Friends, I write a lot about 'how bad things are', because if we don't acknowledge what we're up against, we can't respond effectively. But I prefer to talk about 'what we can do', and below is a very promising proposal. The authors are looking for feedback, as they should, and I hope some of you rise to the occasion. Please send it directly to them, but you are more than welcome to copy me as well. regards, rkm http://cyberjournal.org ============================================================================ http://www.earley.org/Transformation/conscious_action_proposal.htm CONSCIOUS ACTION PROPOSAL Jay Earley, Ph.D. •••@••.••• Fred Cook •••@••.••• Since there is a pressing need for fundamental social change, we intend to create an organization, Conscious Action, whose goal will be to understand and facilitate the process of social transformation. There is much known about what is not working in our current society, and there are many useful visions about the direction needed to create a healthy society, but less seems to be known about how to get from here to there, about the process of social transformation. There is still not enough consensus about the direction of change, and we need an open-ended, process-oriented approach of "finding our way together". There isn't enough theory and practice available to social change agents in a practical way. There are academic studies of social movements, but these are little help in guiding social action. There is intuitive knowledge accumulated by experienced activists, and some of this is being offered in trainings, but little of it has been systematized, written about, or otherwise incorporated into our common cultural heritage. The existing trainings need to be more widely attended to catalyze the scope and pace of change that is needed. Much of what is known about social change applies primarily to single-issue efforts aimed at stopping destructive policies, as opposed to the broad efforts to create healthy alternatives and fundamental change that are needed today. There is also a need for action research into spiritual approaches to social transformation. Therefore we will study the process of social transformation, and disseminate our results in a variety of ways that can be directly used in social change efforts. We want to foster the process of self-reflection and self-understanding among social change agents, organizations, and movements through training, consultation, action research, and collaboration. We have two related goals: 1.To increase the effectiveness and scope of social change efforts by fostering awareness, learning, and communication. This means enhancing attention to process and results, and encouraging creative experimentation. 2.To enhance the way social change efforts are aligned with the new, more evolved society that needs to be born. This means that our social change organizations and movements must be participatory, life-affirming, ecological, relational, just, holistic, and spiritual. We believe that these goals are mutually enhancing, that the more our efforts are spiritually and socially evolved, the more effective they will be. Even though we need social transformation on a global level, Conscious Action will focus on the U.S. We will study social transformation as it can happen in today's historical, political, and economic situation. *** BASIC PERSPECTIVE ON SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION There are four fundamental aspects of our vision of social change: CONSTRUCTIVE AND TRANSFORMATIVE MOVEMENTS We will focus our energy on social change organizations and movements that aim to create healthy alternatives rather than just working against destructive institutions and policies. We favor those movements that attempt to include all perspectives rather than dividing people into "us vs. them." We will also emphasize social change organizations and movements whose goal is fundamental change, not just relieving suffering or stopping destructiveness, as important as these are. Fundamental social change: 1. Addresses the root causes and systemic nature of social problems. 2 . Changes the paradigm by which we live and the institutions that embody it. 3. Affects every aspect of society, culture, consciousness, technology, and ecology. 4. Alters the balance of political, economic, and communicative power in ways that make it easier to create further positive changes. Because of this orientation, we will not emphasize some of the actions usually associated with social movements, such as demonstrations and civil disobedience, though we will include them. Constructive and transformative movements may not involve these actions at all. And for those movements that do, these actions are only their most visible aspect, occurring at particular stages of movement development. A GENERAL MOVEMENT Sociologists distinguish between specific and general social movements. A specific movement is aimed at a certain social issue, such as women's rights or the environment. A general movement represents a collection of specific movements that are related to each other in values, orientation, vision of society, or strategy. There is a collection of movements today that could be considered a general movement, but they have yet to truly coordinate themselves and work together. We will work toward facilitating the emergence of a general movement that is consciously oriented toward social transformation. This general movement would include social movements that are mostly political (e.g. social justice), those that are mostly personal (e.g. holistic health, consciousness), and those that include a cultural emphasis (e.g. women's movement, voluntary simplicity). The general movement in the U.S. must collaborate with similar movements in other parts of the world. SPIRITUAL ORIENTATION Many social change agents are inspired by higher values and ideals even if they don't use the word "spiritual." We believe that the most effective social change efforts are those that are informed by spiritual perspectives and levels of development. This includes the dissemination of insights and practices from the world's wisdom traditions that promote