[OSList] who are the right people

Tue Jun 14 08:49:44 PDT 2016

Michael you are brilliant! Especially at 2 am. Just love it when you "turned
on."  And Chris M. -- you have just heard it from the "horses' mouth, from
the lips of experience, from the old dog who's been there. I'd better stop
'cause I am tearing-up. Can't blubbler now!

ho 

-----Original Message-----
From: OSList [mailto:oslist-bounces at lists.openspacetech.org] On Behalf Of
Michael M Pannwitz via OSList
Sent: Monday, June 13, 2016 8:44 PM
To: christopher macrae; World wide Open Space Technology email list
Subject: Re: [OSList] who are the right people

Dear Christopher,

my German version of
"Whoever comes is the right people"
is
"Die da sind, sind genau die Richtigen"
which, at least in German, makes it even more clear that this has nothing to
do with who was invited or who should have attended or whether this or that
system is completely represented.

The point of this "priniple" (in German "Tatsache des Lebens" or "fact of
life",  is simply to focus on who is at the event and to not start, as many
meetings do, with enumerating all the folks that should have been there but
did not come.
That stance just distracts from the possibilities manifest in those who are
present, them are the once with passion and responsibility (if they are
there voluntarily, it helps).

Now, all the stuff about having a broad representation is first of all a
question the sponsor of an activity might have to worry about. Many
approaches that aim at getting solid action and solutions employ complex
organisational development designs to have all "stakeholders" aboard.

Now, OST also is an actionorienting approach but not in the sense that it
focuses primarily at creating projects and solutions.
It focuses primarily at reducing the shackles (controls) placed on the
forces of selforganisation.
And to support that, it suggests five prerequisites to be in place for the
force of selforganisation to unfold more freely.
None of these prerequisites have to do with "representation" or
"particiapation".
There is one of the prerequisites - "high diversity" -  which is often read
as "all sides" or "representing the entire system" and frequently then leads
to declaring OST to be a "democratic" approach "or a participatory
approach".
To me, the force of selforganisation has no idea of what a democratic,
participatory, all-including, whole-system-in-the-room etc approach is. 
In fact, selforganisation is a force that has no idea at all... just as all
universal forces.

Seeing it this way I wonder whether the notion of "who all needs to be in
the room to move the system in the direction we want it to go" is just
another one of these control mechanisms in disguise.

As facilitator I try to support an understanding among those that have come
is the right people... simply because they are the only present and
demonstrate through their presence that they have a passion, care and are
ready to do something, whatever that might turn out to be.

By the way, I like the original wording of this "principle" with "is the
right people" rather than "are the right people" because "is" implies people
in the sense of a group/body/tribe/nation...

Thanks for your questions, just get carried away by questions!

Greetings from sleepless in Berlin at 2:43 am local time mmp

On 12.06.2016 23:41, christopher macrae via OSList wrote:
> "the people who come are the right people" but sometimes doesnt that 
> depend on how much work has been done on the invitation process to 
> include all sides including those who may not know they are part of 
> the broeken systems
>
> i guess when an open space is about a local community issue its 
> relatively simple to see whether everyone has been included but
>
>  my main concern is on issues only global youth can mobilise if 
> sustainability is to be our future - and yet while i am interested in 
> movements that empower youth  (sytarting with creating jobs) i also 
> see sustainability -whether we win it or lose it - as an 
> intergenerational compound crisis -
>
> does the generation of trump or clinton understand how much they have 
> presided over designing non-sustainable systems?  has mass tv media 
> becomes such an intergenerational liar that we no longer have enough 
> bases for intergenerational trust?  what 5000 people invitation to 
> open space would maximise a movement of networks to combat the 
> national rifle association at least on selling assault guns-
>
>  here are these systems that seem so broken - are we deceiving youth 
> in implying that enough elders will ever come to celebrate youth's 
> best endeavors
>
> I also have a suspicion that eg hackathons viralise their invitations  
> and get extraordinary collections of young participants in ways that 
> open space invitation agents may need to get smarter at - if 
> intergenerational space is to be convened as much as the coming decade 
> of tipping points will require
>
> just thinking aloud- any views?
> chris macrae
> www.globalyouth50000.com <http://www.globalyouth50000.com/>
>
>
>
>
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--
Michael M Pannwitz
Draisweg 1, 12209 Berlin, Germany
++49 - 30-772 8000

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