Digging relational sociology

Since the last post, and before it too, I have been quite intensively burrowing through some material on process sociology, relational sociology and critical realism. Through this I came to discover the links between Norbert Elias and Pierre Bourdieu. I toyed with idea of figurations and fields, came across the idea of institutional entrepreneurs and generally have been finding the experience rather enjoyable indeed. One of the great finds was Mustafa Emirbayer’s (1997) Manifesto for a Relational Sociology. Relational sociology is all about shifting from a concern with ‘things’ to a concern with ‘processes’. As I read through the article, Stacey’s work on complex responsive processes kept popping into mind.

Anyway, Emirbayer, building on the work of Dewey and others, elaborates three distinct forms of action: self-action; inter-action; and trans-action. Self-actional theories are based on the idea that actors act through some sort of internal propulsion which is somehow inerrent or intrinsic to their being. Such actors could be individuals, groups, organisations or societies as a whole and they are treated as non-problematic given entities. Inter-actional theories tend to focus on the interactions that take place between actors, often by examining the interactions between variables that describe these actors. However, such theories fail to actually examing the ways in which the actors themselves are interacting and potentially changing in this very process. Both self-actional inter-actional theories are based on a substantialist logic and miss the complex dynamics that are captured in trans-actional theories. Trans-actional theories (the basis for a relational sociology) engage primarily with the relational processes between units or terms and see the dynamics these entail as continuously reproducing, dissolving or transforming the very same units and terms and their relations with respect to each other over time.

This somehow leads me on to this little extract – which is a timely contribution to my last post:

“transactional thinking contests the intrinsically reified nature of all categories [with state, civil society, market being examples of such categories, my addition]: it shows how they “totalize” identities that are in fact often multidimensional and contradictory; prescribe modes of thought and action against which alternatives can only be labelled “deviant”; naturalize rigid distinctions that suppress possibilities for creative (self-) transformation; and, most generally, accept rather than contest the historically variable relational matrices that serve to constitute invidious distinctions and categorizations in the first place (Somers and Gibson, 1994, pp.55-57).” — Emirbayer (1997)

So I suppose that somehow, having conversations about this transactional or relational perspective may be an important part of the work I do here. It will be interesting to see how this happens… As will understanding what it really means to work within a critical realist framework as a self-proclaimed ‘institutional entrepreneur’ – someone who uses “the causal powers of pre-existing structures to create new institutions or challenge existing ones.” At the same time, I am still trying to get my head around exactly what ‘reality’ is and what we are or are not talking about when we talk of ’structure’ and how this connects to the idea of ‘institutional logics’.

Market, State & Civil Society: a flawed distinction?

For some time I have been pondering the distinction that is routinely made between state, market and civil society. I have increasingly been drawn to the conclusion that while this is a convenient and seemingly self-evident distinction it is also, at some more critical level, a flawed – or perhaps better, a misleading – distinction.

The basic unit of states, markets and civil society is people. People interacting in different ways, for different purposes, based on their respective values, beliefs, assumptions, worldviews, priorities, etc. Within this broader social figuration, power dynamics play a central role in determining what gains legitimacy over time and how new order emerges.

One of my major concerns is with the reification of state, market and civil society. If we were to adopt an understanding of each of these as particular delimitations of social processes that have been arbitrarily – or at least narrowly – construed as systems or else as system components, then we gain access to a very different perspective on each of these. These different spheres of activity, distinguishable by their perceived and ascribed functions, are not in and of themselves actors but are, rather patterns of interaction. By this I mean to say, that there is no agency that can be ascribed to the ‘whole’ even though it may be possible to describe phenomena as if this were the case.

In moving beyond such ’systemic’ and reified understandings of society, we perhaps are able to dissolve some of the constructs that limit our own understanding of what social change is and how it happens… more to come on this in future posts…

emerging opportunities

The road to Delwara...

It’s been almost a month and a half since I returned to Seva Mandir. I have been writing my experiences and reflections almost fanatically – dedicating substantial chunks of my time every day to this endeavour. When I’m not writing, I’m either reading, engaging in conversations or else observing and trying to pay attention to what is going on, what is being said and what isn’t.

