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Abstract:
In his Conclusion from the 2001 book “Doing Democracy: The MAP Model for
Organizing Social Movements,” the late nonviolent activist Bill Moyer summarizes the
history of the many 20th century social movements he helped organize, followed by his
analysis of the 21st century context for social movements, and his advice for future
activism. The text of the Conclusion is followed by my commentary, where I update and
knit together various descriptions and analyses from the Conclusion and from his other
writing, as well as several concepts of macro-analysis for the 21st century that Moyer
was exploring at that time, interspersed with my own opinions. The commentary is
followed by selected references and resources.
Doing Democracy in the 21st Century
Introduction to Bill Moyer’s Conclusion in the book “Doing Democracy”
Youthful activists may not have heard of Bill Moyer, who participated in and helped
organize most of the social movements of the 1960s and beyond, until his untimely death
almost 20 years ago. And older activists also may find some benefit from information
about ideas Moyer had begun to explore in the late 1990s, and was still integrating into
his work. Some relevant references can be found after the Commentary, below.
Building on the foundation of Moyer’s Movement Action Plan (MAP) Model, and his
analysis of the four roles of activism with their positive and negative aspects, his
Conclusion in the book “Doing Democracy” describes the path forward that he foresaw
for the 21st century, and also some of the potholes that effective activists will want to
avoid. He advocated an “even broader agenda of personal and social transformation, and
[proposed] several new directions for activists to consider.”
Summarizing the history of social movements in the latter half of the 20th century,
Moyer highlights trends of nonviolence and liberation threading through the decades, and
weaving into the future. Although his advice is now at least two decades old, it’s still
valid, and my hope in sharing his Conclusion and expanding on its contents is that current
and future activists working toward a sustainable and nonviolent future can more readily
benefit from his work, and themselves continue to update and expand on his vision
beyond this summary.
Outline of the Conclusion of “Doing Democracy”
Toward the Future
Modern Era Social Movements
Modern era social movements – pluses and minuses
* Deconstructionist analysis.
* Multiculturalism.
* Pluralistic relativism.
Five Strategic Guidelines for Social Activism in the 21st Century
1. Continue to expand local, national, and international efforts to alleviate the
world’s immediate problems and crises.
2. Recognize that the world’s critical social and environmental problems cannot be
solved within the present modern era of maximum material growth and prosperity.
The first societal myth is that the international system of growth and prosperity will
end poverty, hunger, and disease and create political democracies around the world.
The first societal secret of the modern era is that while it is creating growth and
prosperity for some, it is creating poverty, hunger, disease, and reduced quality of
life for the great majority.
The second societal myth of the modern era of growth and prosperity is that
everyone can eventually live at Western levels of consumption.
The second societal secret is that not only is it impossible to achieve the promised
growth and prosperity for the world’s poor, but it is even impossible to sustain the
current level of growth and prosperity because it is destroying our environmental
life-support systems, depleting natural resources, and leading to ecological disasters
and economic collapse.
3. Realize that the goals of most social movement programs are based on false
expectations about the success of the modern era of economic growth and
prosperity.
4. Organize strategically for transformation from the modern era of economic
growth and prosperity to a new era of ecology, justice, and sustainability
Replace the growth and consumption paradigm with an ecological and well-being
paradigm.
Create an analysis, vision, and action strategy for transformation
Use existing developmental theories of societal transformation
Overcome activists’ resistance to social transformation
5. Include personal and cultural transformation as a central strategy for creating a
peaceful world – starting with activists ourselves and our organizations
The need for a spiritual perspective
Next Steps
==============================================================
Conclusion
By Bill Moyer
(Selected phrases within the text are highlighted in bold to assist readers, but only those
in the outline above were in bold in the original. MS)
Toward the Future
In March 1959, I was voted out of the Presbyterian Church because I invited a
Catholic and a Jew to talk to the youth group. This incident led me to the Quakers, which
in turn prompted my early “retirement” as a management systems engineer for an
international corporation, just three years after graduating from Pennsylvania State
University. I knew that I wanted to do something more meaningful with my life. I had no
idea that it was the start of “the sixties” and never suspected that I was beginning my new
profession as a full-time activist.
It is from this vantage point, as a lifelong activist, that I look back at the evolution of
contemporary social movements in the United States. I participated in many of the
important social movements of the last 40 years, and it has been my privilege to work
with and train thousands of activists in these and other movements, nationally and
internationally.
In the 1960s, the civil rights movement launched the modern era of social activism in
America. Larger numbers of people began participating as social movements addressed
an ever widening array of society’s problems and conditions. In each succeeding decade
the number of people and of movements has increased, and more complex tools of
analysis and organizing methods have been developed. My own analysis, the Movement
Action Plan (MAP), grew into a detailed framework for strategically understanding and
conducting social movements as I worked to create change and help increase the
effectiveness of others.
The following review of the contributions and the limitations of modern social
movements is based on my experience and attempts to refine my own thinking by
studying the theories of analysts in other fields. In reflecting on these, I believe that 21st-
century social movements must take on the even broader agenda of personal and social
transformation, and I propose several new strategic directions for activists to consider.
Modern Era Social Movements
The civil rights, anti-Vietnam War, and anti-nuclear war movements of the 1960s
were all “issue oriented” and were energized by the emergence of socially conscious
youth and by the new student and counterculture movements. Participants in this new era
of citizen activism used the nonviolent principles and methods developed by Gandhi and
King, which have been adopted by many succeeding movements in the US and around
the world.
In the 1970s, influenced by the women’s movement, some activists began to
consider the importance of individual change in the process of social change.
Feminism, especially, turned the spotlight on the destructive impact patriarchy had on
personal and social relationships. Influenced also by Quakers and the human potential
movement, activism was increasingly characterized by new models and methods for
democratic group dynamics and organizational forms, such as collectives and consensus
decision-making. These were integrated into the anti-nuclear energy movement that took
off in 1977 with the Seabrook nuclear power plant occupation and arrests.
The focus of social activism expanded during this decade to include a wide range of
disenfranchised groups – women, gays and lesbians, students, working-class people,
native Americans, and people of color. By putting the issues of these groups on the public
agenda, social movements fostered an awareness of the shadow side of American life in
the modern era. The primary goal of these movements was to give marginalized
populations their rights and bring them into full participation in mainstream society.
Understanding and describing the way in which American society violated the rights
of these oppressed groups and its own deeply held cultural values was facilitated by an
analytical approach known as “deconstructionism.” Deconstructionists focused on
revealing what was wrong with an oppressive, patriarchal, capitalist society. The
“multiculturalism” movement emerged and advocated that marginalized and
oppressed people should not only reclaim their heritage and cultures, but should
also be widely acknowledged and honored.
In order to honor and support all the different oppressed groups, with their values and
politics that sometimes conflicted with other oppressed groups, multiculturalism adopted
the principle of “pluralistic relativism.” This was a new egalitarian worldview that
advocated every group’s right to its own culturally based reality and version of
“truth,” which was to be considered as valid as any other. Consequently, any claims to
universal values or truths (such as the importance of nonviolence or environmental
sustainability) that challenged the truths of any marginalized individual or group were
often resisted as being hierarchical and oppressive, just as the dominant society was
oppressive.
