Beyond the Rules of Order

"We cannot dismantle one system without having another in its place."

—Mahatma Gandhi (Sharp 1973)

To understand yourself, you need to explore your inner experiences. Likewise, ifmultileveled organizations want to know themselves, they need to explore Open Forumsto understand their various parts. Open Forums in my definition are structured, person-to-personor cyberspace, democratic meetings, in which everyone feels represented.Furthermore, they are facilitated in a deeply democratic manner, which means thedeepest feelings and dreams can also be expressed. In other words, the Open Forum is toa corporation or city as innerwork is to an individual. The analogy between the innerworkof an individual and an organization's Open Forum goes even further. Just as yourpersonal learning depends on how open you are to your various parts, feelings, anddream figures, an organization's self-discovery process depends on openness to thediversity of its individual members, and the diversity of their inner and outer worlds.

Diversity awareness is multileveled: It is a matter of noticing cultures, ages, genders,races, sexual orientations, religions, economic backgrounds, jobs, abilities, andworldviews and dreams. Process-oriented work with organizations is based on awarenessof and bringing forth the richness of our total diversity and complexity.

It is said of Gandhi that "he didn't want to win battles; he wanted to win hearts and minds"(Atlee; Bondurant 1965). The methods of the process-oriented Open Forum aim at doingexactly that. By fostering awareness of the deepest feelings and communication signals ofeveryone in the community, we can create nonviolent yet direct exchanges. The newprocedures presented in the following chapters are adapted to working with organizationsnot as mechanical entities, but as living systems, be they schools, businesses, or cities.

It often seems to me as if the very people we have made responsible for leadership andglobal change are not always the best for the job. Most organizational and world leaders,activists, and politicians have little training in understanding people or helping groups tochange. Yet most of us who are supposed to know most about personal transformation—namely, those in the helping professions—usually avoid organizational tasks and theproblems of social transformation. The lack of conscious leadership is why troubledorganizations turn against their troubles, and conflict with conflict. They assume thatexisting conflict is "wrong."

Process ideas are different. Instead of thinking in terms of the paradigm that condemnswhat's going on in a given conflict situation and implementing programs, methods, andprocedures that implicitly look down on the people involved, process-orientedorganizational work discovers the missing power of transformation in the tension itself andin people's behavior. In the new paradigm, conflict itself is the fastest way to community.Conflict is its own healing.

Democratic methods, rules, and laws alone do not create a sense of community. Rulesand laws may govern mechanical systems, but not people. The new paradigm, which Idescribe in the following chapters, acknowledges that organizations are partiallymechanical beings needing behavior change. However, in the new paradigm,organizations are also living organisms whose lifeblood is composed of feelings, beliefs,and dreams. Ignoring the flow of this "blood", that is, moment-to-moment experiences,disregards emotions and represses what I call "the dreaming background" to the everydaylife of schools, businesses, and cities. Ignoring the dreaming background eventuallydepresses us. When "facts" become more important than feelings and dreams, we getbored, don't vote, won't go to meetings, avoid relationship problems, and becomedisinterested in public life. Disinterested participants erode organizations, precipitatingtheir collapse as if they were empty, paper buildings.

In today's world, "good" ideas don't work without communication awareness. One sidecannot truly win in a battle. In addition, one method alone cannot deal with human issuesfor long. In fact, our organizations are no longer localized in one spot; cyberspacechanged all that! There are no longer simple localities in our second-millennium world. Weare rather a planet of interconnections.

Therefore, creating deep democracy deals with community members not only as separate,local entities but also as sensitive, nonlocal interconnecting spirits of the times, which areconstantly changing. In other words, each of our viewpoints has something global andeternal about it, for even if we are not around, there is always someone else who seemsto fill in for us. In fact, any viewpoint is more like a ghost than a fact. Even when no singleperson represents that viewpoint, it sort of "spooks" us. We have all witnessed at one timeor another how roles such as the "rebel" or the "unconscious leader" hover like spiritsaround groups.

Even in serious situations, process-oriented Open Forums can bring out the spirits in thebackground in a playful manner to reveal the community as a global, dreaming being inthe midst of self-discovery. By taking the group's process as a teacher, everyone becomesa learner and leader, including young children and longtime gang leaders. According toWilliam Ury in his excellent 1999 book, Getting to Peace, "In 10,000 schools in thiscountry, kids as young as six or seven are learning peer mediation." He tells us that in thecities of the United States "gang leaders often become the best mediators, they commandrespect for the transformation they've gone through." The awareness methods of process-orientedOpen Forums work in face-to-face interactions and on the Internet.

