Bcc: contributors Friends, Please accept my apologies for delaying the posting of your recent comments. The first item below offers a bit of dialog about how the word 'democracy' is used, and misused. Following that are responses to the Zen quest story, posted without comment. all the best, rkm http://cyberjournal.org ============================================================================ From: "Robert Vogel" <•••@••.•••> To: <•••@••.•••> Subject: Re: rkm ruminations... Date: Fri, 12 Jul 2002 16:43:02 -0400 Nowhere is democracy perfect, but the challenge in globalization (as in nations, corporations, and markets) is to democratize. Robert A. Dahl, Professor of Political Science Emeritus at Yale, has written a book "On Democracy" which has a fairly pessimistic view. "...Crucial decisions mainly come about through bargaining among political and bureaucratic elites. Limits are set not by democratic processes but mainly by what negotiators can get others to agree to and by considering the likely consequences for national and international markets. Bargaining, hierarchy, and markets determine the outcomes. Except to ratify the results, democratic processes hardly play a role." It is unlikely that conditions for democracy can take place for international institutions. "Although democratic processes may occasionally set the outside limits within which the elites strike their bargains, to call the political practices of international systems "democratic" would be to rob the term of all meaning." There is the challenge R.L.Vogel East Lyme, Ct. USA ====================== Dear Robert, Thanks for telling us about Dahl's book. We certainly need a lot more out-of-the-box thinking about 'democracy', and Dahl seems to have some light to shed. Permit me to suggest a way of looking at the word 'democracy', and its usage... Suppose someone shows you a motor vehicle, with four wheels, a cab up front, and a flatbed in the back. He says to you, "How do you like my new car?". You say, "That's not a car!" He replies, "What do you mean? It's got four wheels, a steering wheel, it goes forward and reverse, I can ride around in it... Isn't that a description of a car?" Normally when we characterize an object, we identify which category it best fits in. Our vehicle above fits in the category 'truck'. To call it a 'car' is either a joke, a sign of stupidity, or the ramblings of a demented semanticist. Now let's look at our 'advanced' societies and identify what category of governance they belong in. I suppose the choices might include: 'democracy', 'aristocracy', 'dictatorship', 'oligarchy', and 'plutocracy'. As I see it, based on evidence such as Dahl offers, our societies are clearly 'plutocracies', which means, "government by the wealthy". To call them 'democracies', because they 'have elections and competing parties', is like calling a car a truck, because it has 'four wheels and carries me around'. best regards, rkm ============================================================================ Date: Sat, 29 Jun 2002 09:18:00 -0400 Subject: Re: The Zen of Global Transformation From: thomas brinson <•••@••.•••> To: <•••@••.•••> Right and Left On! ============================================================================ Date: Sun, 30 Jun 2002 01:56:33 -0700 To: "Richard K. Moore" <•••@••.•••> From: Rosa Zubizarreta <•••@••.•••> Subject: Re: The Zen of Global Transformation Wow, Richard. Very cool! if you are addressing your message to business consultants, you may want to mention that what you are proposing is very similar to Edgar Schein's idea of how to create culture change... he talks about "culture as the residue of learning", and explains that when a group is able to successfully solve a problem, the assumptions embedded in the strategy that enabled it to do so, become part of what begins to be "taken for granted", or the unconscious culture of the group (the "changed minds" in your model...) so, for instance, if we are a community that is threatened by some circumstance, (say, for example, we are in a drought) and someone proposes a very autocratic, centralized solution (i'm the dictator, listen to me, i'll get you through this) AND IT WORKS (OR APPEARS TO WORK), then what that community "learns" in the process is, "whenever we have a difficulty, we need to have a dictator." IF INSTEAD, someone were to propose an elegant de-centralized solution, AND IT WORKED, then the community would learn that "whenever we have a difficulty, we need to figure out a way that everyone can play a part in the solution." So Schein sees the role of leaders as 1) proposing solutions that have the appropriate assumptions embedded in them, 2) encouraging folks to adopt the solution. If the leader succeeds at 1) and 2), and if the solution proves adequate to meeting the group's need and thus provides folks with the experience of success, THAT is how one creates culture. so, it's just another way of saying the same thing, but from the perspective of of process consulting and social psychology instead of Zen! ============================================================================ To: •••@••.••• Date: Mon, 1 Jul 2002 04:42:10 -0400 Subject: Re: The Zen of Global Transformation From: T K Wilson <•••@••.