By Randy C. Williams

The following is an extract from an article on how the ICA’s concept of its role is changing – from that of an organization that intervenes to awaken and motivate people to effect change to one that participates with others already involved in change. To read the full article, click the “read more” link at the end of this extract.

In 2012 the Institute of Cultural Affairs (ICA) and its founding organization, the Ecumenical Institute (EI), will celebrate 50 years of service to the globe in anticipation of the next 50.  In 1972 the ICA was incorporated and EI initiated a “turn to the world,” representing a significant change in the strategic approach to its mission.  I believe that the national ICAs now spanning the globe must take a “new turn to the world” as they move into the next 50 years.  This is prompted by two societal shifts currently being experienced.  One is a shift in the root metaphor through which we view the world, from the image of the machine to the image of a self-organizing system.  The second is a shift in context, more subtle than the first, from an economic to a cultural age.  In response to these shifts, this “new turn to the world,” as I envision it, has two dimensions.  The first is a turn away from a strategy of intervention and initiation toward one of participation in newly emerging realities that are unfolding all around us.  The second is a practical turn away from an emphasis on program development and delivery toward the establishment and nurture of collaborative partnerships……

From Intervention To Participation
Intervention is what you do when you sense things are going in the wrong direction and someone needs to do something.  We once quoted Joyce Carol Oates when she said, “What appears to be a breaking down of civilization may be the breaking up of old forms by life itself.” ¹ Following Oates’ lead, if we look at current events from a wider, history-long perspective, we can discern positive trends, alleviating the need for intervention and giving rise to the opportunity to participate in an emerging future filled with possibility.

Singing together strengthened our communal bonds.  We often took popular tunes and wrote our own words like this verse to the tune of “Hi Ho Nobody Home”:

As I reflect on my own part in vain attempts to intervene to redirect the course of history, I confess that I now question the truth of these words.  In this day of global influence and the increasing awareness of the interdependence of all things, it does not require keen insight to realize that no single presence or force in the world decides unilaterally how the future will unfold.  Yet everyone and everything influences the future in one way or another.  Martin Buber, the 20th century Jewish philosopher and theologian, suggested that reality is forever emerging from each of us “to the course of being in the world” and that “what is to come will come” only when we decide on what we are “able to will.”  But in the end Buber concludes that, “The matter will not turn out according to [our] decision.” ²

¹ This is a quote the ICA used as wall décor in one of its seminars, attributed to Joyce Carol Oates.

² These quotes are from Martin Buber’s classic book I and Thou, Scribner Library, second edition, 1958, trans. Ronald Gregor Smith, pages 59-60.

All of us, willingly or not, are participants in the emergence of “what is to come.”  We are by default parties to, but not the sole determiners of, the future.  As a result of our very presence nothing will ever be the same.  If we make a conscious decision to willfully be the participants we are, we can then determine the depth, scope and intensity of our participation. 

After a generation of assuming we had to intervene if history was to proceed on the correct course, it is liberating to have that burden lifted.  Peter Senge, known for his pioneering role in systems thinking, must have felt the same when he reported:

Over the past several years, I’ve been involved in initiating a lot of stuff.  It’s really clear to me now that I don’t have to bother with that any more.  It doesn’t mean I’m sanguine that our world is going to be transformed.  I’m just saying the changes needed are happening.  They’re emerging all around us.  …the obvious thing is that…now is the time to look, to watch what’s emerging, to leverage it, and to disseminate it. ³

Having a vision that resonates with one’s hopes and dreams for the future may suffice when building five-year plans, but when thinking on a world-wide, history-long scale, and acting as a part of an interdependent whole, visioning has nothing to do with imposing one’s own aspirations on the future.   It has to do with the ability “to watch what’s emerging,” and then to become a participant in what we see happening—“to leverage it, and to disseminate it.”  Underlying this kind of participation is the realization that good things are happening without our having to initiate anything.  Hence the first aspect of the new turn to the world is the turn from intervention to participation.

From Programs To Relationships
The world becomes a different place for those of us who understand that our role as the servants of the servants is to participate rather than to intervene in the course of history.  With a new root metaphor for life in the world and a new social context within which to function, we can now turn from overdependence on our own initiatives and devices and turn toward building relationships of mutuality, “partnerships,” with those we are called to serve, who wish to participate with us as peers in the transformation of society that is already underway.

