At 07:19 AM 11/21/98 -1000, "Jay Hanson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>----- Original Message -----
>From: fran^don <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>>The concept would seem appropriate for a system of governance on both the
>>national/global level and the community/bigger community level.
>
>Don, you are well aware of the "limits to growth" problem. "Limits to
>growth" is an aggregate problem. How can decentralized governance deal with
>aggregate problems such as "limits to growth"?
>
>Jay
How can decentralized/chaordic structures, lead to fewer people and less
consumer throughput?
That's not a simple question.
It seems to me that a great human die-off and probable extinction is the
most likely outcome of the status quo in today's governance. As you have
pointed out recently, Carrying Capacity, whatever that range of numbers is,
(1 to 2 billion?) is getting smaller every day, and every government of the
"free" world is creating economic conditions to ensure the ugly outcome.
(With the help of not only economists, but people like me, who hold a few
dollars in mutual funds, and move it to whichever fund gets the greatest
return.)
It is from this underlying position of gloom and doom, that I sometimes
speculate in hope and potential remedies, and I sometimes even
enthusiastically believe that we could make a turnaround in a civilized
fashion. Hope spring eternal! Technically, I believe we may still have a
window of opportunity. The prime problem then, is not technical, it is a
human nature and social behavior issue.
By training, I'm a technologist, so I have a basic understanding of physics,
energy flow, systems behavior and that sort of thing. About eight years ago
I first became consciously aware of the serious nature of the global
problematique. I did a little reading in psychology, wondering how such a
smart animal could be so dumb.
Many of the terms and expression used by psychologists to describe the way
we are, I summarized, in a manuscript on the issue, as the Sacred Cow
Syndrome (SCSyndrome). Noted was the fact that most of the essential
efforts of `the 'green movement' deal with the peripheral issues while the
fundamental root causes are seldom discussed because they seem too large.
Inhibitions, cognitive dissonance, group-think, and other quirks of human
nature come into play. The SCSyndrome causes many of us to deny that the
problems are personal. We become addicted to cultures rooted in the past and
we may, for generations, vigorously deny evidence that demands changed
thinking. Since we collectively deny the terminal nature of the
problematique we voters would not permit our governments to make the
required corrections, even if they wanted to. We resist change. We cling to
obsolete tradition and values not appropriate in today's world.
A Brief Sketch of a Recovery Story
A recovery scenario in the manuscript suggested that eventually physical
evidence of instability in both the natural environment and the financial
world, brought suffering to many - eventually, a majority of voters. As in
addiction recovery for an individual, these emotional shocks caused a
virtual societal bottoming-out and an awakening began to take place. Grass
roots community structures began to form and to demand accurate information
in may areas previously unexplored by most individuals. They looked toward
the possibility of long term sustainability within their own communities.
Soon every community realized that their ecological footprint overlapped
many other communities.
As the viability of the current paradigm faded, human survival became a
topic of conversation - even more important than the President's sex life!
Eventually a new recognition. Human population was recognized as one of the
few controllable variable available to humans NOW. The aggregate lifetime
consumption and pollution of a new individual human shifted from a personal
issue to a community issue. Procreation license became regulated by the
community to meet carrying capacity guidelines, so that the long term goal
of "renewable resources only" could be met in several decades.
End of today's story
This story could go on and on dealing with this and that of the may of the
accompanying issues such questions of immigrations, the nature of money,
evaluating wealth, "who owns the commons?' etc. but---not today.
As years go by, and specualtion becomes the past, some things are on target,
and one can imagine that the future may unfold something like the story.
What also gives me hope is that many writers and lecturers today are
advocating change which fit this patter. Theobald is one, Richard Moore is
another. Below is a relevant chunk from an article by John Raven, author
of "The New Wealth of Nations: A new Enquirer into the Nature and Origins of
Wealth of Nations and the Societal Learning Arrangement Needed for a
Sustainable Society. 95"
"""
"Information Generation
"As far as the generation of information relating to new concerns and
relating to more of the relevant consequences of the options which are open
is concerned, it is clear that part of the answer depends on changing the
criteria against which we judge our universities, our policy research and
development units, and our scientists (which is why our image of science and
how it is to be conducted and evaluated is so important). To run information
generation units in new ways we need a new understanding of what an
experiment consists of. We need concepts of "experiments" which legitimise
attempts to influence social constraints and learn from the effects of those
actions. We need to recognise that advance in understanding comes, not from
the unarguability of the work of any individual scientist, but from public
debate between people with different perspectives working in the area. To
facilitate such work we need new criteria to appraise the work of our
universities and policy research units and their staff. And we need new
tools with which to collect that information.
"Creating a Ferment of Innovation and Learning.
"Creating options, feeding comprehensive information about their short and
long-term, personal and social (what is good for an individual in the
short-term may be bad for the community in the longer term), consequences to
the public, and encouraging its members to chose between them not only means
defining new roles for public servants and developing new appraisal systems
to find out if they are performing these roles successfully but also new
forms of democracy. The information which becomes available needs to flow
outward to the public so that they can make informed choices and guide their
behaviour appropriately. This is quite different from information flowing
upward through a bureaucratic hierarchy to elected representatives who take
decisions binding on all. This amounts to a new form of democracy.
"It also involves a new understanding of how interlinked systems processes
are to be influenced. Recognition of the importance of systems processes has
in the past been thought to point to a need for system-wide intervention
based on the assumption that what needs to be done is "obvious". What is
actually needed is both small-scale experimentation (taken to include
monitoring and learning) based on a tentative understanding of systems
processes and multi-level problem-oriented intervention - in China and
elsewhere - not multi-function, "world-government" level, intervention based
on speculations. What is needed is local intervention based on systems
understanding. "Think globally, act locally" takes on a new connotation."
""""
It seems like "Chaoridic" summarizes the movement to community of community
structure where informed choice occurs at the people level. Chaordic seems
as good a name as any.
Well Jay, you asked how decentralized/chaordic structures organization might
deal with the limits to growth issue. The above is my story, and I'm
sticking to it! It makes me feel better than gloom and doom.
Don
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Don Chisholm
416 484 6225 fax 484 0841
email [EMAIL PROTECTED]
The Gaia Preservation Coalition (GPC)
http://www.envirolink.org/orgs/gaia-pc
personal page: http://home.ican.net/~donchism/dchome.html
"There is an almost gravitational pull toward putting out of mind unpleasant
facts. And our collective ability to face painful facts is no greater than
our personal one. We tune out, we turn away, we avoid. Finally we forget,
and forget we have forgotten. A lacuna hides the harsh truth." -
psychologist Daniel Goleman
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