World We Want Seminar/Blog/Action Ideas

by H. Peter Karoff

Draft- May 31, 2006

Phil – The organization and process notions you just posted are breathtaking, and may be exactly right. What are more interesting at this point to me are the potential areas of focus and action within which people might begin to grapple.    

Here are some ideas that flow out of the journey that is the book. They are not the only ideas and may not be the right ones, but they do represent what Joe Breiteneicher calls “intellectual grist” for the field and beyond.

Movement Builders – what does it mean to build a movement of substance and meaning around a critical social issue? What are the strategies for change that have proven effective? What are the lessons learned in collaborative efforts? How has advocacy changed in an era of the increasing use of technology-driven networks?     

How to go out of business - the promises philanthropy make are a serious matter and too often those promises reinforce the status quo instead of contributing to long term solutions. What are the elements to watch for and avoid, and what are those to promote?

Developing Public Capital – communities coming together to solve their own problems means putting those at the center of the problem at the center of the solution. How does that perspective change the role and work of the citizen activist and donor?     

Too many people are sleepwalkers and are not involved in their community. How does one wake the citizen within? What is the responsibility that each individual bears to society?

Where does the moral conscience of your community lie? Does it lie with you? Which organizations provide the moral leadership of your community? Is it possible to build upon that leadership, and enlist others in this work?     

In a society divided by culture wars, how does one hold true to personal beliefs and convictions while at the same time accommodating others who believe differently? What is the role of dialogue, and mediation and what does one do when that fails?

Growing Your Soul – the transformation we need the most is the transformation of the human heart. What does that mean to you, and to the issues about which you are passionate?

Comments

[phil]

Seminar is the word you used, not workshop, not open space, not conversation, but seminar. A seminar has a seminar leader. It is conducted usually in an academic setting. Often it is done for credit. There is usually a daunting bibliograhy. The one convening is an authority. Those who attend are teased into thought through a Socractic process, usually to a pre-considered destination. A seminar is usally held in a closed space surrounded by a wall and a gate, maybe with a porter, certainly with an admissions department. "Seminar," then presupposes a lot.

Let's say we had a Dumpster Dialgoue, as with Diogenes, and took it to the streets, accosting passerbye in the Walt-Mart parking lot? How would that change the decorum? Would it be more or less close to answering the questions you ask, about community building, active agency, soul making and putting philanthropy out of business in a world so great that it was unnecessary? Ask the guy making $6 an hour when he thinks philanthropy will be out of business. He will probably tell you that the shelter closed months ago.

I would say that the moral conscience of our time is in inner exile. It has been termed a Terrorist or a Liberal and is in hiding. Our conscience is that we dare not speak, except in jest, or behind masks, or among close knots of friends.

What is promising is that you have joined the conversation, not as an authority, though you are that, certainly, but as a seeker, among others. Every time you mention sleepwalkers (echoing Bloch's book about complacency and moral cowardice in Weimar), I cock my head. Can't wait for the wake up call. I think people here are ready for that. It won't be a seminar, though, more like block party around a burning barrel. A round table discussion. Bring your own bottle.

Thanks, Peter, for joining us. We are in your house and thank you for the privilege.

[Gerry]

There is a risk here of going forward not completely understanding what is going on here. The end of Philanthropy is the end of Wealth Bondage. When our surplus is shared fairly, we will have neither wealth nor poverty.

Even "movement builders" can be too much top down. It has the feel of bringing the message to the people when you should be finding out what they already know.

I would say that the moral conscience of our time is in inner exile. It has been termed a Terrorist or a Liberal and is in hiding. Our conscience is that we dare not speak, except in jest, or behind masks, or among close knots of friends.

People need permission to connect with their own inner moral resources. We don't have to bring the movement to the people, only to support them in finding their vision.

The goal should be simply to foster more civic activity. People aren't engaged because they can't take what is force fed from the top. It isn't very fun either, given the opportunity many will engage creatively. The status quo doesn't want this, apathy and disconnection empower those who would pull the strings.

[Michael]

It's more than permission, they need to cultivate that experience.

[phil]

Decorum is a filter. If the decorum is stilted, upper class, "tasteful," refined, and conspiculously inoffensive, it will be attractive or bearable only by a certain self-selected affinity group, in this case those with money, education and taste. It will put off those whose energies are more populist or indignant or inchoate. We will have another closed room at a community foundation with people in their church clothes opining in platitudes. That is not all bad, but those same people meet anyway, on boards, at charitable events, etc. They are the upper crust whose blithe acceptance of their own privilege allows them to talk apparently without any self-awarness of "the end of philanthropy," as if they had even begun to address the ills of our world, or had any intention of doing so.

Including diverse voices, and diverse styles, handling the energies and rancors of real cross-group "conversation" is very hard. Peter, you have experienced this in Boston. I recall your mentioning a meeting in which a chair was tossed at you, and another when a black activist among the genteel Boston Brahmins, emptied a garbage sack on the floor while he was giving his speech and so became persona non grata thereafter.

This is the context, a country taught by the "parties" to hate one another, riven by wedge issues. Our fellow citizens take their cue not from urbane seminars but from the machiavellian point counter point and slander of talk show pundits and talk radio. "The Liberals," "The libbers," "The moonbats," "The wingnuts." etc. We dismiss one another, rather than converse and we can retreat into enclaves among the like-minded but not converse across those cultural boundaries very well.