The belief in “radical freedom” was simultaneously adopted by a wide range of
political and cultural groups, including the youth-based counterculture, anarchists,
political Yippies, multiculturalists, and liberation movements on the left. Ironically, it
was also an ideology long held by libertarians and free-market capitalists on the right. Its
impact was heightened by the counterculture of the 1970s, whose “me generation”
proclaimed the view that all people and groups should be free to “do their own thing.”
Ironically, this fit in nicely with modern society’s fundamental principle that
everyone should seek his or her own self-interest in the cut-throat, competitive
marketplace, whether in the realms of economics, politics, or the dynamics of activism.
While recognizing the important and revolutionary contribution that the application of
pluralistic relativism has made on behalf of marginalized groups, social analysts Ken
Wilber and Robert Kegan, among others, have also challenged the unhealthy and
reactionary versions of personal politics.1 They point out the dangers of extreme
individualism, which gives unquestioning support to individual freedom without a
corresponding responsibility, especially when it is based on egocentric narcissism,
epitomized by the attitude “Do your own thing.” They charge that such extreme
individualism undermines the higher goal of achieving a more evolved society that is
based on cooperation and unity among individuals, and relationships among diverse
groups based not only on their differences but also on their commonalties and
mutual concerns.
These critics also see the importance of placing social activism in the larger
framework of human developmental stages. They identify many of the problems that
concern activists as typical of the particular stage an individual or society has reached. A
critical role of social activism, therefore, is to help individuals and societies progress
from one developmental level to the next in a healthy way. I believe these larger
developmental theories are important tools for social activism and have been
incorporating them into my own thinking and training. Many activists, however, might
reject these and all other developmental theories as being hierarchical and oppressive,
stifling individual freedom.
Social activism continued to grow in the 1980s, and politically engaged citizens took
on bigger global issues. Two new mass social movements emerged – the anti-nuclear
energy and the anti-nuclear weapons campaigns – and two others took off – one against
the U.S. intervention in Central America and the other against apartheid in South Africa,
both of which included the inspired participation of faith-based institutions and individual
activists. These movements received worldwide attention and advanced international
activism.
All of these issues required an extensive analysis of military, political, and
economic policies and systems at home and internationally. Mass-based organizing,
nonviolent actions, and sustained campaigns characterized each of these movements,
many of which had sub-movements that progressed through MAP’s eight stages and used
all four roles of activism – citizen, rebel, change agent, and reformer.
While virtually all of the issues and social movements of the previous three decades
remained in the last decade of the 20th century, the 1990s was also a time of international
social activism. After the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and Eastern
Europe, activists challenged the expansion of the power of global corporate-market
capitalism. Many groups actively opposed the North American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA), the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI), and the World Trade
Organization (WTO). The anti-WTO demonstration in Seattle at the end of 1999
signaled the take-off stage of a worldwide movement against corporate capitalism’s
expanding control over the political economies and social policies of nations throughout
the world.
This movement has expanded beyond the specific issues addressed by movements in
previous decades to confront the corporation-controlled global political-economic system
itself. It turns the spotlight on the undemocratic and oppressive nature of global corporate
control, especially with regard to people in the Third World, but also as it is destructive to
workers, the society, and the environment in the U.S. and other industrialized nations.
Consequently, the movement against corporate domination includes groups
addressing such varied issues as homelessness, poverty, social services, food safety,
labor, health care, civil rights, the environment, democracy, and Third World debt.
The activism of the 1990s increased cooperation among social movements
around the world, including those in Third World countries, and connected labor
and environmental issues with international and domestic concerns. The anti-
corporate globalization movement is also the first social movement to take full advantage
of Internet technology to gather data and mobilize diverse groups into action across great
distances.
Modern era social movements – pluses and minuses
Many of the movements from the 1960s through the 1990s were successful in
achieving at least a portion of their goals and objectives. They have developed
sophisticated tools of analysis and organization, and adapted and popularized the use of
the nonviolent direct action methods of Gandhi and Martin Luther King. In addition,
during this period social activism made three other critical contributions to social change:
deconstructionist analysis, multiculturalism, and pluralistic relativism, all of which we
will have to address differently in the 21st century.
* Deconstructionist analysis. During a period when the powerholders are trumpeting the
wonders and success of the modern era of economic growth and prosperity through the
“free” market, privatization, and globalization, social activists have developed
devastating critiques of what is wrong with every facet of present-day society. They have
painted a vivid picture of how social systems and institutions are failing to live up to the
moral and ethical principles of democratic nations. These movements are grounded in
well-documented rational analysis of the problems and how they are caused by society’s
powerholders, social systems, and institutions.
* Multiculturalism. While the powerholders and media laud the unprecedented success
of the modern era, social movements include large populations that were marginalized,
disenfranchised or oppressed. The goals of liberation movements arising from these
marginalized populations include overcoming oppression and prejudice; building the
pride and strength of their own communities; and gaining rights, privileges, and a place in
society on an equal basis with everyone else. An increasing sensitivity to diversity issues
has made social activism far more inclusive and powerful force for social change.
* Pluralistic relativism. A critical aspect of diversity is to honor the experience, culture,
and perspectives of every group in society, especially the oppressed and disenfranchised.
Normally these voices either go unheard or are dismissed in favor of the views of the
powerholders and the dominant paradigm, culture, or group. Pluralistic relativism sees
truth as being relative to the experience and culture of each diverse group and, therefore,
tends to be fiercely anti-hierarchical.
Activism of the last 40 years has also been characterized by some critical strategic
limitations that must be overcome if social movements are to be successful in the
new millennium.
* Most citizen activism has been based on an underlying belief in the viability and
unlimited continuation of the modern era’s mantra of ever-increasing economic growth
and prosperity.
* Efforts to change society’s oppressive and unjust social systems and institutions have
been carried out without a parallel effort to change the consciousness of individuals,
including those in social movements, or to change the culture of activism itself.
* The ideologies of deconstruction and cultural relativism, which have underpinned the
sensitivity to individualism and diversity, were often raised to the level of “political
correctness,” resulting in movements violating their own values and principles. For
example, the politically correct line that “everyone can do their own thing” gave the
green light for relatively few people to act out their anger and rage and advocate physical
skirmishes with the police and property damage, such as in the anti-corporate
globalization demonstrations in Seattle and throughout 2000. This behavior, however,
violated the wishes of the organizers of those events, who called for total nonviolence.
The minority who wanted violence were able to do their own thing, but the demonstration
organizers and great majority of participants were not able to do their own thing, which
was to have a totally nonviolent demonstration.
* There was another critical problem that limited social movement effectiveness in the
new era of social activism: it had few strategic models, such as MAP, to guide it. Because
21st-century activists also lack adequate theories and direction for the new task of social
transformation, I will introduce some in the next section.
Five Strategic Guidelines for Social Activism in the 21st Century
We are in a time of crisis and opportunity. It is a time of crisis because the present
social system is making critical problems worse and is not sustainable; it is destroying the
environmental life-support systems, depleting critical resources, and threatening human
life on the planet. At the same time, we have the opportunity to achieve a momentous
leap forward to a new era and a new way of being human as part of our historical,
evolutionary developmental process.
