In the process of writing my thesis, I have been reading a lot about the development of sociological perspectives. There have been a few major streams of thought in sociology, most of which can be labelled modern or postmodern. More recently, there have been attempts at going beyond postmodernism, although I would say that some are regressive and even progressive accounts are often very shaky. All of this has made me wonder about these orientations, worldviews, perspectives, or whatever else you'd like to call them. What follows are some thoughts, most specifically about postmodernism.

The premodern worldview holds that the world is as it is, created and ordained by God's will. With Galileo and Newton, the modern worldview claims the ability to think and act for itself, emphasizing human agency and scientific progress. Man places himself outside of nature and looks down upon it as an objective observer, a mirror of nature, merely recording what he sees, hears, smells, tastes and feels ‘out there'. Facts are lying around waiting to be discovered, and science offers a representational theory of truth: there can only be one truth and it is of universal validity.

Now there is obviously a lot to be said for this way of reasoning. Nevertheless, at some point, some of us started voicing our doubts about the deep, unquestioned assumptions underlying our modern worldview. This marked the emergence of a new, post-modern worldview, although it would probably reject the term ‘worldview' as that supposes there is one way of looking at the world. Postmodernism has come to be known for its call for relativity and contextuality. There is no such thing as one Truth, as everyone has their own truth, and every claim, all knowledge, each perspective is partial and relative to its context, rather than of universal validity.

This is a very subtle way of looking at the world, and its recognition of relativity and pluralism a very advanced stance. Still, postmodernism is often put down as being relativistic to the point of not being able to say anything at all, as well as deconstructive of existing, modern perspectives. In terms of public relations, postmodernists haven't done a very good job, as they're often seen as annoying, whining, critical deconstructivists. In many ways, this is true, but recently I started seeing there's more to it than that. The point is, if we can't fully appreciate the postmodern message, there is no way we will be able to go beyond it properly. In Wilber's terms, we need to transcend and include the postmodern contribution (which his integral approach does, and does well).

Two observations that deserve to be appreciated more fully, in my view, relate to deconstructivism and postmodernists' critical stance. Until recently, I always took deconstructivism to refer to the process of pointing out how everything is relative, thereby levelling modern attempts at building universally applicable theories. It's not that this is false, but there's more to it than that. Postmodernism's deconstructivism is a response to modernism's constructivism. While modernist scientists claim to be dis-covering given realities, postmodernists claim that this involves a process of construction, rather than one of discovery.

Scientific research generally starts with the formulation of theories and hypothesis about how the world around us might be. In the process of formulating these, scientists are projecting the existence of particular objects, laws or phenomena which are then taken as the legitimate focus of investigation. In this way, these phenomena are increasingly taken to be separate and independent of our ideas about them, to the point of taking on a ‘real and objective' existence. Instrumental in this process is our use of language, by which we draw boundaries, label and categorize the world around us. From this point on, the ‘objective reality' is taken to exist and scientists proceed to ‘accurately describe and represent' these realities.

Postmodernists have drawn attention to the ways in which our truth and knowledge are thus constructed and constituted and call for an appreciation of the assumptions and circumstances of this process of construction by following it ‘upstream'. This is what has been referred to as deconstructivism, but rather than merely paralysing all attempts at gaining knowledge by relativizing it, it aims to draw attention to the process of constructing reality. Postmodernism doesn't object to knowledge or truth in themselves, but rather objects to the ways in which we first construct them, then forget that we constructed them, and finally act ‘as if' they were independent, pre-existing, objective realities.

In that sense, the deconstructive approach is complementary to the modern worldview, because it adds an appreciation of the process by which reality and truth are constructed. However, in their efforts to complement and balance the modern worldview, postmodernists often went to the other extreme, emphasizing extreme relativity and deconstructing existing approaches, rather than complementing them by drawing attention to their constructedness. This is hardly a surprising result, as the pendulum swings of time often go from one extreme to the other. However, it has given postmodernism its bad name of being purely critical and destructive, rather than bringing something new to the table. This is where the second observation comes in (I have no idea where this idea originally came from, but I was made aware of this by Emil Möller - accidentally, serendipitously).

This observation revolves around a distinction between two versions of postmodernism, the first critical, the second affirmative. Critical postmodernism defines itself negatively, ‘merely' deconstructing existing approaches. An affirmative postmodernism, however, would take the ideas of relativity and the constructedness of reality and truth, and proceed to incorporate them in a more subtle, more encompassing view of reality, as compared to the modern worldview. This affirmative postmodernism is relativistic and pluralistic, recognizing that there are multiple perspectives and truths.