Most of my reading has been drawn from the general pool of materials associated with Stacey’s complex responsive processes. In particular, articles by Chris Mowles and others who have pursued their DMan from Hertfordshire’s Centre for Complexity and Management. Some of this has proved incredibly rich. In particular, I have been reading Chen’s (2007) work examining the momentary, subjective experiences of change itself and the ways that such moments emerge through communicative interaction between individuals or even between an individual and a text. Central to this experience of change is paradox – the simultaneous co-existence of two apparently opposing traits (e.g. knowing-not-knowing; powerful-powerless). However, working with paradox does not imply something to be resolved and therefore transcended, but rather as something to be held, engaged with mentally, bodily, and socially in the process of creating new meaning together and bringing about change. Doing so means paying attention to one’s own state of entanglement with paradox – emotionally, bodily, and in terms of thought processes, with particular attention focused on the experience of anxiety. Furthermore, it means looking out for ‘gaps’ that emerge in processes of communicative interaction, where gaps are understood, essentially, as people’s inability to engage with paradox and therefore find themselves re-producing the same patterns of interaction that have existed to date – the very ones in which change is being sought.

I have found myself particularly intrigued by the idea that engaging with texts constitutes conversation – an idea made more meaningful through Mead’s notion that mind is, in effect, a private conversation composed of the same patterns of communicative interaction as conversation with other persons. Thus, as I read, various responses are triggered in my mind which essentially enables something of a conversation to emerge between myself and the text. The text then becomes a part of the ongoing conversation that is my mind. At times I must take myself away from the text in order to continue the conversation I was having with myself on my own terms – since the text continues on regardless of my thoughts – it is not dynamic in the way that my own mind is. Yet still I feel drawn to read on, usually after pausing for a while to write down the proceedings of the conversation that the text has evoked within me.

The subject matter for all these conversations is my life and work here at Seva Mandir; the complex patterns of interactions in which I engage on a daily basis as I try to make-sense and help to enable learning and change to emerge. This includes conversations with organisational staff and citizens occupying a diverse range of positions from Seva Mandir’s General Secretary through to citizens. The foci of these processes of communicative interaction have included: Delwara (and its incredibly complex dynamics); the uptake of action research processes within Seva Mandir; the need to focus on and examine the quality and patterning of relations between staff at different levels in the organisation; the promotion of participatory monitoring and evaluation methods. Regular – almost obsessive – writing, combined with my sense-making conversations have provided the bed-rock of my emerging understanding of what is going on around me. Some achievements that I can report so far that are somehow connected to my own involvement include:

• bettering of relations between two staff critical to the Delwara programme – namely, easing the tension that had emerged between the two senior-most staff within the programme. A range of differences had surfaced over time and rather than getting discussed openly, they had been avoided. The result was that this had started festering and actually becoming harmful to the project. The relationships has been substantially improved and there is now a greater willingness to engage with some of the controversial issues that were being avoided earlier. At the same time, this kind of change will no doubt, be slow and difficult and the initial positive responses
• broadening the scope of ‘what gets talked about’ in the Delwara programme – in particular trying to shift the conversation from what I considered to be a superficial recounting of events to one that delves into the complex power dynamics that shape the way conversations take place. This has also helped to secure a recognition of the need to focus more intently, explicitly and openly on the way that power dynamics are playing out within the programme. In addition to this, the very approach and ideology underlying the programme can now be surfaced, deconstructed and debated. An essential part of this process will be that of identifying and developing the appropriate language for communicating this.
• activation of a citizen-staff member of Delwara’s citizen’s forum in overcoming power relations – in this case with respect to the local community mobiliser notifying the more ‘powerful’ communities that if they do not contribute the monthly cleaning fee, then their cleaning services will be suspended. This subject appeared to somehow get avoided during the meetings.

While this is all well and good, it doesn’t really do justice to what I have been doing. Many of my conversations are not of the kind that will yield instant results. Rather, they are exploratory, probing conversations that seek to gradually uncover the complex, multi-layered and political nature of the patterns of interaction that are Seva Mandir. I then work to bring these patterns that I observe to light and to encourage reflection on and inquiry into these patterns as part of the conversation that I engage in. Thus, as I move around the organisation, having conversations, gathering stories and inviting further inquiry and exploration I am able to construct complex narratives that are at once descriptive and transformative through the process of their co-construction and the conversations that they make possible. By continuously reflecting on my own interpretation of these stories, I am able to pick apart my own possible biases and explore options for addressing them.