In the 21st century, social activism has a critical role to play in assisting a transition
from the present modern era to a new ecological era of human equality and
environmental sustainability. To meet the challenge of the new century, social activists
need to consider adopting the following five strategies.
1. Continue to expand local, national, and international efforts to alleviate the
world’s immediate problems and crises.
The world’s immediate social problems and crises are ongoing, and the modern era
continuously creates new problems and bigger crises. Some activists have become
discouraged because social problems continue to snowball despite their gallant efforts,
and some of today’s crises seem too big to tackle. But imagine just how much worse off
we would be without the social activism of the last 40 years – or the past 200 years. The
crises we now face can only be successfully challenged by social movements that engage
people at the local, regional, and international levels to connect their issues to changes in
the larger social systems. Only such interconnected worldwide activism can bring about
the necessary paradigm shifts discussed below.
2. Recognize that the world’s critical social and environmental problems cannot be
solved within the present modern era of maximum material growth and prosperity.
We live in a brief period of history that glorifies the modern industrial philosophy of
material economic growth and prosperity. Led by the United States government and
mammoth conglomerate international corporations, virtually all the world’s nations,
leaders, and institutions proclaim their allegiance. Even China, Russia, Poland, and other
former Communist states are participating through the corporate-led globalization
system’s institutions, such as the World Bank and the World Trade Organization.
Activists must be aware of two of the most commonly used societal myths supporting this
philosophy, and the societal secrets that discredit them.
The first societal myth is that the international system of growth and prosperity
will end poverty, hunger, and disease and create political democracies around the
world. The powerholders trumpet that the modern era has brought unprecedented levels
of economic growth and prosperity that will continue indefinitely into the future. They
rightly point out that hundreds of millions of people have achieved levels of
consumption, affluence, health, and longevity undreamed of, even by royalty, a century
ago. There are approximately 23 economically “developed” nations and all the rest are
told that they are “developing” countries.2
The first societal secret of the modern era is that while it is creating growth and
prosperity for some, it is creating poverty, hunger, disease, and reduced quality of
life for the great majority. Despite its obvious success, the modern era of economic
growth and prosperity has a colossal downside: it creates astounding economic, social,
and environmental problems. Instead of being helped by the modern era’s corporate
globalized system, the majority of people in Third World countries experience increasing
poverty, hunger, disruption of traditional culture, loss of land, unemployment, oppressive
or dictatorial governments, and warfare. While these problems affect well over 50 percent
of the people in the “developing” countries, even 10 to 15 percent of the people in the
United States experience various degrees of poverty, slum housing or homelessness,
unemployment, incarceration, or inadequate medical care. 3 This downside of the modern
era is totally excluded from the accounting system that is used to guide corporate and
governmental decision.
Moreover, the powerholders’ primary strategies to solve the world’s problems
stemming from the modern era – economic growth and direct aid programs – not only fail
to help but usually make the problems worse. The chief strategy is to promote more
economic growth on the theory that a “rising tide lifts all boats.” But while decades of
record-setting worldwide economic growth has created tens of millions more middle- and
upper-class consumers, it has produced even more poor people. The capitalist market
system inherently continues to distribute most of the benefits of growth to the affluent
minority and most of its costs to the poor majority. Consequently, the growth of the
market economy has produced a widening gap between rich and poor, both within nations
and between the already rich and poor nations, as well as creating additional
environmental devastation. 4
Additionally, the foreign aid programs that purported to help the poor in the
“developing” nations have created mountainous debt and dependency relationships,
and enable the imposition of “structural adjustments” that benefit international
corporations and investors. Both of these have also forced the curtailment of social
services and other benefits to the poor, thereby increasing the poverty and suffering
of the majority. This strategy does not work for the poor even in the United States, the
world’s leader in economic growth and prosperity, where the top 1 percent of the
population owns as much wealth as the bottom 95 percent, and where 10 to 15 percent of
the population still lives in poverty. 5
Finally, while there is increasing pressure on Third World nations to adopt the façade
of democracy through national elections, the democratic rights of all countries are being
supplanted by the autocratic power of corporation-dominated international institutions
such as the multinational corporations, the World Bank, and the World Trade
Organization.
The second societal myth of the modern era of growth and prosperity is that
everyone can eventually live at Western levels of consumption. “Economics is the
science of growth,” was the injunction of university economic textbooks when I attended
classes in the 1950s, and growth remains the centerpiece of western economics. Today, as
they gather under the banner of globalization, virtually all the world’s powerholders
pledge themselves to joining the bandwagon of globalized economic growth. The
presumption is that their populations can become full partners in the era of material
consumption. The advocates of worldwide globalization raise up the ultimate vision of a
future time when the rising tide of continuous economic growth and prosperity will have
lifted all “developing” boats. As President Clinton, the leader of world globalization for
the past eight years, said, “All of us now have to build a global economy that leaves no-
one behind.” 6
The second societal secret is that not only is it impossible to achieve the promised
growth and prosperity for the world’s poor, but it is even impossible to sustain the
current level of growth and prosperity because it is destroying our environmental
life-support systems, depleting natural resources, and leading to ecological disasters
and economic collapse. For three decades there has been mounting indisputable
evidence that unfettered growth and consumption are destroying environmental life-
support systems and depleting key natural resources. Many scientists fear that this
environmental devastation will result in catastrophes and threaten human existence on the
planet, at least as we now know it. 7 Most activists are familiar with this litany of
problems, which includes the melting of the polar ice that threatens to flood the world’s
coastal cities; depletion of the protective ozone layer; global warming that will change
the world’s weather patterns and threaten agriculture production; and pollution or
depletion of critical resources such as water, air, arable land, and oil.”
These problems exist today, just when the nations with the majority of the
world’s people – China, India, the former Soviet states, and many Third World
nations – have adopted concerted policies to start participating fully in the era of
economic growth and prosperity and achieve the goal of becoming developed. This is
a flawed dream. A research project that measured the effect of humanity’s “ecological
footprint” reports that it would take from five to six Earths to bring everyone up to the
level of today’s U.S. economy. The researchers conclude that the process of developing
more nations will simply speed up the current race to ecocide. 8 Moreover, most of
today’s programs that are supposed to alleviate environmental and resource
problems of growth and prosperity will merely delay the inevitable collapse and
thereby increase its impact when it eventually occurs.
3. Realize that the goals of most social movement programs are based on false
expectations about the success of the modern era of economic growth and
prosperity.
Almost all social movements – including those that advocate peace, ending poverty and
hunger, developing the Third World nations, or helping economically disenfranchised
groups – are based on the goal of providing everyone with their just and full benefits of
economic growth and prosperity. While these are important and laudable efforts, social
activists need to investigate fully whether this goal is attainable and sustainable based on
the limits of natural world.
Even much of the current anti-corporate globalization movement is hindered by a
belief that the global system of growth and prosperity can work for everyone. This
ignores the reality of limited resources and the degradation of the environment
caused by modern industrialism and the consumer society. It would be irresponsible
for social activists to promote programs that help the oppressed and poor to participate in
the modern era’s worldwide economic system if it either structurally cannot include them
or will collapse even sooner if it does. It is incumbent on social activists, therefore, to
develop a strategy of transformation to a new just and sustainable era that will consider
everyone equally.