awareness, compassion, and openness, in forms that support inclusive community and collaborative action. This the psychological and spiritual development of social change agents is very important, as well as the creation of spiritually-oriented, non-violent social change organizations and movements. One of the indicators of one's spiritual development is how large and inclusive is the circle of one's caring. In addition, spiritual values are central to the healthy society that needs to be born, moving away from defensiveness and toward openness and connectedness, mirroring the spiritual truth of unconditional love in our policies and actions. Ultimately social transformation is about the unfolding of spirit through society. OPEN-ENDED LEARNING ORIENTATION Because our world needs social changes of great scope and depth in a short time, we will need to learn as we go and be open to revising all aspects of our program. We believe that social change organizations and movements should continually be in a process of learning about society and about themselves. They should always strive to be the change they are trying to bring about. Their internal processes and approaches to social change should be consistent with their goals for society. Social movements should also be ready to change their goals, purposes, strategies, and processes as they learn more about societal dynamics and social change, and as they develop in maturity. In order to grow, they need to be open about their own processes, constructively self-critical, and open to criticism from their own members and from opponents. Improved observation and communication will enable rapid learning, re-orientation, and a "finding our way" style of navigation. We hope that social change agents and organizations will develop in ways that include periodic realization of whole new levels of understanding and radical changes of perspective. *** BASIC PERSPECTIVE ON OUR WORK There are four basic principles that guide our work: VISION OF THE WHOLE PROCESS We will create an outline of all the different aspects of fundamental social change that are needed for success and how they are related to each other. This will provide a comprehensive framework to guide our work and the work of others. INCLUSIVE APPROACH As we study the various existing concepts and practices related to social transformation, we will not attempt to arrive at our own vision of the most accurate analysis and approach. Instead, we will assume that most, if not all, of these concepts and practices contain part of the truth, and so we will include each of them within the larger framework we will be developing. We are inspired by Ken Wilber's method of "orienting generalizations" and the consensus-building processes used by Karl-Henrik Robert in developing The Natural Step. DEVELOPMENTAL APPROACH Psychologists who study adult development have learned that there are stages of cognitive, moral, emotional, interpersonal, values, and consciousness development. The highest of these stages tend to reflect levels of spiritual development that represent the noblest aspirations of the world's religions and philosophies. Studies of social evolution reveal that societies and cultures also go through stages of development that have some correspondence with the individual levels of development. The development of a "wisdom culture" reflects higher developmental levels and increased effectiveness in incorporating people at diverse developmental levels into a just and co-intelligent system. There are also studies of stages of the life-cycles of organizations and of social movements that are valuable in understanding them. All these developmental perspectives will inform our study of citizens, organizations, social movements, and societies. INTEGRATION OF INTELLECTUAL UNDERSTANDING, SELF-AWARENESS, AND COLLABORATIVE ACTION Our work will integrate intellectual understanding through research, self-awareness through personal and collective practices, and collaborative social action. *** ACTIVITIES Conscious Action will collect and synthesize (a) various analyses and critiques of current society and (b) various visions of a healthy society. This will guide our study of the process of social change. We will investigate the change processes (e.g. creating alternative institutions) that can contribute to the transformation of a society and culture, and the forces that support or restrain these processes. Click here for examples. We will outline the functions (e.g. fund raising, recruitment) of social change organizations and social movements that are needed for success and create an overview of each function, which lists a representative sample of relevant academic research, practical proposals and projects, best practices, and popular writings. We will organize and synthesize these to foster practical effectiveness. Click here for details. We will research and synthesize existing understandings of each function in detail, interview experienced and knowledgeable social change agents, and do additional research to extend and refine our understanding of that function. We will perform this more detailed research for the most crucial functions, and if possible, for all of them. How many functions we can study in detail will depend on the number of researchers that join our organization, the amount of funding we receive, and the particular interests of our researchers. We will publicize all the functions, and encourage other groups to research them. We will develop a practice that combines action research with self-awareness during social action. This will be a form of action inquiry. It will be used by our members and taught to social change agents and organizations. Click here for a description. We will collaborate with leading researchers to develop and refine instruments and indicators to better measure crucial kinds of development in ways that balance scientific validity with immediate usefulness in social change. We will sponsor or support gatherings of movement leaders for the purpose of helping to coalesce a general movement for fundamental change. Because of our broad perspective, we will be able to perceive