Organizing reflection 6

This is a post in my series on organizing ”between and beyond.” Other posts are here. The purpose of this post is to reflect on subjects occupying my mind. I make no claim to fully believe what I write. Neither do I pretend that others have not already thought or written about the same subject. More often than not, I take up, combine, and add to already existing thoughts and ideas.

What is on my mind?
Changing the system doesn’t necessarily change people’s behaviors
Changing the system doesn’t necessarily change people’s behaviors because their underlying values are unchanged. John Schinnerer writes in a mail to sociocracy.groups.io, January 12, 2018, that (my emphasis in bold):

“… we humans are quite good at not changing our behavior, regardless of change of some aspect of a system. There is no system that is proof against human behavior.

So if I want to I can still live my prejudicial behavior, my un-equivalent behavior, my autocratic behavior, and so on, within a sociocracy (or Holacracy, or “teal organization,” and so on) by name. I might have to “work the system” differently, but it is always possible
to some degree.

John Schinnerer specifically addresses human power relations:

The basic means of human power-over are available one way or another, because they involve far more complex systems of human relating than just the formal governance processes and structures.

I think a key point is, there is so much more to human power relatings than is addressed either explicitly or implicitly by the SCM or any other implementation of sociocracy.”

An example of human power-over is when a sociocracy facilitator subtly manipulates the sociocratic decision-making by putting time pressure on the person who has an objection. I have seen it happen.

Related posts:
Organizing in between and beyond posts