4. Organize strategically for transformation from the modern era of economic
growth and prosperity to a new era of ecology, justice, and sustainability
To achieve this transformation to a new paradigm, activists need to become familiar with
the developmental nature of individuals and societies. Just as we as individuals develop
through stages from birth to death, societies may be seen as passing through
developmental stages. With this in mind, today’s social and environmental problems can
be viewed as resulting from the present developmental stage, which I have called “the
modern era of economic growth and prosperity.” Solutions to the world’s problems
ultimately require a developmental transformation to a new human era.
Consequently, social activists need to consciously develop analyses, visions, strategies,
and programs within the larger context of creating a momentous paradigmatic leap to a
new era.
Replace the growth and consumption paradigm with an ecological and well-being
paradigm.
While the modern era of economic growth and prosperity has many positive
characteristics, including a high production of goods and services, technological
advancement, democratic forms of government, ideological values of civil and human
rights, and a stable and established social order and authority, it has a massive downside.
This downside includes economic growth and prosperity accruing only to the economic
elite, whether individuals or corporations; enormous social, political, and economic
stratification, with an ever-widening gap between the minority of haves and majority
have-nots; scarcity amid plenty; an ideology of adversarialism and competition; the
destruction of the environment and depletion of natural resources; an emphasis on the
private market over community benefit and control; and the promotion of individualistic
psychological qualities of egocentrism, narcissism, insecurity, low self-esteem, and
dependency. In fact, these problems are so built into the modern era of civilization that
anthropologist Richard Heinberg has concluded that the characteristics are fundamental
aspects of each of the 21 recorded civilizations over the past 5,000 years. 9
There are many descriptions of and different names given to the alternative era of
ecology-justice-sustainability. Some of its features would include improved quality of life
for all instead of materialistic quantity and affluence for some; an end to the insecurity of
scarcity by guaranteeing everyone on earth that their physical needs – the basic
necessities of life – would be met; a low maximum limit on material affluence; an
emphasis on cooperation, caring, and sharing; development of non-material aspects of
human potential; economic principles, based on the limits of Planet Earth, that would
maintain ecological and resource preservation and a steady state economy; maximum
political and economic decentralization; participatory democracy; universal values, such
as identified by the United Nation’s Declaration of Human Rights; democratic global
structures of integration, coordination and, where necessary, enforcement; and, finally,
individual transformation from an egocentric to a universal caring psyche. 10 The most
important thing now is not so much a completed vision, but to engage people from
every country in the process of creating and achieving such a vision of the new era.
Create an analysis, vision, and action strategy for transformation
First, as part of the process of engaging people in creating a paradigm shift, activists need
to develop an analysis that shows that the problems we are addressing are caused by the
modern era itself and can only be ultimately solved by a new era that includes the next
developmental step for humanity. Second, we need to identify and describe a
preliminary vision of a new human era that can solve the problem. Finally, the
movement needs to conduct strategic actions that are part of the transformation
from the present to the envisioned next era. This could include a wide variety of
actions, including educating activists and the public regarding the need for a paradigm
shift and creating building blocks toward the new society in whatever ways are possible.
Use existing developmental theories of societal transformation
Fortunately, there are theories of societal transformation, such as those of Don Beck, Ken
Wilber, and Robert Kegan, that activists can use to help them develop analyses, visions,
strategies, and actions for personal and social change. 11 For example, Spiral Dynamics,
promoted by Don Beck and Chris Cowan, is a theoretical framework that describes eight
stages of human development that can be applied to individuals, societies, or the human
species as a whole. 12 This model can help activists create strategies for social
transformation and also help them analyze how the reactionary shadow side of
social activism itself now works against the transformation process.
Ken Wilber describes the positive role that social activism plays in the process of
social transformation, as well as its shadow side, including ways that distortions of
activism are inadvertently a barrier to achieving positive social change. 13 Robert Kegan
describes five levels of individual psychological and relationship development through
which people need to progress to function in a truly peaceful society.
Overcome activists’ resistance to social transformation
Many activists have long recognized the need to include strategies for social
transformation in their social movements, and some have already begun to use these and
other theoretical models. There are, however, a number of reasons why many activists are
bound to be resistant. First, they are too busy on the front lines and have no time for
anything else, or they are afraid that any new effort will take the focus from current
programs that are addressing immediate serious social issues.
Other activists will oppose transformation because it requires new personal qualities
and new organizational values. Individual activists will need to learn the skills of
cooperation and caring, and social movement organizations will need to value unity
and develop respect for the deeply held values, myths, and beliefs of all cultures,
including those of their opponents. While this will be difficult to accomplish out in
the world, it will also be difficult for some activists to make the necessary changes
within themselves.
In addition, Beck, Wilber, Kegan, and others point out that the process of social
transformation will require adding reconstruction to deconstruction analysis, unity to
diversity, and universal integralism to pluralistic relativism. Many deconstructionists,
however, have been so focused on criticism and what’s wrong that they have also
criticized all different progressive ideas and cannot support positive holistic visions for
the future. Many of those promoting diversity, differences, and separateness have
difficulty thinking in terms of commonalties, alliances, cooperation, unity among all
groups, and building bridges between the oppressed and the dominant groups. Finally,
“ideological” multiculturalists, who promote pluralistic relativism and difference among
groups as their end goal, have trouble with social transformation efforts that include
universal values and truths and global systems and structures because, as Ken Wilber
points out, they see all developmental theories as hierarchical, all universal truths as
elitist, and all hierarchical structures as oppressive. 14
5. Include personal and cultural transformation as a central strategy for creating a
peaceful world – starting with activists ourselves and our organizations
Social movements have primarily focused on changing social systems and institutions to
achieve their goals of a more peaceful, democratic, just, and sustainable world. However,
there are many reasons why these goals cannot be achieved without equal attention
to creating personal and cultural transformation – starting with activists ourselves.
Ken Wilber and others point out that human society is made up of three
interconnected and interdependent parts: individuals, culture, and social systems and
institutions, the “I”, “we,” and “it.” 15 They are different aspects of the same whole;
consequently, one can’t be transformed for long without the requisite changes in the other
two. Therefore, even if a society’s social systems and institutions were transformed
to the peaceful paradigm, the change would not last without a parallel
transformation of that society’s individuals and culture. Similarly, the good society is
unlikely to develop without individual change because, outside of dictatorships, social
system and institutional change usually follows personal and cultural change on the part
of at least some of the population. Finally, to achieve personal and cultural change in
society, social activists have to lead by example, demonstrating the desired alternative we
seek.