where a certain kind of movement or organization is needed for the general movement to succeed (e.g. a movement to create an alternative economy), or a certain application of a function is needed for a certain movement or organization to succeed (e.g. how to generate public support when issues are complex and hard to understand). We will direct our research toward helping this to happen. We will communicate our understandings in a variety of ways that make them accessible to the people who can use them in their social action. We will attempt to frame our communication in ways that are appropriate for the development level and social perspective of various audiences. We will use websites; articles, books, and multimedia productions aimed at various audiences; training and consultation with social change organizations and agents; collaboration with other social change researchers and trainers; and action research. We will seek to collaborate as much as possible with other researchers, social change trainers, social change organizations and movements. *** OUR ORGANIZATION Conscious Action will combine research, theory, education, social action, and self-awareness. In addition, we will reflect on our own processes, applying our results to ourselves and using what we learn from our self-study in developing our understandings further. We see ourselves as continually learning and developing our own understandings and processes. Our organization will consist of 1. Participant-observers, who are both change agents and systematic thinkers 2. Researchers, who do higher level analysis and theorizing 3. Consultants, who train, coach, and consult with social change organizations 4. Writers, multi-media artists, public speakers, and other communicators Some people may play more than one of these roles. Some participant/observers will be members of both our organization and another social change organization. They will bring our understandings to their organization and feedback to us what they learn in practice. Our research into existing knowledge will involve * Library research into both academic and popular writings * Interviews and conferences with knowledgeable change agents * Research into existing social change practices, strategies, and trainings. Our research into new knowledge will include * Action research, including action inquiry and transformative dialogue * Focus groups with movement members and the public * Survey research * Field research and participant-observation Our consultants will educate change agents in action inquiry and our synthesis of the existing knowledge that is relevant to their work. We will ask them to feed back to us what they learn in applying this information. In addition, our consultants will educate some change agents to be participant/observers and work with us. In forming generalizations and hypotheses from our research, we will consult with other researchers and knowledgeable change agents, using consensus building processes whenever possible. We will create an interactive website that organizes existing and incoming knowledge in accessible form, and invites feedback, interaction, and additions to the site. *** DETAILED DESCRIPTIONS For more details, click on the following links: Transformative Change Processes and Supporting and Restraining Forces. A list of change processes that can move a society toward fundamental transformation, and forces that support or restrain these processes. Functions of Social Movements. Lists of internal and external functions of social movements that are necessary for success. Each of these must be studied in detail. Goals for the General Movement. A summary of goals for the general movement toward fundamental social transformation. Action Inquiry. A description of the practice of action inquiry, our main research practice. *** COLLABORATION We are looking for people to join us or collaborate with us, including: * Researchers, theorists, ethnographers * Participant-observers * Consultants, trainers, coaches, organizational development practitioners * Social change agents * Volunteer helpers * Office workers * Information technologists, website designers & managers * Fund raisers * Business development, administration, and other organizational specialists * Writers * Multi-media artists and producers * Public speakers and other communicators * Integral learning specialists * Philanthropists * Students To discuss working with us, please contact Jay Earley at 415-924-5200 or •••@••.••• Fred Cook at 861-1711 or •••@••.•••. We are eager for feedback on this proposal. Please email your thoughts to us at •••@••.•••. We will attempt to incorporate your ideas into our work and to respond to you personally. (This may take a while since this is a purely volunteer effort at this point.) We also plan to create a website that will include comments from others, so with your permission, your feedback may appear in that forum. We have created an email list for people who are interested in Conscious Action . Please subscribe if you would like to be kept informed about our activities and learnings. *** SUMMARY Our first goal is to perform a self-reflective function for the general movement (and its sub-movements and organizations) so that it becomes knowledgeable about its own process and the best practices for each of its functions, making it increasingly effective in creating fundamental evolutionary change in society. Our second goal is to educate the movement so that it takes over this self-reflective function itself. Our ultimate goal is that this self-reflective function become part of the new healthy society that is being born. What we have to offer that is unique: 1. An inclusive, developmental/spiritual approach 2. An emphasis on constructive, fundamental social change 3. A broad vision of the process of social transformation 4. The combination of library, theoretical, interview, and action research 5. The integration of self-awareness, research, and education. 6. Communication to a broad audience in a variety of modalities ============================================================================
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