[Oe List ...] Ecology and the Social Process: This press release, from September of 1996, recognized a remarkable effort, spearheaded by Jean Watts.

Tue Nov 24 12:13:11 CST 2009

And if this is an ICA project, I have much to learn about how ICA expanded
the understandings of EI. So this is part of the reflection as well.

Herman

  _____  

From: oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net [mailto:oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf
Of James Wiegel
Sent: Tuesday, November 24, 2009 12:17 PM
To: Order Ecumenical Community
Cc: Colleague Dialogue
Subject: [Oe List ...] Ecology and the Social Process: This press
release,from September of 1996, recognized a remarkable effort,spearheaded
by Jean Watts.

BARATARIA-TERREBONNE NATIONAL ESTUARY PROGRAM (BTNEP): Governor Mike Foster
was notified this week that the BTNEP's Comprehensive Conservation and
Management Plan is the recipient of the American Planning Association's
award for Outstanding Planning in the Comprehensive Planning--Large
Jurisdiction category.  This national level award follows a regional award
from the same organization in September, 1996.  The 1997 National Planning
Award recipients will be recognized on April 8, 1996 during the annual
conference to be held in San Diego.    Contact: Barbara Keeler (5-6698)

Jean responded to, and received, a grant to facilitate this CCMP effort as a
part of the US Environmental Protection Agency's project to protected the
largest estuaries in the United States.  She involved a number of us as
colleagues -- both in Louisiana (Carol Fleishman, Carlos Zervigon, Julianna
Padgett, among others) and also brought in colleagues from around the
country (Sue Laxdall, Sherwood Shankland, among others)

After a series of Management Conferences involving important stakeholders in
the Estuary (think:  the end of the Mississippi river south and west of New
Orleans) a "conceptual framework" was created to show the complicated
inter-relatedness of what was going on in the Estuary.  Jean wrote this up
as a chapter in Government Works, edited by Jim Troxel.  This conceptual
framework was represented as a set of triangles:  The Natural Factor (lower
left) (consisting of the Land Mass, the Water Flows and the Diverse Biologic
Communities (plants, animals, micro-organisms, etc.), The Human Factor
(lower right) (consisting of Economic Development, Education and social
life, and National Recognition (think "social process"), and The Management
Factor (top) (consisting of Research and Data, Regulation, and Planning).  A
fourth set of triangles also emerged, called the Linking Factor which was
placed in the middle of the other 3 (consisting of Balanced Use Indicators,
Infrastructure Compatible with Nature, and Common Ground Solutions).  These
triangles went down a level or 2 and were very useful in describing the
complex interactions taking place.

This is the best work I am aware of at expanding the "social process" work
to the next larger set of dynamics and functions.  In this framework, the
Natural Factor is the foundational, the Human Factor, in some sense, is
living off /living with the Natural Factor, and the Management Factor
represents the attempt to coordinate the other 2.

INTERESTING SIDE NOTES:  My daughter was in high school at the time and as I
described this project, she said, "Finally, Dad, you are working on
something important."  She was taking a course in ecology or environmental
science at the time, and I paged through her text book.  In the last chapter
I spied a triangle!!  It was describing the cosmology of tribal peoples --
the three poles were Nature, Human Beings, and Spirit.  I thought, Wow -- we
replaced Spirit with Management!

HOW THIS FRAMEWORK EMERGED FROM THE PLANNING PROCESS:  The beginning point
of the project was the identification of 9 priority problems in the estuary
-- based on extensive scientific studies and data collection -- things like
erosion of barrier islands, incursion of salt water destroying fresh water
marshes, over fishing, etc.  These priority problems were predominantly
located in the NATURAL FACTOR triangle.  As the stakeholders assembled to
review these data and articulated their VISION, it predominantly focussed on
the HUMAN FACTOR triangle -- them and their children continuing to live in
and prosper in this place, being able to learn and grow and develop their
communities, and being recognized as a national treasure (significance).
When we turned to contradictions, it turned out that most were in the
MANAGEMENT FACTOR triangle -- the ways of doing research and regulating and
planning were as much a block as a benefit in caring for the Estuary.  As
the planning moved into Strategic Directions, many of the actions and
recommendations fell into this 4th area -- the LINKING FACTOR -- developing
new, more helpful indicators to measure, working towards common ground
solutions vs. reliance on legal action and regulation, etc.

and Water Jim

There's a big difference between marching to a different drummer and having
no sense of rhythm whatsoever. -- the morning paper.

Jim Wiegel
401 North Beverly Way, Tolleson, Arizona 85353-2401
+1 623-936-8671 +1 623-363-3277
jfwiegel at yahoo.com www.partnersinparticipation.com

  _____  

From: Richard & Maria Maguire <unfolding at smartchat.net.au>
To: Order Ecumenical Community <oe at wedgeblade.net>
Sent: Tue, November 24, 2009 6:27:48 AM
Subject: [Oe List ...] Nature and the Social Process Triangles

At 06:26 AM 22/11/2009, you wrote:
Yes we have, and many other colleagues we know as well.  But its not easy to
do.

We notice that social process triangles speak directly about the natural
world only is as a resource in the economic triangle.

Since the triangles are about the *social* process I find it difficult to
put nature in directly.  If I were to include the natural world it would be
in a symbol that surrounds and interacts with the social process all over
the place, or a large triangle of some sort with the social process as a sub
triangle.  The natural world is finally more powerful and durable than our
human social world.  We arise from it and  utterly depend on it.  Our
Western technologists have only recently begun to realize what Indigenous
peoples have known for a long time--our fate will very much depend on how we
treat it.  It almost seems that our attaining a healthy relationship with
nature very much depends on our creating the balance in the social process
that has been so important to us as the ICA.  It is clearer than ever that
economic overemphasis of the current society, even more blatant than in the
60s, is not only the source of great social injustice, but also damage to
our natural world for which many people, and other species are paying
dearly.

Another thought I have had is that nature plays an unspoken role within of
the social process, particularly as a locus of meaning and significance, so
especially in common religion, but also in wisdom etc.  An awful lot of our
political activity now has to do with the natural world as well. Maybe we
should include this in our contexts.

On another note:

Since the Nobel commission gave the Peace prize to Obama for *promising* to
eliminate nuclear weapons, maybe they should *promise* that a Nobel peace
prize will be given to the "world leaders" who put a strong carbon plan into
action, some years after it is successfully implemented.  After all, they
don't give prizes in physics or medicine until the results have been
validated, (I understand that that's the reason why Einstein never got one
for relativity) and the same could be true for the peace prize.

Best wishes

Richard

> hat's a good statement and worth archiving!
> 
> Occasionally I muse on how to place the social process into the Earth
> process. I haven't had a brilliant idea about this yet. One approach is to
> have an Earth process set of triangles (like the carbon cycle, the
> hydrological cycle, etc.) parallel to the social process. Another approach
> is to have the Earth process in the middle triangle of the social process
> triangles. Another is to redo the social process triangles to include
> interactions with nature.
> 
> I haven't really done much except muse about this. (One approach I saw
that
> I question is to apply the social process to nature--it's not entirely
> unfruitful but it seems like an artificial imposition on the natural
> processes rather than beginning with the natural process itself.)
> 
> I wonder if anyone else has thought about this.
> 
> -

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