Institutional Jujitsu
Don’t fight forces, use them

The Intersectoral Dialogue, organized and sponsored by the International Facilitating Committee, brought together approximately 70 key representatives of the various sectors of civil society to discuss issues of development and environment. The Dialogue was an attempt to discover the fundamental differences and bases for future discussions, rather than to embark on an exercise in finding arrangements.

The Intersectoral Dialogue was unique in more ways than one: it was not merely an exercise in restating or negotiating the sectoral positions; it was specifically designed to generate a deeper understanding of the many differing perspectives that exist among constituencies concerned with sustainable development. New and innovative techniques like Buckminster Fuller’s concept of "tensegrity", Stafford Beer’s extension of the concept as "syntegrity" and Da Zi bao, a unique electronic message system were experimented with, to facilitate discussions and capture the significant insights, concepts and contents that emerged from the discussions. Visual notes of all that transpired in the conference were pasted along the walls by one of the facilitators, to form a visible and visual history of the entire process.

Da Zi Bao, traditionally a Chinese wall newspaper, adapted to the needs and technical resources of the meeting, enabled brief messages to be entered into a database and quickly compiled into a small newsletter. The idea was that these unspoken insights would contribute effectively to the dialogue. Da Zi Bao also provided a forum for including the insights of those who could not be present at the meeting and had therefore sent in their views, conceptual insights, or positions/statements in advance.

Buckminster Fuller’s concept of ‘tensegrity" , the notion that balance in physical systems is found between the forces of compression and tension (or "agreement" and "disagreement"), formed much of the preliminary design-thinking for the meeting.

The external images of Buckminster Fuller’s inner conceptual architecture were prominent in the room. The seating of the participants was arranged in a modified hexagon; a large model of an icosadodecahedron hung in the middle of the meeting room as the focal point. A model globe moved progressively during the two days of the meeting from being external to the structure, to being an integral part of the structure. These models symbolically represented the conceptual architecture needed for the dialogue on the problems of the earth. Smaller flexible models of the geometric structures were also present and available for "playing" with, as participants felt like physically exploring the interesting nature of forms that are inherently flexible because of the balance of forces within them.

Stafford Beer’ s extension of the concept as "syntegrity" was applied in a group process and posed a major challenge to the facilitating team. When " a group is consciously struggling to express its integrity, its wholeness, it looks for the compression of its shared idea into a cohesive statement. It is also aware of tension, what else but tension generates discussion, never mind arguments?" (Staffored Beer: The story of an Organisational Idea, unpublished chapter, 1992).

Occasionally, a "pulse check" was taken of the opinion or mood of the participants about the process or about a particular direction that the dialogue might take.

There was always a fine link between too much emphasis on process and not enough on the substance of the dialogue. This tension also existed continuously among those participants, who became mindful of the need to hear and see form the others’ perspectives and not just to asset what they had already decided needed to be done. The readiness, ability and willingness to open a space for listening to differences, not speaking in order that your perspective would be heard, is what differentiated the meeting from numerous other s that have taken place to address the problems of the environment.

Conflicts emerged, alternative direction for the dialogue were suggested, clear insights and conceptual door openers wee offered, taken up and also ignored. The emotions that these generated were acknowledged, and instances of deep and possibly irreconcilable differences were experienced. The facilitators attempted to navigate the meeting through these unfolding experiences without being too directive or reactive, remaining open to the outcome.

The need for small group sessions emerged at the end of the first day. Three groups were formed that met at the end of the first way and early in the morning of the second day. The need to make some kind of statement about the experience emerged eight urgency towards the middle of the second day. This was facilitated through the use of "stickies" on which participants recorded their vision of what would be needed to continue the dialogue, what were their greatest hopes and their worst fears. These ‘stickies" were then grouped into a structure, to present a cohesive and comprehensive picture of the Dialogue.

During the two-day sessions, there was a significant evolution of thinking among participants, demonstrating a growing realisation that larger goals of sustainable development can only be achieved by introducing a wider ranger and longer term thinking within each sector. It was clear that conventional concepts of consensus and majority-based decision making were inadequate for the task of redesigning the future.

Interest in continuing the dialogue was manifest by the fact that a sizeable number of the participants, organized follow-up meetings throughout the remaining 12 days of the global Forum. this continuing dialogue led to a clearer identification of additional research needed for improved mechanisms to bring different sectors together and to design new institutional frameworks that could make this happen. the International Facilitating Committee was asked by many of the participants to devise follow-up action in the form of meetings, research programmes and models for exploring the potential of the techniques discussed during the meeting.

by Tony Judge and Jose Sotto

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