Bringing "Collective Objectivity" to Society's Decision-Making

As suggested by George Por in his entry about intersubjectivity and collective objectivity,
approaches such as Andrew Cohen's remarkable enlightened communication constitute leading-edge work in group-level "collective objectivity".

However, our global predicament and democratic sensibilities call us to translate this capacity for collective objectivity into our political/governmental institutions in ways that actually enable us to collectively address our growing collective problems well. For this task we need to know more than powerful in-group processes that deepen the consciousness of participants. We need further explorations to clarify ways to do at least the following (and probably more) in ways that can enhance a group's collective objectivity and channel it into service of the whole society:

From intersubjectivity to collective objectivity: a socioeconomic imperative

There’s nothing like the joy, freedom, and deep intimacy of intersubjective space, in which ego-driven programs are effortlessly replaced by the curiosity of who we really are when we are free from the illusions of a separate self. A passionate yet playful curiosity of what our connection is about floats in the room when the tyranny of the ego’s desires and fears that drive our acts, is gone or, at least, suspended for the time of being together with other aficionados of Truth, Beauty, and Good.

Traditionally, the experience of reaching a heightened state of awareness and interacting from within it with others in the same state was the privilege of participants in shamanic dances, Tantric sex ceremonies, other mystic traditions, and the modern-day group experiments with “psychoactive vitamins,” and rave parties. They’ve certainly reached a level of intersubjectivity not accessible in ego-driven states but they all shared a pre-rational logic that made those occurrences of collective consciousness unfit for dealing with challenges that required cognitive skills in managing complexity.

Intersubjectivity in the trans-rational is a whole different ball game! What prompted this blog entry was my experience of it in a circle of “enlightened communications,” last Friday:

Evolutionary leadership, ubuntu, and the homecoming of CI

In my previous entry, I mentioned that I'm working on the design, with Peter Merry, of an EVOLUTIONARY LEADERSHIP Learning Expedition that we'll launch in September. We say, evolutionary leadership is about the practice of looking at and thinking from the biggest context with the greatest clarity, AND acting to meet the needs of all parts for the good of the whole.

Meeting those needs requires competence in freeing and mobilizing the collective intelligence of the whole. We need to learn enabling and empowering the self-organization of all communities of practice and communities of co-creation involved with the situation. It’s a core competence of evolutionary leaders, that we want to help developing in the Learning Expedition.

Talking about "freeing and mobilizing the collective intelligence", I'd to share with you what a colleague wrote to me in our pre-Basecamp email exchanges:

Intersubjectivity in an organic pub

I wrote about intersubjectivity as a direct experience of CI, in a couple of entries of this blog but until recently I didn't put myself in a situation of responsibility for facilitating it. That opportunity was given to me when following our conversation about How local meetings with global experts can boost CI, Chris Macrae invited me to talk to a small group in London, last week. We were all guests of the Duke of Cambridge who was very generous to us. No, not the member of the royal family but a trendy organic pub sporting his name, with good food and a lovely, little patio where we enjoyed the sun and an intriguing conversation. The invitation was to speak about my life's work. Given that it's CI, I thought it would be more interesting to not speak about but trigger an experience of it.

The untapped potential of the Internet Archive for CI

Hi Euan, R U planning to attend NotCon 04? One of the speakers will be Brewster Kahle of the Internet Archive. He is a guy with an amazing, literally "far out" vision of universal access, and the Wayback Machine supporting it, whom you really should meet.

Of course, I would never tell you what you "should" :-) but in this case, I do it for the good of the whole, which would greatly benefit from the two of you connecting with one another and exploring your vision and aspirations, if you have not yet done so. To nudge that chance, I'll email this URL to Brewster with whom I had some beer yesterday on a sunny terrace, in Amsterdam, and exchanged ideas about how to dream into being some unprecedented capabilities of collective intelligence.

I would love to go to NotCon 04 but have prior commitment to attend. I plan to follow it remotely, so if you go, don't forget to blog it. Here's the freshest pic of Brewster, from the terrace:

Why I gave the "The untapped potential of the Internet Archive for CI" title to this entry? Not enough time to tell it right now, but if you meet Brewster or follow in this blog my explorations with him and his friends, I'm sure you will find out.

Knowledge Mapping

When I read a speech by Robert Horn, his work became the seed crystal for making sense of a lot of other cognitive mapping technologies, and I got a strong "hit" about their importance and potential. I think this is a key area to add to our understanding of tools for high-quality deliberation and collective intelligence.

Knowledge mapping is a general term that covers
* mapping public issues ("social messes," "wicked problems")(e.g., Robert Horn [see note below])
* mind maps (e.g., Inspiration software)
* pattern languages (e.g., Christopher Alexander)
* dialogue mapping (e.g., CogNexus Institute)
* graphic facilitation (e.g., David Sibbet)
* geographical information mapping (GIS - Geographical Information Systems)
and may include more traditional visuals such as
* quantitative charts and graphs
* process and procedure flow charts
* timelines
* and all other forms of visual presentation of information, especially of relationships (e.g., Edward Tufte)

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FOCUS ON PUBLIC ISSUE MAPPING

Knowledge mapping offers a tremendous resource to enhance the collective intelligence of deliberations about issues or problems. We can lay out what we collectively know, visually clarifying relationships among the relevant factors, actors, sectors, etc., involved with the problem.