While all this is ongoing, I find myself experiencing anxiety. Time appears to be passing by and I do not yet feel that I have managed to set up the kinds of conversational processes that I feel I ought to be setting up. While I am furiously going about having conversations with those around me, I do not feel that I have even come close to achieving the level of reflection that is required to really enable those involved to gain deeper insights into the ways that they themselves are co-re-creating the situations that frustrate them. Furthermore, I have not yet managed to engage myself at the zone level in the way that I feel is required to enable me to gather stories and deepen my understanding of the particular qualities of the patterns of communicative interaction at these levels. Getting an experiential grounding at this level, I believe, is going to be integral for developing any meaningful transformative processes within the organisation.

As I gradually move into the zone level, I will continue with my conversations, inviting those around me into inquiry, encouraging the uptake of action research processes and reflecting on the continuously unfolding patterns of interaction, power relating around me and the ways in which ideology and identity shape and are shaped by all this… Let’s see where this takes us.

since I’ve been back

It’s now officially more than a week since I’ve been back at Seva Mandir and things are quickly entering what could be called ‘full swing’. I’ve been taking out a lot of time for reflection and reflective writing and I’ve also been very busy having conversations with those around me. A few days after arriving I came across the work of Chris Mowles who has been using Stacey’s work on complex responsive processes (Stacey 2000) in international development contexts. Chris also has a blog (Reflexivepractice) that is certainly worth checking out for those interested in such issues. Since then, we’ve exchanged a few mails exploring these ideas and this has proved quite thought-provoking. I suppose I am quite struck by the fact that we live in an age where such connection is possible and that someone I have never met is so ready to take the time and effort to communicate with me. So thank you Chris!

Back to the nitty-gritty of my life and work over here… All is going well. Through the various conversations I have had so far with staff from across the organisation, I have been busy trying to communicate the nature of my inquiry. I have identified multiple opportunities for collaboration though I am still not clear on how to procede with any of them. For the most part I can see opportunities for taking up approaches broadly modelled on Participatory Action Research (see the Annex to my learning plan for a brief description) within the organisation. However, as I continue exploring, conversing and reflecting, I find myself increasingly drawn to using insights drawn from the theory of complex responsive processes to frame my work and research.

During a conversation with the CE, I was advised to focus my efforts on the zone level. This is Seva Mandir’s front-line responsible for field level implementation – and, therefore, arguably for making social change happen. Clearly then, their capacity is key. I must admit that the idea of engaging at the zone level is one that I have found tempting for a long time – precisely for this reason. While I continue to be excited by the idea of working at this level, I feel more aware than ever that the very idea of capacity needs to be considered very carefully. Indeed, as I wrote in a recent mail that I

believe that the ‘problem at the zone level’ is not simply a problem of the zone at all. It is, rather, a problem embedded in the way that the interplay of power relations, ideology (including what is considered legitimate and what isn’t), conversational themes (e.g. performance, reporting, etc.), identity (e.g. within the organsiation) and its associated patterns (perceived or real) of exclusion and inclusion create dysfunctional patterns of interaction across the organisation. If this is really the case, then it is to the nature of these patterns and the role we each play in either perpetuating or transforming them that efforts need to be directed if substantial change is to be realised.

After quite a lot of practice I think I am starting to think – and see the world – in terms of complex responsive processes. While this has enabled me to see a range of limitations in many other, more systems-based approaches, I can’t quite bring myself to reject such approaches fully. Furthermore, I find that the whole domain of participatory action research holds a great deal of potential when used as a vehicle for learning about how to bring about change. The complex responsive processes approach, however, seems to be particularly useful as a way of understanding the interpersonal dynamics that are going on all the time. These dynamics intersect (through all manner of communicative interactions – not just conversations) with the kind of systems-based thinking that, although not generally made explicit, underlies the way that work is conceptualised, articulated, assigned and judged… apparently quite often with confoundingly counterproductive consequences!

Delwara, the gem that it is, has already provided me with a valuable opportunity to try and explore the usefulness of the CRP way of understanding – and hopefully transforming – organisational life. There will be more to follow on how this went very soon. In the meanwhile, I hope to spend some time in the coming days making field visits and spending as much time as possible with zone staff, chatting with them and examinging the ways that they participate in the patterns of communicative interaction that they are a part of. I also plan to pay special attention to the way that the day-to-day lived realities of the field staff intersect with systems-based models – in terms of both confluences (where there is synergy) and collisions (where there is tension, anxiety and frustration). It will be particularly interesting to observe the way that power dynamics play out amongst different groups of staff and the different ways that people resist, comply and, more generally, participate in reproducing or transforming the patterns of communicative interaction that they co-create. And, of course, at the end of the day, we’ll be wanting to look at just how all this translates into more positive change on the ground… won’t we?

getting back on track

After my more than 3 months in England, replete with my first term at IDS and some quality time with my family, I’m now back at Seva Mandir, Udaipur.