The transformation from the modern society of individuals striving to achieve
personal gain and prosperity in a competitive marketplace to a new cooperative,
ecological, just, and sustainable society involves a paradigm shift. This shift has been
described by social critic Riane Eisler as moving from a “dominator” to a
“partnership” model of human relationships. 16
At the individual level, this involves a developmental leap from an egocentric,
competitive, and self-serving personality. Many theorists have identified three general
stages of individual moral development. Ken Wilber labels them as pre-conventional,
conventional, and post-conventional. 17 Feminist psychologists Carol Gilligan identifies
four developmental stages: selfish, caring, universal caring, and integrative. 18
For a large number of individuals, making this transition would be quite a
psychological leap. As Paul Shepard suggests in Nature and Madness, the modern era of
civilization requires a “psychological juvenilization” and a “selfish immaturity.” 19 People
who are selfish, arrogant, prideful, overly logical, controlling, and fiercely competitive
are considered normal in modern culture because these personality traits are necessary
and appropriate in a dominator and consumer society.
If humanity is to survive the 21st century, however, it must switch to a new peaceful
era that requires a new human consciousness. To paraphrase Einstein, we cannot create a
new partnership society with the same mentality that created the present dominator
society. If we do not change ourselves, we cannot change the world.
The need for a spiritual perspective
Linda Stout, founder of Spirit in Action, reports that in her national survey, grassroots
activists across America said that spirituality was one of the most critical things missing
in activism. 20 Although this is not a term that has been much accepted in social
movement culture, it is understandable why it is so strongly missed. Spirit refers to the
strong inner urge for meaning in our lives, an urge that involves a deep, positive
connection with each other, the planet, and an evolving universe. Compassion,
kindness, love, equality, support, and caring, therefore, are qualities of spirit. They bring
us back in touch with our true nature. When we experience these qualities we tend to
feel more fulfilled, joyful, energized, and happy. These are also the qualities of the
peaceful model that we seek.
Social movements and their organizations, however, are often characterized by just
the opposite traits, such as competitiveness, self-righteousness, and arrogance. When we
act towards others in angry, selfish, controlling, greedy, competitive, and hostile ways,
we tend to feel separate, unfulfilled, and unhappy, and our bodies then react in ways that
are physically unhealthy. These are qualities that separate us from our true nature and are
characteristic of the dominator paradigm of our present society. 21
Social activism that is engaged in the work of transforming ourselves and our
society from the dominator to a peaceful partnership model of human relationships,
therefore, can be experienced as spiritual work. Spirit is found in the process itself, as
we are involved in the politics of meaning that connect us to our human nature.
Social movement activism would be more effective if it included this kind of
personal transformation. Movement activists and their organizations need to “walk
their talk” by modeling the new way of being in the peaceful era that is required to
ultimately resolve the problems that concern them. Remember Gandhi’s dictum, “the
means are the ends in the making.” In addition, more people would join social
movements organizations, and fewer would drop out, if the movement offered a
friendly, safe, trusting, fulfilling, fun, supportive, and loving environment.
Next Steps
To address the important issues of the 21st century, social activists not only need to
continue what we are doing, but must also overcome some of the traditional limitations of
activism, as well as adopt new approaches to address the larger issues facing humanity. In
order to be catalysts to convert our current planetary crises into opportunities for human
transformation, activists must change ourselves and our activism. Some might form
study-action groups to apply MAP to current social movements and begin new activities
that are part of the long-term process of the transition to a peaceful paradigm, both in our
personal lives and in our social movement activities and organizations.
There is reason to believe that we can make this transformation and assist the global
society in making a paradigmatic leap. Social transformation theories tell us that the
universe is in a constant state of change and that even big transformations happen
much more quickly and more often than we think. And sociologist Paul Ray and
Sherry Ruth Anderson have found that 50 million Americans, who he calls “cultural
creatives,” are already in favor of the social transformation described above. 22
My hope is that this book enables the MAP models and methods to reach a broad
audience of social activists, concerned citizens, students, and teachers, and increases their
understanding and effectiveness in bringing about social change. I believe that facing up
to the impending resource wars and environmental crash, although initially a depressing
thought, could motivate tens of millions of people to support the need for a fundamental
shift to a peaceful era. Finally, I hope that my reflections in this chapter will
encourage social activists to place the transformation from the modern dominator
era of growth and consumerism to a new peaceful era of ecology, justice, and
sustainability at the center of their own efforts.
Moyer’s Conclusion from the book “Doing Democracy, The MAP Model for Organizing
Social Movements,” 2001, ISBN 978-0865714182, is copyright material that is reprinted
here with the permission of New Society Publishers.
For the Conclusion’s footnotes, please refer to the actual book. Inexpensive used copies
are readily available online, and some libraries also have a copy.
https://newsociety.com/books/d/doing-democracy
==============================================================
Commentary on Doing Democracy in the 21st Century
Social movements to reform and transcend racism, war, sexism, nuclear weapons, nuclear
power, and homophobia are familiar, but classism unfortunately continues to fly
somewhat more under the political radar. It’s a societal secret that the power-holders have
used the racism myth to divide and conquer the working class. Rich elites continue to use
racism to distract attention from class exploitation and seduce the white working class
into identifying with the white power-holders rather than with the rest of the working
class, let alone with the poor. Perhaps the modern Poor People’s Campaign can reverse
that.
A century ago, eugenics ideas were shaped by a simplistic application of Darwin’s ideas
about natural selection and evolution. Now, recent discoveries about epigenetics and
increased understanding of the effects of trauma such as Adverse Childhood Experiences
supersede those ideas. But can rich people stop exploiting the poor and then blaming their
victims?
Many more people now, even rich and comfortable people, have begun to realize that the
persistent paradigm of “maximum material growth and prosperity” is actually
impoverishing us. But fans of the current capitalist paradigm of fossil fuel addiction, of
putting financial growth and profits first, and of hyper-individualism, have yet to notice
that it’s leading to disaster and that a radical shift is needed. Thus, while some of us feel
prosperous, and most people define prosperity as having plenty of stuff and money, it’s a
prosperity based largely on brittle fossil fuel technologies that continue inevitably to
corrode. But while progressives have many ideas about changes, too often these ideas are
technologically and ecologically unrealistic.
Fossil fuels are extremely and gratifyingly cheap and powerful, hence our addiction, and
our subsequent industrial overgrowth that’s akin to the algae blooms which arise from the
runoff of fossil-fuel fertilizers from farms and lawns. My other papers on researchgate
explore some of the basics and practical considerations that pertain to our current
unsustainable energy systems, and to what could and should be. Other explorers and
analysts include the hundreds if not thousands of other contemporary scientists and
activists such as Charles Eisenstein, and those at Occidental Arts & Ecology Center, the
Post Carbon Institute, Permaculture Artisans, and the Global Ecovillage Network.
Since Moyer wrote his Conclusion, not long after the 30th Earth Day, more social
movement activists have come to understand that it’s an impossible and false expectation
to extend to everyone on the planet the kind of material and technological possessions
that are piled up by many residents of the overdeveloped countries (aka the First World).
And the best way to persuade the never-to-be-developed countries (aka the Third World)
to step off the illusory path to overdevelopment would be for the USA and Europe to step
up to the plate, de-develop themselves, and embody the steady-state ecology of a good-
faith society that’s healthy. In fact, Moyer foresaw this then-real possibility in his 1978
paper, “De-Developing the United States through Nonviolence.” Sadly, it didn’t turn out
that way.
