Our Approach: Autonomous & dynamic decisions

3. Example A: Either vs. Or decisions

 

How we aim to overcome binary decisions -

1. A case example
2. Subject matter summary
3. Check the navigation map on this topic

Example: Creating vs. Constructing

An emerging network in the area of Social Transformation - formed of individuals and organizations of creative activities - aimed to partake in political and educational reforms in different societies. Starting with a great collective enthusiasm and the notion of occupying a genuinely novel territory of action, the protagonists soon faced sobering reactions from other sectors in society - such reactions ranging from 'we have been doing that already' to 'this is our core competence', 'who are you' and 'what is your offer exactly'. It was not long before the network faced a fork in its road: either to remain a self-help group looking for funds, or to become a valuable partner for governments, companies and civil society alike. The creative energy of the network must either go into sheltered seclusion, or become a communal platform of inclusion.

The core challenge came from a binary outlook on creativity. It was perceived as the opposite to the formal processes of social construction, and partaking in the latter was deemed a treachery of free-flowing human creativeness. We mapped the various facets of the seeming dilemma, including the tension between artistic and autistic stands, creating and complying, forming and formalizing , and collective structures and personal soul matters .

Crossing these polarities with each other, we mapped the resulting playfield for communal action and the consequential potency of the network. As a result, the members reversed the original delegation of structuring dynamics that they had made to other sectors, notably governments ('bureaucratic') and business ('conventional'). On the same account, creativity was seen in a new light - no longer as a supreme and exclusive property of the network, but as an integrative energy common to all. By consequence, the network began to move away from its initial demand positions, now able to articulate offers for cooperation. The responses by other sectors quickly changed. As a 'by product' of the navigation maps, the network developed a comprehensive integral strategy.

Matters addressed

Thinking in alternatives is deeply rooted. Either-Or, Here-There, This-That, Me-You, Good-Bad have - as navigation models - powerful religious and philosophical connotations going back to antique origins of Western thought. They rule the approaches in practically all domains. We do not suggest that this thinking be wrong, but we do challenge its exclusive and supreme adequacy for today's reality.

We map - together with you - the conjunction of Either-Or constellations, taking into account the factual imperatives, strategic outlooks and elementary values in the context of your undertaking. In the end, you will of course take decisions - yet not within a restraining polarity but on the basis of an amplified vision of interconnected options.