Using awareness in groups allows us to discover ourselves, the way we are. Withawareness, we have access not only to our emotions, but also to detachment. Anyonewho uses her awareness to enter the heart of conflict knows from personal experiencethat the emotions that arise are not always predictable. For example, I know from my ownexperience that the feelings involved in tense situations touch me deeply. Sometimespeople scare me; they make me feel sad, or even removed from situations. If I use myawareness, I notice that sometimes my body shakes, as if I were in the presence of ahuge monster, although the person I am facing seems to be acting timidly. Usingawareness connects me to the excitement, the wildness and love in any given moment.Using awareness is a very different paradigm from using rules and power, because withawareness, the next step is not always predictable. Even monsters can be present.

Taoism: Ancient Chinese Paradigm for Process Work

To get along with change and survive the stress of conflict, we need some paradigm thatis beyond those of danger and safety, war and peace, violence and nonviolence. Theseviewpoints are either for or against what is actually happening. If for any reason, you areagainst either conflict or peace, you tend to ignore anger and/or quietness in groups.Process-oriented facilitators do not use peace paradigms, which wage war againstconflict. Process work is based on an ancient Chinese belief in nature called Taoism,which includes all possible states of mind such as conflict and peace, stagnation andbreakthrough. The philosophy of Taoism is expressed in eighty-one sayings of the TaoTeh Ching. The various states of consciousness Taoism encompasses can be seen in thesixty-four chapter headings of the I Ching, or The Book of Changes. I understand Taoismto mean that we should notice and observe nature, then be at peace with what ishappening, be it conflict or rest. If we stop fighting war and struggling against tension, wecan give problems the chance to resolve themselves.

Taoism has been very helpful to me in working with small and large groups. My personalview of Taoism is, in a way, very simple. When I look around, I see that everythingchanges. Try to find one single thing on this Earth that does not change with time. Noticethat there are no firm "things." The stars are in the process of transforming; the Earthevolves; everything is in the midst of flux. Each of us changes each day. This is theessential view of Taoism as well as modern theoretical physics. Everything is in the midstof change. Fixed things do not exist. In a way, everything is moving and dancing together.

The afternoon before I began work on this book, I went for a hike in the mountains andclimbed for several hours into the hills until I stood on a high, rocky terrace. I lookedtoward the heavens and saw clouds streaming by, like blue-gray balls of cotton, flowingbeneath a bright blue sky. Elk running across the meadows caught my attention as Igazed into the autumn valleys, painted red and gold by the changing seasons. Abovewere the clouds flowing across the sky; below, the elk running through the meadows.

While enjoying this view, a thought came to me: the whole Earth is changing, shuddering,and shaking. The animals, plants, rocks, and stars of this universe are moving, notindependently of one another, but together in a sort of dance. Just as the clouds, the elk,and the Earth dance together, so do all things dance together.

While I stood there perceiving this immense dance, I was moved to tears. This experienceput the job of mediating organizational change into perspective as part of a larger, moreawesome interaction—the world's dance. This view that things are changing andinterconnected is the view of Taoism.

We could say that the way in which things move and change is a dance. Each dance is akind of Tao. Conflict is that particular kind of Tao, that particular dance, in which younotice someone yelling: "You are stepping on my feet, get off my toe!" When no onelistens, the dancers' Tao of conflict may turn to the Tao of violence. However, no Tao isinevitable. Awareness can change a painful situation into an enriching one. To preventviolence, we need to become aware of feelings and pain and of the call, "You are steppingon me!" In this moment, awareness can lead to new relationships, new dances.

This reminds me of a recent interaction my partner, Amy, and I saw in London, where wewere working with a large group of people who had come from all over the world. At onemoment, the peaceful atmosphere of the group was awakened by the cry of a womanbringing everyone's awareness to the pain of gays ostracized by their families andcultures. The group atmosphere, or Tao, changed; conflict was present. The veryopenness to tension introduced by the gays allowed those who had been repressingthemselves to speak about their problems.

In one powerful interaction, Irish participants spoke about the ancient feeling of being"stepped on" by the English, and this opened the historical conflict between the Irish andEnglish. At one moment, a sensitive Irish woman came forward and spoke of her sense ofbeing less valuable in the eyes of the English. She cried, "Why colonize, why down us?Where are your feelings?"