Moyer also noticed and explained the Third-Worldization set-up, which is the societal
secret hidden by the societal myth of the desirability and inevitability of capitalist
development of the post-colonial countries. The secret is that these countries can never
achieve First-World development and lifestyles. In order to achieve and maintain their
own overdeveloped material development and lifestyles, the US and Europe have already
used, and continue to need and extract, industrial resources from the never-to-be
developed countries. But there are no additional countries on the planet, no Fourth or
Fifth World, no additional planets, where the requisite minerals and other commodities
exist for Third World overdevelopment. These actual physical constraints are The Limits
to Growth first described by Donella Meadows et al in 1972.
Since World War II, economic colonialism has been substituted for military governance
colonialism. Although after 1945 most Third-World nations gained their political
independence from the various European colonizers, they were left with the very bad
habits developed during autocratic colonial administrations. The dangerous domineering
habits of colonizers also persist in our obscene military spending on fossil-fuel-intensive
weaponry.
Of course, if the people in the never-to-be-developed countries just grew food for their
own subsistence instead of cash crops for export, then they would not be available to
work the mines and process the minerals and other resources ‘needed’ by the fossil-fuel-
industrialized First World. But real grassroots independence in the Third World can’t
happen while multinational corporations and autocrats insist that their paper property
rights are more equal than indigenous and peasant prehistorical property rights. Similarly,
US legal eminent domain precedents have been showing some mission creep into
benefiting private for-profit companies rather than only truly public purposes.
Moyer also described his experiences in the early 1990s in the former USSR. Those
liberated populations expected a Marshall Plan like Europe had received after World War
II. But instead they got predatory capitalism which had no intention—and perhaps not
even the capability—of building the public institutions which would be necessary for
durable democracy in Russia. Meanwhile, doubt grows about the durability of ours.
The American dream, according to Frank Luntz, is for people’s children to have a better
life than their parents. This is the societal myth. But the societal secret is that profit-
maximizing capitalism is a bait-and-switch, substituting material excess for balanced
quality of life and real wellth,* and turning the American dream into a nightmare for
many. Poverty here can be seen as internal colonization, now that there’s no more frontier
and all financial profit has been defined as good for the economy.
Nonetheless, the movements for a Green New Deal, restorative agriculture, fossil fuel
disinvestment, degrowth, and de-development have gathered strength since the turn of the
millennium, and continue to spread at the grassroots.
Individuals and Social Movement Activism
Moyer also describes the ways in which both individuals, and a society as a whole, must
evolve so as to embody the new planet-friendly paradigm we need to replace the outdated
paradigm of “maximum material growth and prosperity.” Individual activists will be
more effective to the extent that they grow beyond the ‘Dominator Culture,’ which is the
.
* The Oxford English Dictionary’s history of the word “wealth” indicates that
etymologically it’s equally valid to spell it “wellth.” In other words, if something labeled
‘wealth’ is not improving anyone’s welfare, it’s not actually wealth. And if it could be
used in a way that could offer anyone better welfare, it’s not as much wealth as it may
seem.
hierarchical, patriarchal, authoritarian, hyper-competitive, and centralized-control
paradigm that we have all (including those in oppressed groups) absorbed to some degree
just by growing up in one. Repression of our natural human personalities tends to leave
us emotionally defensive and isolated, sitting ducks for manipulation into addictive
consumerism and knee-jerk politics. And then we keep giving monopolistic multinational
corporations their power by buying their stuff.
Being oppressed or abused does tend to make one feel angry and self-righteous, and it’s
all too easy to fall into the role of ‘negative rebel’ behavior which sabotages positive
goals. In fact, right-wing activists seem to be at least as negative as what I’m aware of on
the left, as well as generally more violent. Often at rallies one hears activists shouting
angrily about injustice. Sadly, this tends to alienate the undecided, when giving voice to
the pain and sorrow that caused the anger is what’s needed to arouse sympathy, support,
and meaningful change.
Thus, Moyer partnered with the Australian activist Carol Perry in developing the
Creating Peaceful Relationships in a Dominator Culture (CPR) workshop. The Karpman
drama triangle was a key concept, and in the intervening years it has been improved by
David Emerald’s addition of the positive roles of the Empowerment Dynamic which
mirror and transcend the negative roles of Karpman’s model. Emerald’s book is an
excellent and accessible explanation for those who are unfamiliar with either model.
Empowerment was recurrent theme for Moyer.
The CPR workshop also included a concept of verbal, emotional aikido that’s effective
when one encounters dominator behavior. Emotional attacks, hostile arguments, and ad
feminem insults can be addressed in a way analogous to the physical aikido art of balance
and self-defense. One simply and adroitly sidesteps the hostile energy, and moves around
it to see the world with the opponent’s point of view, and to begin to understand their
emotional perspectives and real needs. Remaining grounded and calm, rather than
becoming defensive or reactive, one can then empathize with their needs and feelings
(while still firmly connected to one’s own needs and feelings), and have a conversation
about finding a win-win solution. And friendly questions and humor can work wonders in
such situations. Moyer once told me, “I don’t argue.”
Practices such as Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication (NVC) as well as
Perry’s and Moyer’s CPR workshop, offer recipes for such peaceful and respectful
conversations about conflicts. The NVC recipe has 4 steps for participants: 1. Observe
and note actual problematic words and actions; 2. identify and name one’s Feelings about
the words and actions; 3. state one’s Needs which when not met lead to unhappy feelings;
and 4. Request specific actions of the other party to meet one’s needs. There are many
websites and online videos about NVC and similar practices.
Moyer also described another exercise that he developed for himself in the early 1990s,
when he decided to address his male privilege conditioning. He would find 10 things to
be wrong about every day, and say so aloud, “I was wrong!” After he died, I decided to
try it, and it is amazingly effective and liberating. It is quite energizing to simply and
easily let go of a mistaken idea, and it also minimizes the amount of time you spend
being wrong and resistant. And it doesn’t even have to be something major; just saying ‘I
said I knew where we were going, but it turned out I was wrong’ will work. As they say,
‘practice makes permanent.’
Of course, self-empowerment feels least likely when one feels hopeless or angry with no
end in sight. Some boots have no straps. Yet, rumor has it that the meek will inherit.
How? Nonviolent insistence is my guess. (The drawback with nonviolent resistance is
that ‘what you resist, persists.’) The power-holders who have the obvious political,
economic, and policing power are nonetheless vulnerable to the strategic noncooperation
of those they have these powers over. Humor is one of the most effective strategies of
nonviolent grassroots insistence, which Otpor used very skillfully in Serbia. Another is
the kind of organizing practiced by Linda Stout and Spirit in Action.
Societies and Social Movement Activism
Since humanity is a eusocial species, interacting both as individuals and as groups,
effective social movements will address both levels. And ‘macro-analysis,’ developing a
broad and deep understanding of the systemic and institutional roots of exploitation and
oppression, is an approach that Moyer absorbed while working with Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr., and brought forward to share with activists in subsequent social movements. A
larger, societal perspective helps activists tailor their projects to be optimally effective,
and avoid wasting time and energy.