If that's true, then what is the difference between affirmative postmodernism and integral post-postmodernism? Is there a difference? I don't really know of many affirmative postmodernist theories, so it's hard to say. I could imagine that affirmative postmodernism would positively recognize aperspective pluralism, while the integral worldview would bring some good ol' vision-logic (late formal operational cognition) to the table and proceed to integrate them. As Wilber has noted, extreme postmodern relativism may lead to what he calls ‘aperspectival madness', where nothing is better than anything else and nothing meaningful can be said. Aperspective pluralism without the rejection of hierarchy could lead to the integration of the different perspectives, which Wilber calls integral-aperspectivism, or plain integral. The difference between affirmative postmodernism and integral, then, may be found in the recognition of verticality and holarchy.

All in all, I've come to understand and therefore appreciate the postmodern contribution a little more than before. Having grown up in the Netherlands, I'm intimately aware of the postmodern recognition of multiple truths and perspectives, and I can sometimes struggle with relativism and hierarchies. These questions are very much alive in me, so I enjoy considering them and reflecting on my own thinking. As always, feedback and ideas are appreciated.

I figured if I was going to talk about the Great Chain of Being, I'd better draw up some cool diagrams like that chaotic guy is always telling me to. You may have noticed, however, that my diagrammatical skills are tainted by the dubious quality of paradox. In figure 1a, I portray the great chain as soul enveloping mind enveloping life enveloping matter. His C-ness might have put it like this: (soul(mind(life(matter)))). No wait, now that I've taken a better look at how he pulls that trick I see it's completely different. Nevermind though. The point of figure 1a is that matter is transcended and included by life, which is tee-and-ied (yes, T for transcended and I for included) by mind, which is tee-and-ied by soul. And then ultimately, soul is tee-and-ied by Spirit, which is at the same time the paper/bits on which the entire great chain is printed/displayed, being the ultimate ground of reality and all.

Now let's have a look at 1b. This is where the paradox comes in, ‘cause now matter is represented by the largest circle, while soul is represented by the smallest circle, contrary to figure 1a. Please note, however, that paradox really means ‘apparent contradiction'. Hah! It's not really contradictory, because in figure 1a I represent the transcend-and-include aspect of the great chain, while figure 1b represents depth and span. Basically the argument runs like this: since life transcends and includes matter (like molecules tee-and-ie atoms), it has more depth. It is more complex and has a higher level of differentiation and integration. However, since it takes matter to ‘produce' life, there can only ever be less of life than of matter, so as depth increases, span decreases. In the example of the atoms and the molecule, there can only ever be fewer molecules than atoms, as the former tee-and-ie the latter. This is why, in figure 1b, span decreases as depth increases.

With that out of the way, we can proceed to my main argument, which is actually about the evolution of human ways of being in the world, applied loosely to the way they have expressed this in organizing themselves economically. Along the way, it'll become much clearer what I mean by that (I hope).

Over time, ‘we' have evolved from the universe into the solar system into the lithosphere into the hydrosphere into the atmosphere into the biosphere (including the anthroposphere and ‘civilization'), now slowly giving way to Teilhard de Chardin's noosphere. Yes, I am a crude storyteller, but only because this is not the main point of it. For the first time, evolution is now becoming conscious of itself (by means of human reflexivity and awareness, allowing for some level of choice and free will). By exercising our free will, by growing what Stephen Covey calls ‘the space between stimulus and response', we can evolve consciously, in fact embodying evolution. We're pushing the evolutionary envelope, pulling the future into the present moment, which itself includes all of the past - and at the same time we're conscious of this!

This is indeed a very exciting thing, and we're only just getting started. Having become conscious of all this, we can now reflect back on our short spurt of human history and notice some patterns. In doing this, I noticed that what we're conscious of is itself evolving. Our perception, our worldview has evolved, and the ways in which we have expressed them in collective organization have, too. And this is where the great chain re-enters the story. Consider this: the dynamic relational exchange that sustains us has evolved from physical exchange to emotional-relational exchange to mental exchange, and we're increasingly seeing isolated forays into trans-rational exchange. On the individual level, this has happened many times before, but historically, humanity's center of gravity is only now starting to go beyond the level of mental exchange.

One of the most obvious ways in which this development finds expression on a collective basis, is in our economies, in the ways we organize our processes of exchange. As Otto Scharmer, Brian Arthur, Peter Senge and others note in their article Illuminating the Blind Spot: Leadership in the Context of Emerging Worlds, the business environment is shifting from more tangible to more intangible realities. I'd say this is analogous to the development from more gross to more subtle realities, as mapped out in the great chain. Business has long been located in the physical world of product-making. In the noosphere, however, we find that business is increasingly about services, about ideas and sense-making (rather than product-making), about communication and language in a globalized world where everything is connected to everything else, just like Teilhard de Chardin had envisioned (although obviously his vision was not limited to the economic dimension of reality).

