Númena is a non-profit organisation devoted to research and development in the social sciences and humanities. It was founded on 5 January 2001 by a group of young researchers who had already been collaborating with each other on an informal basis. It is difficult to explain who, how or why idealized Númena without naming names. Let us just say that we were young social scientists of some talent.
By working in academia we eventually became conscious that it is a setting for arbitrariness without appeal and, in brief, an industry perfect even in the alienation of work. Conversely, the social and symbolic capitals of the academy are essential factors of production in the economy of the social sciences and humanities. It is a harsh diagnosis, but we were by no means the first to make it:
"The worker, that is, the assistant, is dependent upon the implements that the state puts at his disposal; hence he is just as dependent upon the head of the institute as is the employee in a factory upon the management. For, subjectively and in good faith, the director believes that this institute is 'his,' and he manages its affairs. Thus the assistant's position is often as precarious as is that of any 'quasi-proletarian' existence..." Max Weber in Science as Vocation
What was to be done? Númena embodies the strategy we articulated in response to this dilemma and its history is the account of the surprising viability of such a solution. What we did, in fact, was to formalize a network of collaborations which existed for some time, giving it the chance to operate as a social and symbolic capital accumulator and not only as an informal scheme of intellectual mutualism. Once formally established, Númena began operating and secured a bureau in Taguspark, a science and technology park in Greater Lisbon, and its history became mostly that of the projects it exist to host.
