Kay Vogt here. I have been in this type of discussion before. In particular within the Carl Rogers client- centered movement with regard to what is Rogerian therapy. The same arguments that have already surfaced here have been raging there for years. What has happened over a history of about 50 years is that his theory is largely misunderstood and empathic listening gets reduced from a very difficult to do I/thou dialogue to parroting. This has undermined the whole movement, and led many people to believe that they are practicing client- centered listening when they are not. When it fails to work as promised, they blame the model.
There are purists in the client-centered movement who are insultingly rigid and this has further undermined the model. I don't know what the answer is, because its seems clear to me that there is a need to preserve and protect the model as something very special and grossly misunderstood. At teh same time, it seems important to ackwowledge that there is always a natural evolution toward something even better and deviations from the model may be moving toward something even more beautiful. My concern with both open space and client-centered therapy is that their apparent simplicity leads to gross oversimplification and frankly people trying it without a deep understanding of what they are doing. And like Birgitt, I too have experienced quite a few people who say they have experienced Open Space and don't like it and when I question them it wasn't even close to being Open Space. Radical approaches like Open Space, in the hands of someone who doesn't understand the underpinnings, tend to become watered down techniques. The approach becomes altered to the point that it bears no resemblance to the heart of the original model. When it is used as a technique, it falls far short of its potential, thereby harming the image of the process. And given our quick fix nature, it is all too tempting to take something so powerful and expect to be able to be able to really experience it over a lunch break. When I hear someone saying they are doing Open Space I am quite vocal about asking them not to call if Open Space if its missing the element of truly being open. I modify the model sometimes, but I don't then call it Open Space. Next week I'm using what might be called a modified version at a conference. However, I am not calling it Open Space, I call it self-organizing because of precisely this problem that Birgitt raises. So to the 2nd question about the woman who is calling her model something else, maybe it is something else.