Margaret Wheatley, author of the acclaimed book Leadership and the New Science, has drawn upon her knowledge of biology and quantum physics to establish some basic motifs for the way effective organizations operate, based on how nature and the world work.  She argues that we are the sum total of our relationships, whether in the workplace, community or society at large.  In an article co-authored with Deborah Frieze she writes:

[T]he world…changes as networks of relationships form among people who discover they share a common cause and vision of what’s possible.  …our work is to foster critical connections (my emphasis).  We don’t need to convince large numbers of people to change; instead, we need to connect with kindred spirits.  Through these relationships, we will develop the new knowledge, practices, courage, and commitment that lead to broad-based change.  …emergence only happens through connections. ⁴

³ Peter Senge, “The Solutions in Our Midst,” Oxford Leadership Journal, October 2010 edition.

⁴ See footnote #1

Wheatley and Frieze stipulate that arriving at critical mass is not the issue, but making “critical connections” is.  They suggest a four-step process for fostering critical connections to achieve global change—“name, connect, nourish, and illuminate,” ⁵ reminiscent of Senge’s “leverage” and “disseminate.”  The resulting “critical networks” evolve into “communities of practice” which in turn become “systems of influence” which create global change.  The mention of “new knowledge and practices” calls to mind the research done by EI and ICA in the 60s, 70s and 80s to develop new intellectual, social and spirit methods.  In many ways these were ahead of their time, but today this work could be, and in many cases is being, adapted and used by communities in their efforts to bring change.

The practical implications of this new turn to the world suggest that our task is no longer to awaken and engage those whom we serve, but to connect, nurture, leverage and disseminate the courage and commitment of resilient and resurgent communities that are already awake and engaged, to create the synergy needed for sustained global transformation.

Terry Bergdall, president and CEO of the ICA-USA, was reflecting after a meeting with a group of new colleagues about how in the old days the “altar call” at the end of one of these meetings would be to ask people to come be a part of the work we were doing.  Today our request has more to do with affirming our relationship with them and offering our services to assist them to do what they are already doing in their community or organization.  As Terry summed it up:

Perhaps the direct message ICA needs to be conveying…has to do with pointing people back to their local situation to explore, and act upon, opportunities for ethical engagement.  Indirectly, ICA programs…are possible resources people can draw upon for training and inspiration as we encourage and support their local engagement…

For the ICAs this will necessitate turning from a focus on program development and dissemination and turning to the formation of collaborative partnerships, in some cases with the most unlikely of partners.  This does not mean we stop doing programs.  Within these relationships of mutuality existing programs can be adapted and new ones created that address the specific needs of the collaborating partners, using the intellectual, social and spirit methods that we developed years ago. 

Rather than as a process that we initiate to spur people and organizations to action, program development and delivery must now be done primarily in response to partner requests. 

⁵ Margaret Wheatley and Deborah Frieze, Walk Out Walk On: A Learning Journey into Communities Daring to Live the Future Now, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2011.  This book tells the story, in prose, poetry and photography, of seven communities who are “living the future now.”

The ultimate goal would not be to conduct programs, although we would conduct programs, but to serve those partners with whom we collaborate, on their terms.  To affect this change in emphasis would be like a metamorphosis.  From the outside everything would look the same, but inside it would be different. 

A refreshing thing about the ICA is that it is not and has never been in the business of building and perpetuating itself as an institution.  As it has been for the last 50 years, and will be for the next 50, it is about the task of service to the world.  Because growing themselves as institutions is not what the various national ICAs are about, their paid staffs are, by design, small teams of competent, dedicated professionals.  Many, but not all, are former Order members who have the experience and memory of the past that are essential to do the tasks of the present and future.

Many of us who are part of the history of the EI and ICA, while widely dispersed, continue in one way or another to do what we did when we were together as a covenanted, missional body.  We strive to live out of the commitment we made years ago to be in service to the world, and we hold this commitment in common with the mission of the ICA.  In addition to the endeavors in which we are already involved, the ICA gives us another significant way to continue to live out of our deep calling.

As the ICA continues toward building collaborative partnerships and serving resilient communities and organizations that are “living the future now,” many of us know and work with entities that have the potential to be ICA partners.  ICA-USA has engaged with old and new colleagues to establish working partnerships with Learning Basket, First 5 LA, and the Oikos Scholars, to name a few, and is currently working with various organizations to accelerate green initiatives in Chicago’s 77 neighborhoods in an effort called “Acceleration 77.” 

Other ICAs have similar stories.  In each case the ICAs will fulfill their mission by working with their partners as the partners work to realize their own aspirations. Meanwhile, the emergent future, where all creatures will live together in peace with justice, and the beauty and mystery of the earth itself will be held in sacred trust by all, continues to unfold.  Each of us has the opportunity to participate with great intentionality in that unfolding.

Randy C. Williams
is Acting Board Chair of ICA-USA

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