•••> Well Richard, I think you've put it pretty much into a nutshell. This fits right in there with van Steenis "Alternating Minorities" and is a way to implement that idea and more. Problem solving and community building/empowerment at the street level. Temporary situational working groups. Juries. What a concept. What will have to happen, of course, is that, one community at a time, those in local "politics" will need to be convinced to loosen their (sometimes) well intended grasp (stranglehold) on the communities airways and allow this process to happen. I don't even think it's going to require replacing anyone (other than through the normal attrition of the electoral process), but simply convincing a few amendable individuals here and there to give it a try. What should happen then, assuming this works as planned, is that it will simply transform politics and politicians as we know it/them into a mediative function instead of a controlling one. We could end up with truly "fair" and representative "governance". Truly it could even be lighter and more subtle than that which the word governance evokes. I checked your web site to try to get a URL I could refer people back to on this from the various groups, without having to republish the entire treatise each time and didn't see this there. Any idea when you might make it more immediately accessible to the world at large? Pretty inspirational, my friend. TK ============================================================================ Date: Wed, 03 Jul 2002 10:11:56 -0700 From: Janet McFarland <•••@••.•••> Subject: Re: The Zen of Global Transformation To: •••@••.••• Thanks! Lots of food for thought. I think Co-counseling Community actually is the most integrated design I'm aware of, has been functioning for 30 years internationally. Are you familiar with it? (or re-evaluation counseling). It's got some cult-like aspects which I think have kept it from gaining wider popularity. But the model is excellent and it is international. For some reason I can't bring up the website www.rc.org. I guess I don't know how it could be used but the model is good. Janet ============================================================================ To: •••@••.••• Date: Sat, 6 Jul 2002 06:25:59 -0400 Subject: Re: The Zen of Global Transformation - publication version X-Juno-Line-Breaks: 0,3,5-7,9-10,12-16,21 From: T K Wilson <•••@••.•••> Hey Nas, Finally got around to reading the entire revised edition of "The Zen..", after I sent it to half a dozen different people with my personal recommendation as to its efficacy. No problems. Haven't got any responses back yet but I have been recommending that they make inquiry back to you or simply subscribe to cyberjournal. I see its not on your site yet but its obvious you've been quite busy. I think you've outdone yourself (yes) this time. I hope you plan on posting replies to your subscribers as I'm really curious to see what the response will be. Most of those I sent it to are currently involved in organizational efforts of one kind or another. BTW, what's a signed copy going to set me back? I would like one. Gotta go; just thought of someone else that needs this. Best, TK ============================================================================ From: "Linnea Meyer" <•••@••.•••> To: <•••@••.•••> Subject: Re: nasrudin, and the story of the zen quest story Date: Sat, 6 Jul 2002 21:12:43 -0700 Ha! Richard! Congratulations! and Nasrudin! I went into orbit when I first read your 'zen' posting to the list - ;-> Fantastic! I would have responded sooner, but have bought a house and have been doing all those things that go with it for the past few weeks. I am right near seatac airport, Seattle. I can envision an event (conference and book signing) down the road a bit - for Nasrudin here in Seattle - home of Jeff Bezos and Amazon.com! ---<snip>--- My best regards to you and to nasrudin - Linnea/tai'a ps: Richard, read Dr Michio Kaku - if you have not yet - and his discussion of the 'necessary step' - of humanity - toward achieving a 'Type One' civilization status. Kaku is a professor of physics at City University of New York - or some univ there. He is alive, engaged, positive and has a wry sense of humor. You will enjoy him - if you have not already. Check out his books on Amazon. ============================================================================ From: •••@••.••• Date: Sun, 7 Jul 2002 12:36:34 EDT Subject: Re: nasrudin, and the story of the zen quest story To: •••@••.••• I assume that all this leads to how to make this a better world, and, in taking away the possible programs for doing so, it leaves us with the generalities. That's not bad, per se, so I am going to respond in generalities, as well. One of the components is honesty----of self motivations, thought, and that of others. Openness----which one might say is also really honesty, but I will allow it to stand by itself, because secrecy takes away too temptingly from honesty. Thirdly, (not necessarily in the order given), is love. First of all, love of oneself, without which love of others is a travesty. But then, love and respect for all others, regardless of their thoughts and actions which might be contrary to our own. Fourth, let's take it a step further, and say love and respect for all things on this planet, without which love for oneself and others could not flourish. That should be a good start--------and then, we can tackle the problems which the world is facing today, which is a more complex subject, but without which the above, we would have no place to start. Hope I have added a drop of clarity. Evelyn Goodman ============================================================================
Share: