Monthly Archives: August 2015

1 Motivation and Meaning

From Economics to Politics

Christian Felber’s Change Everything is about economics but it soon becomes clear democracy is central to its proposals. If we are seeking a fair economic system, then we must improve our democratic or political systems.  This post focuses on his chapter: Motivation and Meaning.

History tells us humanity is very good at inventing unjust economic systems. Indeed the purpose of many political systems appear to be to legitimise injustice. Where there is justice it tends to draw little attention and can seem unstable. However, given most political systems prove unstable in the end, this does not mean justice is impractical.

It’s easy to forget the equitable purposes of institutions over time. For example, insurance used to be a means to share risk. If someone claimed, everyone’s premium would increase by a very small amount. These days if you make a claim, your premium increases by a large amount. We’ve forgotten the equitable principles underlying the original scheme.

There are many other examples; the carpetbaggers of the 1980s, who joined building societies with the intention to vote for their demutualisation. Demutualisation changed assets owned collectively into shares owned by each shareholder.

So, there is something more fundamental than either politics or economics. It is fundamentally to do with our spirituality, the values that we bring to the marketplace.

From Politics to Spirituality

Felber’s chapter Motivation and Meaning is a good place to start.

Survival of the Fittest

I have written in earlier posts about the mis-use of Darwinism by apologists for the current economic system. Felber writes on page 106, “the capitalistic, that is, social Darwinist image of humankind according to which human beings are primarily motivated by egoism and competition“.

Why do we attribute this view to Darwin? Presumably it alludes to the “survival of the fittest”, a term missing from the first edition of the Origin of the Species. Alfred Russell Wallace who proposed a similar theory of evolution to Darwin’s at around the same time, makes no reference to it.

Somehow survival of the fittest has become integral to the Theory of Evolution. Why is this? It seems likely competition was an important element of the worldview of the powerful at the time of Darwin and Wallace. They seized upon survival of the fittest as a way of demonstrating their approach as natural.

It is hard to think of a more blatant example of science being formed by society. The powerful wanted a theory of evolution that supported their way of doing things and that’s what we have. They say, “Our economic system is just like natural evolution where the powerful survive and the weak go to the wall.” This is perhaps one of the most damaging myths of our time.

Questioning Competition

Is it true competition solely motivates people? 80% of new business start-ups fail. Obviously there are many reasons they fail and some ideas deserve to fail. But how many fail because they believe in competition? They believe not only that they have to protect their business against competition but that they have to work alone, never in partnership. I suspect it is those businesses that understand businesses survive when they collaborate that do in fact survive (assuming they are viable). Viable businesses fail when they are badly managed and a mindset that is competitive to other businesses and bullying to its staff is likely to be poor at management.

On page 113 Felber writes,

“Thus the root of the problem lies in inwardly impoverished people who are incapable of investing their own lives with meaning; they lack the self-confidence needed to recognise themselves as being ultimately responsible for their own lives and their own decisions.“

Competition pushes the reason for my failure onto someone else. It motivates me and maybe in the short-term winning the competition means business success. But in the end it seems “those who live by the sword perish by the sword”. The original Greek does not use ‘die’ but ‘perish’. The difference is intentional, to live in this way causes the person to perish, to lack meaning or purpose other than to triumph in competition. We confuse perish and die because to perish is to die from the inside out. Most of the world’s religions recognise this.

Competition and Meaning

If we are planning to change everything, to change economic systems towards something more collaborative, equitable and sustainable, it is necessary to change our political systems and to change our political systems we need to change ourselves. It’s a tall order and one that has been known for centuries. If we’ve been trying for centuries and failed, why should we be successful this time?  If only competition motivates us, what does this say about the meaning of our activities?  Is it true the “business of business is business”?

Who says we’ve failed? Perhaps the times and places where there is justice appear rare. Often they are communities within a larger economic system they oppose, perhaps by having a profound impact. The retail co-operative movement, which because it was successful inspired many other experiments into mutuality and education, had an impact in the fine-grain of our lives in many ways we don’t notice unless we know some history. We don’t see it because our attention is rarely drawn to it. This is what happens when you have a single prevailing economic worldview.

0 Planning

My last post about community planning, completed a sequence about the representation function of my three function model and so it is time to move onto the second:

The last post about Community Planning emphasised why it is important not to confuse your local plan with the plan agreed with your partners.

Some formal planning meetings are somewhat daunting!

When you meet with partners from the local authority, police, NHS, local schools, local businesses and so on, they will each have their own plans.  Their plans are worth no more than your local plan, although they might have spent more money on it and so may like to think theirs is more important.

So your role is negotiation, aiming for agreement to as much of your plan as possible.  Remember you won’t get all of it or even necessarily the parts you would most like.  Perhaps the people of Maltby would have prioritised a by-pass over everything else.  They were never going to get a by-pass but other chapters in their plan were very successful.

So, you need to think about how you can increase your plan’s credibility.  First, consider your methods.  How did you write the plan?  How many people did you involve in the planning?  I estimate the Maltby plan included material from over 400 people.  The plan itself included by-lines from people who didn’t necessarily agree with the main argument.  An uneven plan can be more credible because it shows the plan is not the product of one small group of people.

Think about how you’re going to present your local plan.  Negotiations may involve several meetings with partners.  Who will take part and how will you support them?

Some groups send different people to each meeting.  This may show wide support for the plan but it sacrifices continuity.  Consider a small group that meets between the meetings with partners to debrief the last meeting and prepare for the next.  You can then send one or two members of the group to each meeting.  Thus you preserve continuity whilst demonstrating wider support.

I would normally send at least two people to meetings with partners.  More than two might be difficult to accommodate.  With two people present, one can be the main representative and the other take notes and make suggestions from a less pressured perspective.  They can rotate these two roles.

Such arrangements, so long as they are not too complex, can appear impressive.  A consistent line represented over several meetings by a small group may appear more credible than the same line represented by one spokesperson.

Remember you won’t have a lot of money or assets compared with other partners so you need to show you are an organised and disciplined group.

Pay attention to the plans of your other partners; get hold of copies and read them.  In your planning group, divide their proposals into four groups. Proposals that

1. support what is in your local plan.
2. address issues not covered in your local plan.
3. could be tweaked to line them up with your plan (or where your plan could be tweaked to line up with their proposals).
4. you cannot agree to.

Work out what you want to support, what you think could be changed and what you oppose.  Some things you may oppose but be willing to trade for other parts of your plan.

Keep your powder dry!  Don’t go in and simply state what you support or don’t support.  You may be able to gain support for your priorities from partners who appreciate your support for theirs.  You’re likely to lose some arguments and so plan ahead!

And finally, don’t sacrifice your integrity, be consistent and don’t walk out if you can possibly avoid it.

These negotiations can be fraught with difficulty.  I’d love to hear your stories about how they’ve worked out, positive or disastrous!

0 Building Your Brand

This post about building your brand in my series about the first element of the Circuit Questionnaire, you and your brand.  These posts will soon be assembled in a logical and coherent fashion.  In the meantime, read and enjoy them as they are!

My brand stands out because it is political. If you are building your brand you may wish to copy me in this respect but would that be wise?  Being political is not a good idea for a business and indeed some business support networks do not allow political or religious bias. So, why a political brand?

You see why branding is important? It is partly about me and how I convey my experience and what I have to offer. But it is also about how I want to be seen. I’m seeking lasting transformation of society and so seeking people who seeking similar change.

I am at the centre of my brand. If I am successful and find I have a legacy, other people will take my place. They will be there because of my brand.  Brands evolve naturally and so,n the distant future, they may be able to trace a line back to me, even though I would not recognise what they are doing. Would I approve of what they’re doing in my name? Possibly not.  Would Mr Kipling (if he existed) think the cakes sold under his name today are “exceedingly good”?

So far I’ve written about my brand but I haven’t said what it is! Here are my notes from a few months ago under questions from the circuit questionnaire:

What does my brand stand for?

Money flowing in the local economy is far more important than personal wealth. So, I aim to change the mindset, encouraging investment in localised economies and discouraging offshore accumulations of vast sums of money.

The first sentence is crucially important to understand my political position. Note this is not opposition to personal wealth. It is a statement about the nature of money. Money’s value is through its use to build community. It builds community as it changes hands and so the flow of money is where our focus should be.  When money accumulates it is not put to work building community.

This has profound implications for the ways in which we understand our roles as participants in the economy. The decisions we make have profound effects on the economy. Wealthier people have more power and so more responsibility. This is why integrity is an important personal value and why transparency and accountability are paramount political values.

What does it stand against?

Goliath is the corporations and the political system that has handed so much of the country’s assets to them.

Need to resist this mindset from (1) a pro-business perspective because businesses keep money flowing, and (2) community associations who care for their place and tackle disadvantage.

We elect governments to protect us against the power of large unaccountable corporations. When we find governments are selling out to them, not safeguarding our interests, then there is a need for a greater democratic input into politics. I believe this will come from an alliance between community organisations and local businesses. Businesses and their customers, if you prefer.

In what ways is my brand contentious?

Capitalism has been a boo word on the left for many years but it is true there has been no more democratic approach found. The communist experiments in the twentieth century demonstrated the dangers of enforced solutions.

There are capitalist models of the left. The old retail co-operative movement is a brilliant example of how bottom-up economic approaches can co-exist with massive corporate systems. Is there a modern alternative, equivalent to the retail co-ops? I think there is and I blogged about an economy for the common good recently.