That seems to be the world in which we live right now. But even business (or in fact, especially business) is pushing the evolutionary envelope, and I think we're beginning to see the first signs of large-scale, trans-rational exchange on the level of soul. Business is evolving from product-making to sense-making to sensing. Flow, presence and mindfulness are the new competitive advantages. We're going ‘upstream' experientially, from looking at things ‘out there', to noting our relationships to things, to considering our ideas, our thoughts and language (services, the experience economy, the linguistic turn), to becoming aware of the present moment (the ‘inward turn'), the perceptual order that pre-exists the conceptual order (William James). Our eye of contemplation is opening up. Eleanor Rosch speaks of primary knowing. Otto Scharmer is doing incredible work on the U curve. Csikszentmihalyi has been telling us all about flow for quite a while now. And then there's the work of guys like Wilber, the increasing attention for spirituality in the workplace... Isn't it obvious?!

So, Can Big Business Save the World? Hell yeah! Big business is moving ‘upstream' into involutionary potentials, it's evolving consciously, and in fact I suspect it will be the single most important factor (though not the only one) in collectively walking the path of breakthrough, rather than breakdown, and taking yet another big step in the relative realm of Lila, the play of life. And I am deeply, passionately and detachedly dedicated to playing my part. To be continued...

 

Yield who will to their separation

My object in living

Is to unite my avocation and my vocation

As my two eyes make one sight.

 

For only where love and need are one

And work is play for mortal stakes

Is the deed ever really done

For heaven and the future's sakes.

‘Holacracy' refers to a structure of governance resulting from a synergy between the ideas on sociocracy and Ken Wilber's work on holarchies. Sociocracy was developed mainly by Kees Boeke and Gerard Endenburg in the Netherlands. Its global website defines the sociocratic method as "a way of producing and leading organization on the basis of equivalence in decision making through the principle of consent". I first came across it while looking for a subject for my graduate thesis. I read the book on sociocracy and participated in a sociocratic thesis circle consisting of my thesis coordinator, other students writing their thesis and Gerard Endenburg, who is a professor at the University of Maastricht, where I study international business.

More recently, I was sent an interview with Brian Robertson, President and CEO of Ternary Software, a company organized around the principles of sociocracy. In this article, Robertson combines his understanding of Wilber's work on holarchies with the ideas of sociocracy, to arrive at what he calls ‘holacracy'. These ideas turned out to be very relevant to a conversation I'm involved in, concerned with the design of the organizational structure of the Dutch node of the Center for Human Emergence (the story of which is told over at Peter Merry's blog, here on Zaadz).

From what I had seen of it so far, I had a feeling that sociocracy seems to be leaning a bit too much towards consensus-based decision-making. Living in a country that has taken consensus to its extreme in political decision-making, I am acutely aware of the limitations of it. As such, I intended to write a critical article on sociocracy and holacracy, but in the process of re-reading and reflecting, I hit upon some partial assumptions and projections of my own. I'm glad I did, because it turns out that a conversation around Robertson's version of sociocracy might well be an interesting and fruitful investment of time! (Apparently, the Integral Institute is also considering adopting holacracy [source: Integral Visioning, Robertson's blog].)

The four main tenets of sociocracy, and therefore of holacracy, are:

1. Decision Making by Consent: Consent is a method of decision-making whereby the arguments presented in discussing a decision are of paramount importance, and the result of the discussion is that no one present knows of a paramount reason to continue discussion before proceeding with the proposed decision.

2. Circle Organization: The organization is built of a hierarchy of semi-autonomous circles. Each circle has its own aim, given by the higher-level circle, and has the authority and responsibility to execute, measure, and control its own processes to move towards its aim.

3. Double-Linking: A lower circle is always linked to the circle above it via at least two people who belong to and take part in the decision making of both the higher circle and the lower circle. One of these links is the person with overall accountability for the lower-level circle's results, and the other is a representative elected from within the lower-level circle.

4. Elections by Consent: People are elected to key roles exclusively by consent after open discussion (this is not a democratic majority-vote election!). Most notably, the election process applies to the representative elected from a lower-level circle to a higher-level circle.

(Taken from the interview with Brian Robertson)

The essential difference between consensus and consent is that with consensus, everyone needs to agree, ‘whereas consent requires that no one know of a reasoned and paramount objection to making the decision'. Consensus is necessarily personal, involving emotions and ego-based politics, while consent is impersonal, considering the functional value of the decision. While the meaning of the words consensus and consent is very similar, in my view the main difference is in the quality of the interactions. When engaged in from an egocentric or ethnocentric position, the interactions will get personal and outcomes will, at worst, serve one person or faction, and at best be a compromise. However, when interactions in the circle take place at the worldcentric level, individual positions are no longer fear- and ego-based, but serve ‘the whole'. Again, this is my interpretation of things - Robertson also discusses these issues in his interview.

