sharing my first OS experience

Bernd Weber weberb at gmx.at
Thu Jul 1 09:32:49 PDT 2004


Dear Sambiase, dear Mayke

I have been working in the development cooperation field in Africa
for several years now and I agree fully with Maykes impression, that
there is usually a collusion between northern "development experts"
and southern participants, that the northerners should and do know
the answers, whereas those from the south are happy to get them,
without activating their own expertise.

But I disagree with Sambiase, that it is a good strategy, to start
this way and then change to OS. Doing so shows you as the northerner
as supporting both concepts and therefore producing confusion.

My experience is, that african people without os experience start
with such an expectation, of course. But northerners without os
experience also: they expect the expert to bring answers and
solutions.

But after the introduction to OST, the collection of the themes and
the market these expectations have dissipated, and I very rarely met
the type of confusion you are relating.

So I prefer doing OS right away from the beginning

Bernd



On Thu, 1 Jul 2004 08:45:01 -0300, Luiz Sambiase wrote:
Hi Mayke
Excellent. This strategy may be applicable to communities in my
country as well. ( Brasil)
Luiz
----- Original Message -----
From: Mayke Wagner, essence
To:
OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE..EDU
Sent: Thursday, July 01, 2004 5:47 AM
Subject: sharing my first OS experience
The first day of the conference was "traditional"
with one expert in front and everyone else listening. So the people
really experienced a change when the Open Space started and you could
tell they were struggling with those 2 concepts. My impression was
that in the field of developmental aid - certainly in the area I was
working in - the people felt comfortable with the idea of an expert
from the North (Europe) having the answer (and consequently the
responsibility - ability to respond) for the problems in East Africa.
Open Space questioned this assumption and invited them to acknowledge
their own expertise and ability to find their own answers for their
problems. After the first 4 sessions we had the evening news and in
the discussion it became clear that the participants were torn
between the "traditional" way and the Open Space way. I addressed
this struggle on a meta-level with the participants the next day
which was helpful to create some more discussion and insight...
>>From a systemic point of view it was quite startling to see how this
"imperialism" of the European expert having the answers for the
problems of East Africa was supported by the behavior of the European
participants as well as of the African participants. Both sides
contribute their share to keep this pattern stable which in the long
run does not support sustainable independence...

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