On the nature of change

http://theecologist.org/2018/dec/03/nature-change
Date Written:  2018-12-03
Publisher:  Ecologist
Year Published:  2018
Resource Type:  Article
Cx Number:  CX23160

The first in a series of articles exploring how dialectical systems thinking can direct change making. The 'On the Nature of Change' series will have three clear sections: 'The Philosophers' will examine a philosophical theory of change, and how this has developed and evolved over time. The second, 'Interpreting the World', and will apply this theory to three fundamental areas: the self, the team, society. Lastyly, 'Changing the World', will present clear ways in which this theory of change can be practically applied.

Abstract: 
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Excerpt:

I am also of the Watership Down generation. The film is about a rabbit who alone recognises the need for a radical change, and must persuade those around them to take enormous risks to meet that challenge. As a child I wanted to see a different world in which human beings behaved entirely differently towards animals and the environment.

Today I find myself editing The Ecologist. This platform has called for urgent changes to prevent environmental armageddon for decades. From its earliest days it referred to systems thinking as a theory of change that could help diagnose the problems caused by industrial capitalism and its impact on the natural environment.

The Ecologist itself has gone through many changes, including going online. It is now owned by The Resurgence Trust, which promotes the values of empathy, oneness with nature, and wellbeing, and has the core aim of "changing people's worldviews so they live in harmony with each other, and with nature". I am very fortunate to be in the change-making business.

The five decades since The Ecologist was launched have witnessed extreme change - but very few of the kind I have hoped and campaigned for. McDonald’s still trades. The Amazon rainforest remains under grave threat. And now climate breakdown is upon us and fascism is the spectre haunting Europe.