Without going into too much detail on the principles of sociocracy and holacracy themselves, I'd like to mention the following strengths of this system, as I see them:

- taps collective intelligence

- more adequate in light of increasing complexity, interdependency and speed of change, human need for self-actualization, and pathological effects of existing structures

- facilitates conscious evolution of the organization (in the Top Circle)

- scales horizontally and vertically (organizational span and developmental depth)

- bottom-up empowerment, rather than top-down control

However, there are still two issues on my mind, one more fundamental and one to do with Robertson's use of holarchies. The fundamental issue I see has to do with the difference between consensus and consent. As I see it, the long-term success of the sociocratic method hinges critically on people's capacity to take an impersonal, worldcentric stance. Robertson mentions that possible attempts at sabotage or stonewalling decision-making are prevented by the principle of consent, and that it actually helps one figure out where such attempts are coming from and address the root issues. I agree that this is possible, and this is proof of sociocracry's potential. However, it presupposes that people are willing and able to recognize and address their root issues. That takes a lot of courage, and I know I don't succeed as often as I'd like to. I don't think sociocracy/holacracy is for everyone, and I don't think it's 100% foolproof. I'd love to hear (different) opinions on this!

The second issue I have with holacracy is more specifically tied to Robertson's application of the notion of holarchy to the organizational structure. While he recognizes the need to distinguish between individual and collective holarchies, he goes on to confuse them anyway. The individual holarchy of atom, molecule, cells, etc. is clear enough (if not, I've explained this in another post). However, as an example of a collective holarchy, he mentions teams to departments to companies. This is where I don't agree. When you move to a higher level in a holarchy, it implies that the higher level transcends and includes the lower level - that's why it's called a holarchy. Transcendence implies a qualitative transformation, emergent properties, novelty.

Moving from a team to a department to a company, in my view, is not transcendence. It's not a qualitative transformation, and therefore it's not a vertical holarchy. Wilber has commented upon this in Sex, Ecology, Spirituality (p. 50) where he considers the common confusion of horizontal communion, or self-adaptation, and vertical self-transcendence:

Some writers, such as Koestler, lump together self-adaptation and self-transcendence and refer to them interchangeably, because both embody a type of "going beyond". But apart from that similarity, the two are different in degree and in kind. In self-adaptation or communion, one finds oneself to be part of a larger whole; in self-transformation one becomes a new whole, which has its own new forms of agency and communion. [...]

As Ilya Prigogine puts it, the various levels and stages of evolution are irreducible to each other because the transitions between them are characterized by symmetry breaks, which simply means that they are not equivalent rearrangements of the same stuff (whatever that "stuff" might be), but are in part a significant transcendence, a novel and creative twist.

(Emphasis in the original)

While I agree that there is a developmental holarchy (e.g. Piaget's preoperational to concrete operational to formal operational cognitive development) that can and often does to some extent coincide with the organizational hierarchy, I don't agree that the organizational hierarchy from team to department to company is itself a holarchy. However, since they do often coincide to some extent, this problem is not insurmountable in practice. A more problematic use of holarchies occurs when Robertson jumps to the industry level and likens the company to an individual and the industry to the collective, claiming that this is a different holarchy altogether:

Just like a human maintains its own dominant monad even while a member of a company, so too do companies maintain their own dominant monad even while a member of an industry. An industry is a collective of individual companies just as a team is a collective of individual humans (and an industry is also an individual in its own right, just like a company, but in a completely orthogonal way to the individuality of its membership).

Again, I don't agree - the implications of this line of reasoning are somewhat dangerous, as a dominant monad has absolute control over its sub-holons (see Wilber's Excerpt C: The Ways We Are in This Together on ‘constitutive components' and ‘participating partners').

I think this use of the notion of holarchy is deeply problematic. However, it can easily be corrected and is in no way central to the strengths of the sociocratic and holacratic method, nor to most of the conclusions of Robertson's article. I would enjoy a conversation on what exactly a more healthy use of holarchies would mean for this aspect of holacracy.

All in all, I am impressed with the organizational potential of holacracy, which essentially transcends and includes sociocracy by adding some more depth and meaning, using the work of Wilber and others. I hope to continue the conversation around the organizational design of the Dutch node of the Center for Human Emergence and see if we can use the insights generated by Robertson's pioneering work to develop ourselves individually and collectively. To be continued or, better yet, to be transcended and included!