Lost Valley Intentional Community, Eugene, Oregon

10 August 2011

A video has been posted on YouTube that talks about using sociocracy at Lost Valley Intentional Community. This is a nice video for residential communities — cohousing, cooperatives, condominium, and intentional — because it talks about the values and benefits of creating a sociocracy without the corporate/business vocabulary and concerns. It is also set on [...]

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DecisonLab, Sussex, England, UK

8 August 2011

A consulting practice that offers facilitation, training, coaching, and consultancy services to organizations and leaders who share common visions of bettering the world. Since January 2010, DecisionLab has been governed and operated along sociocratic and cooperative principles. In March 2010, DecisionLab incorporated as Sociocratic, Ecological and Economic Development (SEED) Ltd, which is a registered member of Co-operatives UK. Their [...]

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Aptivate, Cambridge, England, UK

8 August 2011

An NGO and not-for-profit organisation that provides IT services for international development. Works on both grant funded projects and direct partnerships with NGOs. Mission Aptivate believes in the power of knowledge and communication to alleviate poverty, suffering and conflict, and in the right of every individual to inform and be informed. We are dedicated to [...]

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From Users and Choosers to Makers and Shapers

31 July 2011

Having a right to participate means being recognized by the state as having an entitlement to be informed and involved. Making that right calls for amplifying and channeling citizen voices on the one hand and strengthening the state accountability on the other. Reinventing peoples´ role in this way—”from users and choosers to makers and shapers”— [...]

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Grassroots Governance & Accountability

31 July 2011

An article appeared today in Repùblica, a newspaper in Nepal, on the need for participatory, transparent, accountable, and inclusive governance. An OpEd essay written in support of a proposed freedom of information law it presents the reasons why applying these principles will strengthen governance at the grassroots level. Only when citizens are informed, they can stand [...]

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What Is Power?

5 April 2011

In physics, power is the rate at which work is performed or energy is converted. As people, we have personal power, the ability to accomplish tasks and achieve goals; power with, the ability to engage with others to accomplish tasks and achieve goals; and power over, the ability to control others to accomplish tasks and achieve goals. Without [...]

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Positive Power Over

5 April 2011

Power over is not always about forcing, coercing, pressuring, manipulating etc. It can be as engaging as power with. In terms lazy subordination and undeveloped personal power, power over can be an engaged relationship between the autocrat and the subordinate. Some people want to be dominated and to do so is engaging them, even if [...]

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How We Decide and Why It Matters

20 January 2011

A wonderfully readable update on brain research is Jonah Lehrer’s How We Decide that looks at how our emotions affect decisions and what the brain tells us about it. Lehrer worked in the lab of Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel, is editor-at-large for Seed Magazine, and  publishes regularly in major magazines and newspapers. He has both [...]

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Fractals, Natural Writing Systems, Topological Features

18 January 2011

Big words in a string — fractals, natural writing systems, topological features — that all melt down to the fact that our writing systems develop out of the forms we know from birth, the world around us. The shapes in the landscape and in our built world are mathematically similar to those in letters. And [...]

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Fairness is for Employees as …

6 January 2011

Fairness is for employees like quality is for customers—it takes years to build up but collapses over a singe incident. Ricardo Semler, Maverick, 1993, p.150.

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