You are breaking the rules even by countenancing us. And we appreciate it deeply.

Your right move here, Peter, is Dick Minim's, the distinguished Senator from your state. Triangulation. Here is where you call us "a bit over the top," and set up a duality of extremists on both sides, positing yourself as the referee, judge or moderator. Good luck.

The Happy Tutor is remembered for his aphorisms, Tooterisms, as with this: "Outside the news studio the miling mob skins the moderator alive."

We know the Kerry moves, the Clinton moves, the the DLC moves, the bland moves of he who raises his eyebrows. We know the history and the provenance of that style and could teach it in one of those seminars to the rising cadres of think tank thinkers, news casters, and managers in prep school or college. Yet, we call that sleepwalking, how about you?

I want to say that the boundary spanners are the ones who will change this game. You have mastered the style of the courtier, the seminar leader, the board member, the fair minded executive, the consultant to wealth, he who offends no one. Yet you seethe at the sleepwalkers. Welcome to our world. We live this daily. We hang out on the net talk about it. We truly welcome your presence and your willingness to engage us.

Scary, isn't? What gets reborn on the net is persona, the masks we use to pass in good company for ourselves. As David Weinberger said, "We in blogs are writing ourselves into existence." We are writing a "we" into existence. You are among that blogger we, as you are among an upper crust we and a new money entrepreneurial "we." That gives you tremedous opportunities to link up conversations, funding networks, activist networks, and create a container for "Seminars," but also workshops, open space, blog brouhahas, pocket meetigs in people's homes, and all kinds of ferment. You what that? Or do you prefer the genteel illusion that all is well and that philanthropy will soon wither away having created paradise on earth? Where I live the counter-myth is The Rapture, where the liberals die in endless warfare in a world wrecked by environmental collapse and the Saved, rescued in the nick of time by Jesus, jeer from Heaven. The philanthropists here, some of them, shrug at global warming and say, "It is Gods will, I give where I can be of use, to my Church."

A seminar here where the issue are raised, not just mentioned, or glossed over, would produce fury. Abstraction can glide over it, but to connect is to connect with the mind of Fox News, the mind of a resurgent bigotry recoded as free market logic, in which the blacks and browns get what they deserve. To awaken that mind will take wilier strategies than those of the conversational essay.

Anyway, thank you for being here. We are over the top, no doubt. We won't accomplish much without the fat and happy who trinagulate from the middle, posing as moderators as the whole scheme shakes itself to pieces. How do we get them engaged? We can't be moderated, but we can take turns in framing the conversation. Now it is your turn.

[Gerry]

It's more than permission, they need to cultivate that experience.

I agree, and I think that is one area that Open Space helps too. Even without consciously cultivating it, being in a space where you are invited to put up any issue that matter so you is very powerful to that end.

This is quite a conversation, Phil. You've said that Peter is a salesman, so he needs to know more about what we have to sell here. Everyone is talking about emergence like it was magic or something, but we are working to understand what it is, how it works and how to design with it. We know too well that a lot of hype is created around these ideas, and some of his network are hip to this as a new investment trend. Many of them are in the position of having monetary resources to invest, but to invest wesely is to be able to tell the real thing from the snake oil.

The invitation is to witness this happening first hand and get involved. There are investment opportunities both charitable and potentially very profitable that we have to take on the slow way for lack of resources. No one is asking for money, we are getting busy. Money would help and make things go faster, but more important is the committed citizen who holds that wealth and wants to put it to a good use.

[phil]

What is tough is the mixing of closed, almost cliquish and often coded conversations. Can we in any way mix Peter's network and that around the Dumpsters scattered throughout the internet? What will be the misunderstandings, the offenses given and taken, and will we fight through those to perilously shared understandings and common projects? "I am up for it," as Chris says, "How about you?"

[Gerry]

You know that I am more than ready. I also don't think the conflicts will amount to much in reality. The Open Space format lends itself to bridging differences, all the more reason it is the best for this project. When people talk honestly, face to face about what is important to them, they usually manage to resolve any conflicts. Most conflicts aren't fundamental, and we can get past the ones that are language, style or emphasis.

[phil]

One thing about open space, though, as Chris noted, it does take time and commitment. 2.5 days is more than many can commit, and "busy people who are important people" may be the least likely to attend. I don't know that is bad, but it does limit the audience. If we get 25-50 per city is that enough?

[Gerry]

Whoever comes are the right people. This is the leading edge of change. How many does it take to wake up the rest? There is a critical .01 % and .1 % in every community, and they are already engaged. Yes some will be otherwise engaged that weekend, but they will also be connected to those who do attend. And some will be getting connected for the first time.

[phil]

Right, and the site itself persists, so whoever comes to hear Tracy Gary is right, whoever comes to hear Peter is right, on and on, with the discussion forums and podcasts interlinking these conversations locally and through rss nationally. Each local site would be like a local civic center, so that speakers coming to town would want to be listed as a matter of course, and would appreciate having a forum put up for them. Estate planning council, community foundations, national committee on planned giving, various charities might all want to have access to a free hangout.

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Right, and the site itself persists, so whoever comes to hear Tracy Gary is right, whoever comes to hear Peter is right, on and on, with the discussion forums and podcasts interlinking these conversations locally and through rss nationally. Each local site would be like a local civic center, so that speakers coming to town would want to be listed as a matter of course, and would appreciate having a forum put up for them.