Moyer refers in his Conclusion to the work of Robert Kegan, who in the interim has co-
authored a book called “An Everyone Culture.” It describes an excellent model of a
nonviolent organization, where participants are comfortably accountable among
themselves as well as to their clients. Because they have built trust and liberated
themselves from the need to avoid and deflect attacks, save face, and tiptoe around the
fear of upsetting others, staff in such organizations have that much more time and energy
for achieving the true goal of the organization, whether a workplace or an advocacy
group. U.S. law enforcement agencies would benefit dramatically from building this kind
of culture.
Being a team player is not one of my strong points, so I found Moyer’s descriptions of his
experiences playing sports offered me some great understanding about teams. In his
youth, he was the quarterback in an amateur city football league that won a regional
competition. I felt that this experience played a role in his skill for organizing people in
groups for action. He had also played baseball and basketball, and really enjoyed
watching games, especially ones with lots of interesting plays. He rather hated the idea
that ‘Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing,” and he really appreciated my take:
‘If winning is everything, then losing is nothing.’
Both individuals and organizations can be usefully analyzed with paradigms such as
Maslow’s hierarchy. A whole and healthy adult has developed in a balanced way on all
the levels in Maslow’s concept, a concept which can be mapped on to the chakras, the
kabbalah, and doubtless other such spiritual paradigms. Similarly, a healthy stable society
contains and honors all areas of human life – body, heart, mind and spirit – in its
members, families, customs and beliefs. And that sort of community honors many kinds
of people, personalities, aptitudes, and attitudes. I’ve found myself to be most effective
when playing to my strong points, while also trying to improve my weak points when
demands are light. Trying to imitate other people’s approaches and methods can lead to
stumbles.
I believe that only this healthy kind of culture can become an ecologically embedded
society, dispatch our fossil fuel addiction, and arrest climate chaos. But how might such a
society be structured, organized, and come to life? I believe that local control and
peaceful ways of resolving conflicts are essential, especially with respect to basic
survival needs and the local ecologies that we depend on. Local control, under the label
of ‘states’ rights,’ is an idea that has been hypocritically exploited by the former
Confederate states and by modern fellow-travelers, and discarded when it doesn’t suit
their political purposes. (As is the case with abortion, which is about women’s control of
their own local bodies.)
Nonetheless, it’s worth noting that the violence which enslaved millions of unfortunate
Africans was the same violence used to conquer the slave-owners in war, and that same
violence – physical, political and economic – continues to sabotage the North’s military
victory.
Moyer, like most U.S. liberals until recently, was skeptical about the benefits of local
control, due to the progressive decisions about civil rights and reproductive rights handed
down by the U.S. Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren, a tilt towards freedom
and equality which faded slowly for some years after Warren’s departure.
While local and centralized control can be more or less humane at various times,
goodwill and generosity are needed at all levels. But without true self-control and local
control at every level of society, the skills of self-governance, responsibility, and
accountability either fade or are never developed. Few of us will be able to participate as
elected officials, so only meaningful participation at the grassroots, and harmonious
interactions among cities, counties, states, and the UN can keep democracy strong. The
research of the late Professor Elinor Ostrom and her colleagues offers additional
perspective on the balance between local decisions and central authorities.
Moyer also refers to the ideas of Ken Wilber and Don Beck, about how societal and
cultural traits and levels of development are similar, in a fractal sort of way, to the
behavior and development – the personal growth – of an individual. Based on my
recollection of Moyer’s description of their theories, their estimate of the level of
societies in our industrialized, overdeveloped system focuses on three levels – the
Individual/Mechanistic (which has been largely achieved); the Progressive (about
community and social systems, which Euro-American culture is somewhere in the middle
of); and the Eco-System level which we are entering. Social movement theorists may
benefit from digging deeper to explore their ideas, beyond my aging secondhand memory
thereof.
Thus, some people are still living in the individualistic/mechanistic mode, as their
personal philosophy and as a lifestyle that is still available though fading. Many people,
perhaps most, are operating on the progressive level, typically concerned with social and
economic equality, and the empowerment of oppressed groups. And growing numbers
are joining those few who have transitioned into a philosophy of deep ecology,
envisioning a healthy future while also integrating the realizations and achievements of
prior phases into the one we are entering.
It’s easy for progressive, ecologically focused people to see those who are still living in a
zero-sum, mechanistic mindset as stagnant, conventional, insecure, even deplorable.
However, as a society progresses through a particular phase, the early parts of the phase
are the positive times of discovery and excitement. But during the later parts, as earlier
ideas mature, ripen and then grow stale and overextended, and a new transition
approaches, that older mode of society tends to slip into increasing negativity and
depression.
This is somewhat like a phenomenon described in child psychology. When a child is
secure in their belief in Santa, you can tell them Santa doesn’t exist and they simply don’t
notice, as if those words were mute. But when a child is almost but not quite ready to
accept that Santa is a myth, they will object and resist mightily that idea. And then, when
they are ready to take the step of understanding that truth, then they hear and accept the
information with complete composure, as if ‘everybody knows that!’
Similarly, as the progressive, social equality phase matures and ages, it comes to include
some impedances and negativity, as when activism goes too far. Sages have suggested
that anything taken to an extreme becomes its opposite. And while the recent sequences
of the social equality phase included events like the New Deal and the liberation
movements of the 1960s and 1970s, much of this progress was made possible by the toxic
bounty of fossil fuel energy.
Individuals and Societies in 21st Century Social Movements
But now we confront the consequences of our one-time harvest of fossil fuels at the same
time as a peak of inequality that may be a symptom of the last grasp of the mechanical-
capitalist complex. Particularly in the U.S. we face the need for radical change in our
energy habits at the same time as polarization and segregation by wealth, culture,
religion, and urban-rural demographics have radically increased not just political tensions
but also grinding political immobility. Within this polarization, some progressive as well
as ‘conservative’ activists behave aggressively and self-righteously, acting out the
negative rebel role, such as the ‘cancel culture.’ Similarly, the phenomenon of ‘micro-
aggressions’ seems to easily slide into counter-productive reactivity and guilt-tripping.
And of course on the right there are various ideological loyalty oaths about no new taxes
and so forth.
I believe this is the kind of hazard Moyer foresaw when he says in his Conclusion:
“The ideologies of deconstruction and cultural relativism, which have underpinned the
sensitivity to individualism and diversity, were often raised to the level of ‘political
correctness,’ resulting in movements violating their own values and principles.”
and
Wilber’s and Beck’s “model [of the stages of human development] can help activists
create strategies for social transformation and also help them analyze how the reactionary
shadow side of social activism itself now works against the transformation process.”
Moyer emphasizes the importance of both personal emotional maturation and societal
transition away from the Dominator Culture, and towards respect and affection for our
fellow citizens as well as for our kin, all the flora and fauna. Failures of either individuals
or a culture to move beyond fear and defensiveness will delay and sabotage crucial
reforms and revolutions in paradigms and infrastructure. The question of how an
individual can create effective change on a societal level is of course of the essence.
