World We Want "Reunions"

In a personal communication Michael Herman suggests that in addition to a book tour and classes or seminars on The World We Want, Peter might consider a "reunion" of attendees. They might gather in Open Space around specific topics to ask what they might do towards the world they want. Through a web portal, success stories, and ongoing publications Peter could document what works. I love this idea, of followup that becomes more and more practical, as people team up to do together what none of us can do separately. Thinking of what will happen after a meeting is the best way to have a good meeting. So, the "reunion" idea could be central to the original book tour and seminars. ("This is the beginning, not the end.")

Looking back on the convening of the original Open Space for Giving in Chicago a couple of years ago with Michael, I recall what "held us back." Each of these items would be easier to address through a national network with Peter's leadership.

1. Invitation - This took us months as the co-conveners tried to create something open-ended but coherent. Peter could provide a proven template.
2. Location - The portal could provide suggestions and examples of what has worked for others with sample costs. (Best to have a site where people do not need cabs or cars, but can walk around to find places to eat, and hotels in various prices ranges. Best to have a nonprofit site, like a community center, church basement, university building.)
3. Deduction - In our conference, my mini-grant of $1,300 was not deductible. If the micro-grants to fund the local meetings were run through some kind of nonprofit fiscal agent locally or nationally, the gifts would be tax-deductible. The $500 that I would have saved could have bought a meal out together for the attendees or could have given Michael a thank you for all he did.
4. Credibility - Michael spent hours and hours trying to win credibility for our crazy idea among funders and foundations in Chicago. They had no idea who I am, and were skeptical. Add to that our ever-evolving invitation and we were lucky to get a foundation to lend their name at all. Peter could easily smooth the way, with a boilerplate intro letter. It would create instant credibility for those trying to pitch in at the local level. The local foundation community would see immediately that this is a seriously considered effort, one that their peers have endorsed in other communities.
5. Courage - A month or so before the Chicago meeting, I almost called it off, because so few had signed up. I was embarrassed that Tracy Gary and other notables had committed on my word. I was afraid Tracy would fly in and I would be the only one there. She told me, "Have faith; if no one else comes, we will enjoy each other's company. Don't flinch." With a national series of events, the conveners will not have to work totally on faith. They will have a proven template, support from prior conveners, and a record of success from earlier meetings.
6. Follow-Up - The original Giving Space group has kept in touch now for two years through a listserv and through Omidyar.net, but it would have been even better if we had known in advance where and how we would continue the conversations.
7. Critical Mass by Topic - This may be the biggest improvement area. We had a great group in Chicago, and it was pretty diverse by area of interest. That made for a great meeting but not for focused follow-up. If we had a national series of local Open Space meetings, and if we posted the "findings" and had a database set up to find people by similar interests, we might then have action-groups form spontaneously by affinity and role. (Environmental activists, organizers and funders, say.)
8. Big Dream: What inspires is the big dream that somehow our seemingly minor efforts will build on another and sweep the nation, moving us as a country closer to our ideal community. Hard to hold that dream when you are alone or one of 40 huddled in Open Space, but with dozens of groups of 40 springing up all over the country, networked together, and sharing their ideas and their active energy, the dream might actually come true.

Michael chipping his ideas here is a good example of hope that dies hard. Thank you, Michael.

Comments

[Julie Caldwell]

Phil, you're right on with this path of thinking. Let me know what type of support you and Peter need. I'll be in Chicago in July, will you? Is Peter coming?

[Gerry]

Isn't the real issue continuity? You know how it is said about Open Space, that it isn't over until it's over? It still isn't over, the scale of what was committed to at that first conference went well beyond the bounds of the conference in time and space. Small groupings continuing to meet and work for several days after the named time, and then continuing to connect and build on what was started.

At Recent Changes Camp we talked immediately about having another gathering in a year, and in other places. There is one now scheduled for 2007 in Montreal.

There is no point in articulating the World We Want if we don't begin actions to make it that way. That certainly won't be done all at once, and so I think not so much of a reunion as a continuation of what was started.

It is very exciting to contemplate Peter's initiative continuing what what started in many more places and with the institutional supports necessary to have it continue.

[Phil]

Julie and Gerry,

Unfortunately neither Peter nor I can get to Chicago this year. But the point about continuity and building in on-going community that leads to specific actions and projects is critical. Otherwise what we have here is a book tour, a commericial deal to sell more books, etc. That would be a huge disappointment, even a betrayal.

My sense is that the book is a strategy, but that the vision is to encourage people at the grassroots to articulate and build a better world.

What is innovative and inspiring to me is the possibility of hybridizing two networks. When you see Peter's book, you will see that all but a few are "Cover of Tiome Magazine" level bigshots. I suspect that for those interviewed at that level their attention waxed and waned. Another day another interview. They will have their big picture ideas, they may have financial resources and connections, but a better world of democracy cannot be created by a Synod of Bighshots operating one by one or in conversation with one another. Their challenge, should any of them choose to accept it, is to build community from the grassroots up - without trying to own it - as in MySpace or Omidyar.

They have to learn what Jesus taught, that beyond success and even significance is surrender. Give it up, all up, the dream of owernship, double bottom lines, sites named after your own family, foundations with marble facades, a marble tomb - give it up.

The benefit to the Bighshots are all these "little people," like us volunteering to help them grow, change, get engaged, lead - not own and run or (forgive the word) "patronize."

So, in the book, many Bigshots interviewed respectfully, I assume, since Peter is a man of good manners. Interviewed that is about the World WE want. As if they knew, as if they had asked.

You get the picture, outside the rarefied world of Top Management, The Cover of Time, and the book by wealthy people called, The World We Want, is the other dream of Civicpace, of blogs, of meetings in church basements, of citizen engagement and action.

The fascination, shimmering potential of this moment is not "either/or," but "both/and." We have both the big and little people circling one another, saying, "Are you kidding? Those people in the World We Want? They are not like me."

In Chicago two years ago we had that delicate balance. Asked by a rich person, "Will I be hit on for gifts?" the answer was, "Yes, if you put 'rich guy' on your name tag. Why don't you just put your name?"

Any way, we have a chance here to do something special - that subsumes but goes beyond rich people's vision of The World We Want and beyond our own stumbling and episodic efforts.