Table of Contents
Forward (Not yet written)
Introduction
to the New Paradigm
Acknowledgements
Part 1. How the Environmental Movement Can Find Its Way Again
As the
Death of Environmentalism memo confirmed in October
2004, the movement has failed to solve the sustainability problem.
Therefore it must either step aside or reinvent itself so that
it is capable of solving the problem.
What follows is a hypothesis for how it may be able to do the latter.
Chapter 1. Why the Environmental Movement Needs the
Right Process - The movement has lost its way because
the process does not fit the problem. This was an easy trap
to fall into, because the process worked at first. But now
we know that what was happening is we were solving the easy
problems first. The hard problems remain as unsolved as ever,
because the current process is utterly incapable of solving
them. The movement can find its way again by changing to
the right process.
Chapter 2. Why Environmentalists are Facing Such Hostile
Opposition - The source of resistance is an invisible
social structure called The Dueling Loops of the Political
Powerplace and its exploitation by the New Dominant Life Form.
This structure explains why environmentalists have been unable
to solve the problem. The present process used by the movement,
Classic Activism, is incapable of seeing such structures. Thus
the movement cannot see the reason it is failing is it is pushing
on low leverage points. Nor can it see how it could succeed,
by finding and pushing on high leverage points, the most promising
of which is the general ability to detect political deception.
Chapter 3. How to Raise the General Ability to Detect
Political Deception - This can be raised by applying
a suitable problem solving process, such as the System Improvement
Process. This has been done. The results are presented in the
form of six solution elements. These have been engineered to
work closely together to change the general ability to detect
political deception from low to high. Once this goes high enough
the race to the bottom will collapse, causing the race to the
top to become the dominant loop in politics. This in turn will
lead to an intense global effort to solve the environmental
sustainability problem.
Part 2. First Things First: Solving the Transformation Problem
We can find our way again by switching to Analytical Activism.
Thus the first problem to solve is how can we transform the
environmental movement from Classic to Analytical Activism?
Part two analyzes how to do this using the four steps of the
System Improvement Process, along with the key tools needed.
Chapter 4. The Transformation Strategy
Map - This chapter presents
a clear and simple strategy for solving the transformation
problem, using the tools of strategy maps and feedback loops.
Chapter 5. Process Step 1: Problem Definition - This step defines
the problem clearly and succinctly, allowing problem solvers
to focus on the few things that make the big difference, and
to ignore everything else.
Chapter
6. Process Step 2: System Understanding - The
goal of the second step of the System Improvement Process
(SIP) is to understand why the system works so well that
its leverage points become obvious. This is analogous to
the importance of diagnosing the cause of a disease first.
The key tool of system dynamics is presented.
Chapter 7. An Assessment of Problem Difficulty -
There are seven difficulty factors causing environmental problems
to be difficult to solve. These factors are used to rate the
top eleven environmental problems. The results explain why
one has been easy to solve and the rest remain unsolved. The
chapter argues that the strategic reason so many remain unsolved
is the problem solving process used by the environmental movement
is immature. The process does not fit the problem. It cannot
handle the seven difficulty factors. Given the principle that
the more difficult the problem the more mature the process
used to solve it must be, it follows that the movement must
switch to a mature process.
Chapter 8. An Assessment
of Process Maturity - An assessment of the process
maturity of fourteen organizations and ten books shows the
environmental movement is presently incapable of solving the
sustainability problem, chiefly because of over reliance on
Classic Activism. This can be corrected by adding the key best
practices of Analytical Activism and those practices particular
to the sustainability problem.
Chapter 9. Finding the System’s Low and High
Leverage Points - This chapter presents the Powell
Memo and the Second Age of Reason as examples of how other
movements found the right high leverage points and pushed
on them successfully. Using the results of this analysis,
the defects and flaws sections of the strategy map are completed.
Two simulation models are then used to find the low and high
leverage points of the transformation problem.
Chapter 10. Process Step 3. Solution
Convergence - Now that
we know where the high leverage points are, converging on a
solution is relatively easy. The Transformation Causal Flow
Model, the completed strategy map, and a collection of solution
elements executing the model and map are developed.
Chapter 11. The Transformation Simulation
Model - If solving
a problem is critical, then a causal flow model is not good
enough. This chapter presents a more mature solution model:
the Transformation Simulation Model and the phase transition
chain.
Chapter 12. Process Step 4. Implementing the
Model and the Map - A
causal flow model is used for a final strategic review of how
to implement the Transformation Simulation Model and the completed
strategy map.
Part 3. Now We Are Ready: Solving the Sustainability Problem
Now that we have the ready in ready, aim, fire, how can a
newly transformed environmental movement begin to solve the
sustainability problem?
Chapter 13. The First Experiment - The
first step in taking up the new paradigm is to think in terms
of process driven experimentation. To make this mental leap
all you have to do is perform The First Experiment. This
requires a small group of people and takes only about 30
minutes, plus another hour or so of lively educational discussion.
Chapter 14. The Dueling Loops of the
Political Powerplace - This presents
a promising hypothesis that could lead to the breakthrough
we’ve been looking for, using the same Dueling Loops
model that was presented earlier in chapter 2. The model
is covered in depth, complete with simulation model diagrams
and a long series of exploratory scenarios. The chapter builds
a strong, clear argument that the Dueling Loops are the primary
structural cause of civilization’s continual inability
to solve the sustainability problem. The folly of pushing
on low leverage points is contrasted to the superior alternative
of pushing on high leverage points instead.
Chapter 15. The Proper Coupling Package -
Currently the human system is improperly coupled to the larger system it lies
within: the environment. The result is the runaway environmental overshoot we
see today. It appears possible to engineer a business model that is so ethically
and financially attractive that its rapid adoption by the global business community
would solve the sustainability problem as quickly as is realistically possible.
This chapter presents a theoretical foundation for how this can be done, along
with sample solution elements to demonstrate how theory may be turned into reality.
Chapter 16. Solution Factories - Tomorrow’s
activist NGOs will no longer be activist NGOs. They will be
solution factories. Ordinary factories produce physical
products that solve technical problems, such as the needs
of consumers. Solution factories produce mental products that
solve social problems, in a process driven, high speed, highly
efficient assembly line manner. The output of a solution factory
is memes.
Chapter 17. What Can I Do Tomorrow Morning?
- This chapter lists dozens of things
you can do to change the system, rather than continuing
to treat the symptoms, so that the system’s new equilibrium
is sustainable. Like the good doctor who first diagnoses the
underlying cause of a patient's symptoms and only then begins
to treat the fundamental cause of the patient's problems, analytical
activists must use all the tools at their disposal to do the
same.
Appendix
Timeline of the Three Cycles of Dark Ages and Ages of Reason
Endnotes
Index
