Agitation

Who agitates the agitators? In service-learning there is a clear effort to deconstruct individual’s presuppositions through reflection on their experience with service. This process is inherently disconcerting and unsettling for those critically reflecting on their assumptions and behaviors. In the end, the hope is that previously unquestioned biases, stereotypes, and behaviors will be questioned, and in some cases reconsidered. Thus, a process of agitation, while disconcerting, accomplishes a meaningful good. The danger, though, is that those that agitate will grow complacent in their own presuppositions, that is, they will ironically fail to let themselves undergo a process of agitation. It seems that this is the special predicament of leadership, that is, the subtle rise of hypocrisy in one’s words and actions. Who will hold leaders, agitators, accountable? What would agitating the agitators look like?