Valerie raises two separate issues - setting goals (and letting go of them) and taking credit (how important were the workshops)?
In Nepal - we started working on hydatid disease and the community took our work into new domains (garbage cleanup, investment in the community, composting, public toilets). I never did find out what happened to hydatid disease but the community is going strong. This is difficult to sell to funders. We also saw the vultures disappear and after celebrating this as a victory over garbage and offal at the riverside realized that 95% of the vultures in the Indian subcontinent had died off in an ecological collapse related to unintended consequences of good intentions. We also realized that our ability to mobilize the community was very much related to the fact that this was the 1990s, and the collapse of Nepalese monarchy as well as the Berlin Wall. I sometimes think transformative change is only possible in situations where the old regime is in the "back-loop" of the Holling cycle (creative destruction and reorganization) and there is sufficient bio- and social diversity to try out new things. Do we therefore foment revolution? Or merely take advantage of collapse (which is all around us in any case). Dangerous waters... And what we learned in teaching ecohealth to grad students as part of a national course, using Val's ideas, was the importance (and difficulty) of starting with "what should be", which I detest (having grown up in a conservative religious community), but which requires everyone to put their values on the table up front. As a veterinarian, I always have started from "what is", which seems less value-laden (mistaken assumption). "What should be" forces you to lay your cards on the table. An important leaning experience. DWT Department of Population Medicine University of Guelph http://www.ovc.uoguelph.ca/personal/ecosys Veterinarians without Borders/ Vétérinaires sans Frontières - Canada www.vwb-vsf.ca Network for Ecosystem Sustainability and Health www.nesh.ca Tel: 519-824-4120 ext 54745 Cell: 519-546-3204 ----- Original Message ----- From: "Valerie Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [email protected] Sent: Saturday, September 20, 2008 8:14:03 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern Subject: [IntSci] Transformation Dear all, Great to have you back, Louise and thanks for the example. The portfolio of intervention frameworks is growing! There seem to me to be two questions in play. First, is transformation a recognisable type of extreme or comprehensive or system change? Everyone's posts, even the doubters, seem to confirm that it is. The second question is, is it possible to intentionally create a transformation? That's a much more difficult question. Wendy's original question was, do we know of interventions that can influence transformation? Our group works on the proposition that any transformation involves a full set of knowledge domains (individual, community, specialised, organisational and holisitc knolwedge domains) and to bring those domains together under conditions where they can work collectively is a step towards a potential transformation. But it is counterproductive to predict the outcome, all one can do is to work with the group in good faith. David has just worked with this framework - he might like to comment. One example involves lead toxicity levels in Port Pirie, a lead smelter town. When 10% of children were identified as having at risk levels, there was, unbelievedly to an outsider, at first no outcry. Everyone in town depended on the mine, the community as a whole was terrified the mine would close, the local Environmental Health Centre considered releasing test results was the end of their professional responsibility, the local Council was made up of mine officials, and the holistic focus remained on maintaining livelihoods. Then one parent whose child was diagnosed at above the level of harm broke the community silence. That child's grandfather was a union official, and an international company with OH&S standards had just taken over the mine. Collective social learning workshops with all the knolwedge domains involved (our intervention) developed a local change strategy. Parents spontaneoulsy formed a lead awareness group with a represenrtative from the health centre, and and voted a community person onto council. Challenged in face-to-face interactions, the new mine owners found they could afford lead-trapping technology, the Council that they could move houses downwind of the mine air plume to a new site. . The holistic focus had moved from livelihood to child safety, and Port Pirie was a different place in which to rear children. So was this a transformation? And what role can one claim for the workshops as an intervention? Valerie At 03:00 AM 19/09/2008, you wrote: >Send IntSci mailing list submissions to > [email protected] > >To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit > >http://mail.learningforsustainability.net/mailman/listinfo/intsci_learningforsustainability.net > >or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >You can reach the person managing the list at > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific >than "Re: Contents of IntSci digest..." >Today's Topics: > > 1. Re: FW: Transformative change (David Waltner-Toews) > >From: David Waltner-Toews <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Precedence: list >MIME-Version: 1.0 >Cc: [email protected], > Wendy Gregory <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >To: Elizabeth King <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >In-Reply-To: ><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Date: Thu, 18 Sep 2008 09:23:16 -0400 (EDT) >Message-ID: ><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 >Subject: Re: [IntSci] FW: Transformative change >Message: 1 > >Based on the last decade working on complexity & international sustainable >development & health, I would concur with you, Elizabeth. We worked for >3-4 years in two wards of Kathmandu in the early 1990s - a lot of data >gathered on parasites, health, animal slaughtering, human-dog >relationships - and some small things changed (rabies vaccination clinics >for dogs, some changes in awareness of disease). It was only when we >engaged the community fully, and embedded the science in an >ecosystem-approach process, that everything transformed. Within three >years they had changed their slaughtering practices, planted trees and >shrubs on the riverbank, put in public toilets, were composting etc etc. >This without much outside money (money targetted at facilitation of social >process rather than projects.) The local butchers, who generated much of >the garbage also generated much of the money in the