to the notion of progress as health justice comes replete with trade-offs and unresolved tensions. I end the chapter with a case study of the COVID-19 pandemic, the way in which it furthered a vision of health as occurring in a much larger ecosystem than previously thought, and corresponding ideas of progress as social justice.

This chapter begins by returning to a key moment for conceptions of medical progress in the context of civil rights movements when a new awareness of the insufficiencies of medical progress as “merely” scientific knowledge gains led to a sustained interest in knowledge that was empowering for patients. Amid the growing numbers of people who challenged the focus on scientific progress, many turned to freedom as a new concept for grounding progress in medicine. At times, this went together with more holistic views of personhood and health and the desire to put self-determination at the heart of theories of progress. Other, related trends acknowledged the potential contradictions between freedom and progress head-on and argued that taking individual freedom seriously implied challenging traditional, scientific/technological forms of medical progress. The chapter concludes with a detailed examination of several recent instances, including personalized medicine, in which technological progress is presented as being highly compatible with individual empowerment and liberation.

This chapter describes and analyzes the role that medicine has historically played in relation to broader cultural attachments to the idea of progress. It offers a historical overview of how the interest – or disinterest – in progress is entangled with contemporary understandings of what it means to be healthy or ill and the medical priorities of the time. Improved medical care had very different meanings depending on the respective value ascribed to individual and societal well-being, attitudes toward death, and the role of physicians. While contemporary ideas about medical progress rest on very different understandings of the human from other cultural and historical contexts, their emergence from a combination of scientific knowledge and ethical preoccupations recurs throughout history. Even as the capacity and desire to intervene in the human body with technological means has increased, both utopian and modest visions of progress in medicine have historical antecedents. The historical overview that follows is crucial for understanding how answers to the question “What is progress in medicine?” have always been contested and historically contingent.

The epilogue considers one possible future incarnation of the idea of progress in medicine, namely progress as achieving sustainability. Despite the fact that environmental concerns have long been associated with reimagined ideas of progress, aspirations for sustainability remain underdeveloped in medicine. Nevertheless, this epilogue discusses the cases in which the concept of medical progress has been coupled with “sustainable” or “green” medicine. Visions of sustainable medical progress tend to presuppose a multidimensional concept of medical progress, call for expanding the time frame in which progress is assessed, and posit environmental limits as constraints on open-ended progress. At the same time, few of these visions engage with the pluralistic nature of medical progress, preferring to understand measures that support a robust natural environment as intrinsically good for the health of individuals and societies, and broadly aligned with the goals of conventional medicine.