Moyer was optimistic about Cultural Creatives, identified by Paul Ray and Sherry
Anderson, that portion of the population who are thinking outside the box of the standard
stale left-right paradigm. Thirty years ago, I got involved in the Green movement, before
it was a political party. Like the Cultural Creatives, their goal was reconciling and
integrating social and ecological sustainability, and I knew that was (and is) at the top of
my agenda as well as at the top of our real cultural and societal agenda. This crucial
priority has only become more obvious in the intervening years. Moyer’s ideas and
suggestions have played a key role in my own analysis of the pickle we are in. Two key
reasons suffice for me in explaining the global problem: 1) The Dominator Culture and 2)
Cheap fossil fuels.
However, readers may be wondering – what about the never-to-be-developed countries?
Or those like China, India, Egypt, or Brazil which are somewhere on the path to
‘development,’ a prescription unknown before World War II. And what about indigenous
peoples? What level/s are they on, and how can societies transition – metamorphose –
from wherever they may be to realize that integration of social and ecological
sustainability? What will that integration look like? Much remains to be done.
The Means Are the Ends in the Making
As Einstein said, ‘You can’t solve a problem using the mindset that created it.’ In our
situation of global ecological devastation, I firmly believe that indigenous philosophies
and technologies have much to teach us about the essential ecological mindset. At the
same time, there are many inspired ideas and elegant inventions that represent the best of
the mechanistic and progressive modes. In a sense, indigenous peasant culture can be
seen as the ‘thesis,’ and mechanical material culture as the ‘antithesis.’ Now we stand on
the threshold of a badly needed ‘synthesis,’ which ought to be an integration of social and
ecological sustainability.
In order to kick our fossil fuel addiction, I believe we must focus precisely and exactly on
our physical needs, because fossil fuels provide physical power. Readers who wish to dig
into that analysis are invited to read my other two papers on researchgate, as well as some
of the other resources listed below.
And in order to replace our current unhappy and unhealthy dominator culture with one of
respect and friendship, we must revive and repair all our existing relationships and
networks in peaceful ways, as well as choosing peaceful new relationships. Of course,
conflicts will still arise in a peaceful culture, but competition can be contained within
cooperation. Moyer echoes Linda Stout’s belief that “spirituality was one of the most
critical things missing in activism.” He often spoke of being mindful of one’s higher self.
And the principle of treating others as we would wish them to treat us is found in every
religion. We can live in a friendly universe.
I hope readers find this material useful to that end.
Muriel Strand
http://bio-paradigm.blogspot.com/
Appendix
Aunty M’s Rules of Politics
1. It’s easier to get forgiveness than permission
2. It’s not what you do that really matters, but how.
3. Don't get mad, get funny.
4. You can get a lot done if you don’t care who gets the credit.
5. Taking things personally is almost always a waste of time.
6. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
7. Votes that are very close to 50-50 often lead to bad outcomes.
8. The only just war is a defensive war.
9. If you are talking, that means you can’t be listening or thinking.
(However, sometimes talking helps to process confusing or paradoxical information.)
10. The pain of losing something is about twice as large as the pleasure of getting it.
11. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
12. The road to hell is paved with good (sentimental and wishful) intentions.
13. The perfect is the enemy of the good.
14. The love of money is the root of only evil.
15. The means are the ends in the making.
16. Don’t agonize, analyze. Then organize.
References and Resources
William Moyer
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Moyer
Resource Manual for a Living Revolution 1977
Virginia Coover, Ellen Deacon, Charles Esser, and Christopher Moore
This handbook is stuffed with techniques for working with groups small and large.
https://www.thechangeagency.org/campaigners-toolkit/activist-education/books/resource-
manual-for-a-living-revolution/
https://newbooksinpolitics.com/political/resource-manual-for-a-living-revolution/
The MAP Model
https://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/moyermap.html
https://activisttools.org/campaigns/movementactionplan/
The Four Roles: Citizen, Rebel, Social Change Agent, and Reformer
https://tavaana.org/sites/default/files/Bill%20Moyer%204%20Roles%20of%20Activists
%20Hand-out.pdf
“De-Developing the United States through Nonviolence.”
http://dedevelopingthroughnonviolence.blogspot.com/
The Dominator Culture
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominator_culture
Carol Perry
http://www.insightmeditationaustralia.org/carol_perry.html
The Empowerment Dynamic Diagram
http://www.cbodn.org/Resources/Documents/2013%20Conference/Power%20of%20TE
D%20Summary%20Two%20Sided%202013_Tso.pdf
Nonviolent Communication
https://www.nonviolentcommunication.com/learn-nonviolent-communication/4-part-nvc/
The Limits to Growth
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Limits_to_Growth
https://clubofrome.org/publication/the-limits-to-growth/
An Everyone Culture: Becoming a Deliberately Developmental Organization 2016
by Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey
https://store.hbr.org/product/an-everyone-culture-becoming-a-deliberately-
developmental-organization/14259
Elinor Ostrom and the 8 Rules for Sustainable Management of Common-Pool Resources
http://commontrust.blogspot.com/
Maslow’s Holistic Hierarchy of Needs
We usually address our needs in a balanced way, with attention to metaphysical needs
while still working on physical needs.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs
Integral Life Practice: A 21st-Century Blueprint for Physical Health, Emotional Balance,
Mental Clarity, and Spiritual Awakening (2008)
by Ken Wilber, Terry Patten, Adam Leonard and Marco Morelli
http://www.integral-life-practice.com/
Spiral Dynamics in Action: Humanity's Master Code (2018)
Don Edward Beck, Teddy Hebo Larsen, Sergey Solonin, Rica Viljoen, and Thomas Q.
Johns
https://www.wiley.com/en-
us/Spiral+Dynamics+in+Action%3A+Humanity%27s+Master+Code-p-9781119387206
The Cultural Creatives: How 50 Million People Are Changing the World (2001)
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/139500/the-cultural-creatives-by-paul-h-
ray-phd-and-sherry-ruth-anderson-phd/
http://culturalcreatives.org/
Spirit in Action & Linda Stout
https://spiritinaction.net/
Bill Moyer’s September 2002 Talk for Activists
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17iITob04t4
Climate – A New Story by Charles Eisenstein (2018)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8IO6Y5baPO0&t=1s
https://charleseisenstein.org/
Sustainable Investment Means Energy Independence From Fossil Fuels
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/256048802_Sustainable_Investment_Means_E
nergy_Independence_From_Fossil_Fuels
Is it true that 'Small Is Beautiful'?
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/333581837_Is_it_true_that_'Small_Is_Beautiful'
Wealth and Wellth
https://westernfriend.org/media/wealth-and-wellth
The Occidental Arts & Ecology Center
https://oaec.org/
Permaculture Artisans
http://www.permacultureartisans.com/
The Post Carbon Institute
https://www.postcarbon.org
The Global Ecovillage Network
https://ecovillage.org/
Primitive Skills Movement Activists:
Jon Young: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9wYwutpIWE&t=3s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWHw3aQQsdk
Bruce Pascoe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qB1-oilD3IU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cfhFwGDIqk&t=182s
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Emu_(book)
Tom Brown, Jr.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Brown_Jr.
GOP pollster Frank Luntz gives the Democratic Party some good advice
https://www.c-span.org/video/?468103-7/frank-luntz-2020-election