community; they said >that our project was the first time they were made to feel as equal >citizens in the community, and so they started investing their money in >the community. That was a transformative change. In Holling's terms, that >would be at the "back loop" (creative destruction and reorganization) of >the figure 8. The local changes survived the chaos of post May 2001, when >the Royal Family self-destructed, and the following 9-11, when the Maoists >were redefined from agrarian reformers to terrorists and shut out of the >political process, but they did not change the larger system. Still, I >know that some of the people in those communities (including the animal >butchers themselves) were very active in the political movements that >brought democracy to Nepal. I have written this up most recently : > > >The Ecosystem Approach: Complexity, uncertainty, and managing for >sustainability, Waltner-Toews, D., Kay, J, Lister, N-M. (eds.). New York: >Columbia University Press, 2008, 383 pp. > >Waltner-Toews, D., Neudeorffer, C., Joshi, D.D., Tamang, M.S. Agro-urban >ecosystem health assessment in Kathmandu, Nepal: epidemiology, systems, >narratives. Ecohealth. 2: 1-11, 2005. >----- Original Message ----- >From: "Elizabeth King" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >To: "James Baines" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Cc: [email protected], "Wendy Gregory" ><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 9:55:20 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern >Subject: Re: [IntSci] FW: Transformative change > >Hi transformation discussants, > >As luck would have it, I happen to be writing a lecture for a class on >resilience and transformations right now, so am primed to chime in a >little bit. From my perspective on such things, transformations can be >distinguished from other kinds of change, and I'd argue that the >distinction is indeed very important. > >In societies, ecosystems, and other complex adaptive systems, there tend >to be configurations that emerge and maintain themselves through >interactions and feedbacks. Mathematicians like to call these "basins >of attraction." The old word for it was "equilibrium" but since that's >so rarely achieved, they're more peaceably referred to as attractors. >Such self-organized systems, wobbling and shifting around their >attractor, have characteristics like resilience, or the magnitude of >perturbation that it would take for them to stop bobbling around their >current configuration, and instead shift over to wobbling around a >different attractor. This would be a transformation. And I think >that's what David was getting at. A perturbation is a temporary change, >and after a time, the system will still tend, through feedbacks amongst >its components, back toward its same old attractor. When a >transformation occurs, the feedbacks that regulate the system have >changed, and now regulate the system toward a new attractor. > >So I'd say that by calling something a transformative change, you're >distinguishing it from a perturbation, and the distinction pertains to >whether the system will reorganize around a change or tend back to its >former state. > >In David's vaccination example, a vaccination campaign WOULD be >transformative if the social norms changed so that people now sought out >and demanded vaccines in the future, and other social institutions >followed by reorganizing around that. In many areas, social norms >haven't been transformed; a fresh externally-driven campaign is needed >each generation. But in other areas, the transformation HAS occurred >and the norm, the attractor around which people's behavior wobbles and >bobbles, has profoundly shifted, and with it other institutions, like >government- (rather than ngo-)sponsored vaccination programs. > >Of course, the distinction between transformative or perturbation change >will depend on the scale at which you're defining your system. A >transformative change in a village in Tanzania may not constitute a >transformative change across all of Sub-Saharan Africa. (But the >possibility of cascading changes is a topic that gives me great hope!). >Usually, though, it's pretty easy to discern the scale that someone's >referring to, even if they don't specify it explicitly. > >If you haven't read a book called Resilience Thinking, by Brian Walker >and David Salt, it's a real little gem, and presents a clear, readable >discussion of these properties of linked social and ecological systems, >and what they mean for sustainability and our lives on this planet. I >highly recommend it, and found it personally transformative! > >So long, >Lizzie > >James Baines wrote: > > David, > > > > I'm prepared to accept that the adjective has > > meaning, but your examples still leave such meaning implicit and unclear. > > I might infer from what you have said that all > > transformations involve change, but only some > > changes result in transformations. > > Therefore transformative change is a particular kind of change. > > > > My dictionary tells me that "transformation >noun > > a marked change in nature, form, or appearance" > > still sounds a bit of a tautology to me. > > > > If this phrase "transformative change" has a > > particular meaning which is not immediately > > obvious to the uninitiated, I'd appreciate a > > simple explanation. Otherwise I can hardly > > participate in this exchange of ideas. > > > > cheers, > > > > James > > > > > > > >-- >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >Elizabeth G. King >Postdoctoral Research Associate >Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and >Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies >106A Guyot Hall, Princeton University >Princeton, NJ 08544 >tel 352-262-3378 > > >_______________________________________________ >IntSci mailing list >[email protected] >http://mail.learningforsustainability.net/mailman/listinfo/intsci_learningforsustainability.net > > > >_______________________________________________ >IntSci mailing list >[email protected] >http://mail.learningforsustainability.net/mailman/listinfo/intsci_learningforsustainability.net Valerie A. Brown AO, BSc MEd PhD Emeritus Professor, University of Western Sydney Director, Local Sustainability Project, Fenner School of Environment and Society Australian National University, ACT 0200 [EMAIL PROTECTED] Ph/Fax 61 (0)2 62958650 http://www.sustainability.org.au _______________________________________________ IntSci mailing list [email protected] http://mail.learningforsustainability.net/mailman/listinfo/intsci_learningforsustainability.net _______________________________________________ IntSci mailing list [email protected] http://mail.learningforsustainability.net/mailman/listinfo/intsci_learningforsustainability.net