An English man who had been silent until this moment explained that being a sailor in theEnglish Navy had forced him to repress his feelings. The woman screamed in pain at him,accusing him of heartlessness. Immediately others surrounded the man to protect himfrom her. Amy and I suggested he be allowed to stand alone with her. The group partedand the two stood in the center as we tried to use awareness and follow their moment-to-momentexperience. As always, we hoped their body signals and process itself wouldshow us what to do.

Then, to the surprise of all, he broke down in tears, admitting with sadness that he hadlost track of his feelings. To the even greater surprise of everyone, as he wept, she peeredat him and suddenly exclaimed, "Why, you have lost your soul!" She explained that sherealized for the first time that he was in a worse situation than she, even though sheexperienced him as the social oppressor. Totally changing her demeanor, she said shefelt badly for him. To the amazement of everyone, they embraced, having reconciled theirconflict, at least at that moment and in that city.

New Dances

In process work, awareness is the key. As in Taoism's view, the necessary next steps torelationships are found in the momentary situation. The job of conflict managers is notonly to reorganize people, but also to help people recognize how their own communicationsignals and dreams, the hidden signals and feelings, the hidden Tao, so to speak, of agiven situation reorganize organizations. These vital signals and dreams bring peopleback into step with one another. The point is to train our awareness to notice thenecessary next steps hidden in what I will later define as "body signals" and"organizational ghosts." Awareness inevitably reveals the new steps that can transformeven intractable conflict.

The Trouble with Democracy

One of the sources underlying the ubiquitous violence we are all increasingly concernedabout is the governing democratic paradigm. Embedded in the foundation of democracyare wonderful ideals such as liberty and freedom. For example, in Articles 2 through 21 ofthe United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we find the right to freedomfrom racial and other forms of discrimination; the right to life, liberty, and the security of theperson; freedom from slavery or involuntary servitude; freedom from torture and fromcruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment. However, can democracy, as it isnow formulated, really uphold these rights?

The root meaning of the word democracy is associated with power, not awareness. InGreek, demo means citizen and kratie means power. Democracy comes from the rootwords literally meaning citizen power. One of the original goals of democratic forms ofgovernment was to balance and distribute power; instead of only the ruling elite, everyonewas supposed to have power. What could possibly be wrong with citizen power? If peoplecould be reasonable instead of emotional, democracy—and the "good" use of power,might work. But without awareness of our capacity to interact, social power alone willnever solve our interactional problems.

Inner Tyranny Instead of Democracy

There are two reasons why democracy does not work well. In the first place, democracymainly addresses social issues, not inner, personal ones. Truly democratic human beingsare that way only very briefly. I have never met even one person who is able to sustain anegalitarian, democratic form of consciousness toward self or others for more thanmoments. Without some form of awareness training, within the privacy of our innerautonomy, most of us behave like tyrants. When it comes to recognizing different aspectsof ourselves, we become dictators who simply refuse to do so. If we are strong, we ignoreour shyness. If we are harmonious, we repress and/or deny our anger.

Instead of enacting the democratic principle that the people or parts should all berepresented, there is usually only one prevailing viewpoint—that of the everyday self. This"dictatorial" viewpoint makes sure that we do not listen to the various parts of ourselves,our feelings, longings, desires, fears, and powers. Democracy—which, in principle, strivesto empower all the parts—cannot work as long as it is recognized only as a blueprint forexternal structures. To make democracy an inner experience, we need to engage in someform of innerwork or inner dialogue to create a deeper democracy.

Democracy's Power Problem

A second problem with democracy is that it is based on the concept of citizen power—morespecifically, the power of the majority—instead of an awareness within each citizen.Perhaps in the best of all possible worlds, the majority is imagined to be interested in theminority's viewpoints. However, this is rarely the case. In fact, as Professor J. J. Hendricksof the Department of Politics and Public Administration at California State University,Stanislaus, points out, democracy without awareness is a form of tyranny.

Awareness is a more comprehensive guiding principle than power. By using awareness,we can track what happens to those people and parts of ourselves that are not part of themajority when the majority rules. Awareness tells us that the minority gets upset when itrealizes that the majority is not interested in its needs and views and that the wishes ofthose with fewer votes will not be heard, even if they are supposed to be heard.

For example, if the majority of teenagers in a certain section of a city are of one particularrace, sexual orientation, and economic class, and two new young adults of another race,sexual orientation, and economic class move into the area, they are likely to beostracized. Democratic procedures, which provide guidelines for behavior but not forawareness, cannot forbid or even address the fact that the disdain of the majorityhumiliates the new kids.