‽istis wonders - just too simple; just too complex‽
(weekending October 28th 2023)
In previous blog-offerings ‽istis has pondered
·
symptoms
v causes (including:
July 2023 https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2023/07/pistis-re-ponders-power-weekending-july.html
& August 2019 https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2019/08/pistis-reclaims-international-day-wc.html)
·
the
past v ‘history’ (including:
August 2021 https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2021/08/pistis-looks-on-as-history-is-being.html
& October 2020 https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2020/10/pistis-reclaims-this-week-in-history.html
& May 2020 https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2020/04/pistis-reclaims-100-years-and-sense-of.html)
·
problem
locus v solution focus
(including: January 2023 https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2023/01/pistis-ponders-noticing-weekending.html
& May 2023 https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2023/05/pistis-wonders-where-are-other-voices.html
& April 2022 https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2022/04/pistis-wonders-about-chickens-and-eggs.html)
Last weekending’s blog included the following as one of several statements
that ‽istis personally would be pleased to hear a leader say:
‽ Maybe when ‘history’ is told, raided or stopped at a particular
moment to favour a narrative of anyone’s ‘my’ or anyones’ ‘our’ resentment,
defeat, maltreatment, exploitation, grievance, atrocity, injustice or
justification – we are all in danger of having no shared future to record or
look back on?
This week the news and airwaves, full of the dreadful, dreadful
events in the Middle East, (less full of the dreadful, dreadful events in
Ukraine, even less full of the dreadful, dreadful events in so many other places
in the world right now), have included information about speeches seeking to
present a context (recent past and very much not-so-recent past) for the
situation – and condemnation from some quarters has followed.
Binaries, polar opposites, one-side-or-another extreme ends without
the shades of a spectrum, or the middle of a continuum apparently and firmly
set in a zero-sum gain worldview – these seem to dominate the discourse and
discussion. So, for ‽istis, the ideas above (symptoms v causes, the past v
‘history’, problem locus v solution focus) continue to be relevant (albeit
that they are also set out in a one-or-the-other formula).
Yet, in the world of social and health care (and probably other
worlds less-familiar to ‽istis) there is emphasis in some approaches and
theoretical frameworks for intervention and change management to focus on
‘solutions’, ‘preferred futures’ and ‘outcomes’; to promote ‘goal-orientated’
practice.
‽istis wonders whether some attempt to apply such an approach to
wider issues, difficulties or challenges – such as peace in the Middle East –
would be just far too simplistic, the ‘problem’ just far too complex; the proposal
just far too naïve…? Mind you what has been tried in the past or what is going
on now does not seem to be working out too well! Perhaps, possibly, maybe it is
simpler to launch another rocket, fuel up another jet, take another hostage, bomb another building, fire
another gun, kill another child!
So, for what it is worth (which may be less than not very much)
here is ‽istis’ oh so naïve, oh so simplistic initial proposal for the outline
of a stepped process:
Step 1: Exploration
with each and every party, separately and individually – what do you want? What
do you really want? Make a list… but
challenge and pare away at suggestions that seem of a second or third order, or
two or three steps removed; challenge and pare away at ‘wants’ that perhaps seem
to be only means to a more fundamental end. E.g: do you really want ‘the
elimination of Hamas’ (as heard from an Israeli spokesperson on ‘The World
Tonight’[i]),
or the elimination of the Israeli state as absolute ends in themselves, or could
these be considered to be a perceived means to another end? Could things be pared
back further and more fundamentally? For example, to ‘peace’ – or to ‘for my
children, family, friends and me to have the opportunity for happiness and fulfilment’?
And ‽istis suspects that if challenged and pared, challenged and
pared – then what may be left could be statements about the basics, the beating
heart ‘stuff’ of life (and Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’ ‘triangle’ comes to
mind[ii],
along with words that might be found in a declaration of rights[iii]:
starting with ‘life, liberty and security of person’): needs met, rights
upheld.
Step 2: Compare the lists and identify the things that each and
every party have listed in common – have we got to a point of agreement, of
commonality? Despite the ‘history’ (way back and more
immediately past) and perhaps even despite what is going on right now outside
of this forum in the present.
And ‽istis does not underestimate how hard and complex it may be
to ‘park’ the past of grievance, trauma, a sense of injustice, hostility, deep
pain and the complex legacy of many revolving rounds of perceived roles:
victim, perpetrator, rescuer[iv];
how hard it may be to move from designating ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’…
And ‽istis does not underestimate how hard and complex it may be
to focus on a preferred future…
But is there a goal/s that we can agree on, an outcome/s that we
may even share?
And ‽istis wonders whether it might end up with a statement something
like this: ‘for my children, family, friends and me to have the opportunity for
happiness and fulfilment; to have our rights upheld and our needs met – and maybe,
just maybe, have some of our wants met too...’
Step 3: Once
a statement of a common goal/outcome or common goals/outcomes has been created,
perhaps the next hardest and complex part begins: consider what
arrangements need to be put in place to achieve this goal/these goals, to
realise this outcome/these outcomes? Identify who (and there’s probably
always a ‘who’ even if the action pertains to an organisation, or if the action
is resource-dependent - for ensuring the adequacy of the resources is surely
part of any action plan…) needs to do what, by when, and how? And
perhaps there is also ‘next hardest and complex part’ caveat to this step too: is
it possible to agree only arrangements that promote MABs (Mutually Assured
Benefits – as opposed to MAD arrangements: Mutually Assured Destruction) or,
at the very least, arrangements that are ABNDTOG (at best not disadvantageous to
one group).
Step 4: Identify some interim (signs of progress) and final measurable
outcome indicators and establish the means to measure them?
Step 5: The next and perhaps most hardest part of all: try it…
Much further pondering needed…
‽ All too simple, especially when sitting at a desk in a largely quiet,
peaceful and prosperous town?
‽ All too complex in practice given the fear, the hatred, the sense
of injustice, the history, the loss, the grief, the vested interests, the generational
and ever-present trauma, the ‘politics’, the economics, the deaths of so many…
‽ How much simpler to launch another rocket, fuel up another jet, take another hostage, bomb
another building, fire another gun, kill another child and another and another
and another…?
©‽istis
NB: further reflections and comments linked to this week’s theme
and past blog entries to be found on X/Twitter: replies, retweets (which don’t
necessarily indicate approval, sometimes the very opposite!) and ‘likes’:
@Pistis_wonders. X/Twitter ‘follows’ and respectful comment and dialogue
welcome...
[i]
BBC Radio4 (UK) 27.10.2023
[ii]
See earlier blogs: https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2022/02/pistis-ponders-needs-weekending.html
& https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2020/10/pistis-reclaims-leadership-weekend.html
[iii] https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights
& https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2021/02/pistis-reclaims-sufficiencism.html
[iv]
See earlier blog and references: https://pistisrec.blogspot.com/2023/07/pistis-re-ponders-power-weekending-july.html