Without losing time I’ve pretty much dived into work, trying to make sense of what I might be able to do now that I’m back. So far this has included talking informally to a number of programme heads, sitting in on a programme meeting, chatting to friends and co-workers, and making a field visit to Delwara (where I was formerly posted). This has already proved interesting and has yielded a wealth of potential entry points for my involvement in processes of collective learning and change. I will be writing more on this soon.

I’ve also submitted my two papers that were due and they are available here.

The first paper (5000 words) is on capacity development. It begins by exploring the concepts of capacity and capacity development through contemporary theoretical debates and then presents a case study based on my own experience in Seva Mandir. It then concludes with some key insights into the practice of capacity development based on this:
1) Understanding and Enhancing Capacity Development: Insights from Theory and Practice

The second paper (2500 words) provides a broad outline of the inquiry that I will be conducting during my time at Seva Mandir. It includes a justification for the inquiry and outlines the particular approach that I am taking – including methods and techniques and the process I will follow for initiating my inquiry in Seva Mandir. The Annex provides a summary of some of the key participatory inquiry/action research methodologies that I intend to use as part of my inquiry.
1) Learning Process and Plan: An Inquiry into the Facilitation of Organisational and Social Learning and Change
2) Learning Process and Plan: Annex

More to follow soon on how my work here is unfolding… it’s getting more exciting by the day!

such a big difference?

As I slowly prepare myself for the work I will be doing upon my return to Seva Mandir, I have been doing my best to get whatever I can out of google books. As elaborated in my Analtical Paper and also alluded to in an earlier post, I am finding myself deeply interested in the work, on the one hand, of Ralph Stacey (and others who subscribe to the theory of complex responsive processes), on the other, of John Heron and Peter Reason (whose work focuses on participative inquiry, including cooperative inquiry). The similarities between the work of these two parties keeps on striking me as greater than the difference on so many levels. Nonetheless, Stacey’s band seem to repeatedly highlight that their approach, which has also been termed ‘emerging participative exploration’ (Christensen in Stacey et al. eds, 2005, pp.99-105), is distinct from action research and also distinct from cooperative inquiry.

At the moment, I’m not entirely convinced that Stacey’s band have done a good enough job of clarifying the distinctions – particularly given that action research and cooperative inquiry are continuously evolving fields through which new forms and approaches are continuously emerging. For example, it appears that one of the distinctions made by Christensen (ibid) is to do with the insider-outside divide – i.e. that action research (including cooperative inquiry) locates researchers as outside of the system they are supposed to be researching and involves them in making diagnoses on the basis of which changes to the system can be made. However, from my (admittedly) limited reading of the cooperative inquiry literature, this is not the sense that I have taken from it at all!

Perhaps what emerges most strongly as the biggest difference between the two schools of thought is that ‘emerging participative exploration’:

• does not require/involve setting up special cooperative inquiry processes that are distinct from the general ongoing conversational life of the organisation.
• integrates reflection and action rather than treating them as distinct elements to be cycled through.
• places a particular emphasis on identity, power relations, repetitive patterns of relating, anxiety, inclusion-exclusion, and transformation of patterns of conversation.

But what does this mean for me? For some time now I have come to construct myself as a ‘collaborative explorer-activist working for intersubjective improvement in the quality of life on planet earth‘. How do I decide whether I should frame my work in the Stacey camp or whether I should frame it in the Heron and Reason camp? Perhaps this is a silly question and I should frame it in neither camp but rather dance about picking the little pearls of wisdom, the insightful conceptual, theoretical and practical lenses that shine new light on the situations that I will find myself facing. I must say that I am particularly taken by the idea of seeing all my interactions – in both formal and informal spaces – as holding the potential for me to both understand the patterns that I am producing and help others understand the patterns that they are producing… and then using this as a means of disrupting dysfunctional patterns; of acting into being new and emancipatory patterns of interbeing.

drawing to a close

The term has now ended. Officially. Tomorrow my parents will come to Brighton and we will spend a couple of days together, talking, walking, looking, eating, laughing and connecting. After that, I will be heading to London where I will, with fingers crossed, successfully brave the process of getting my new work visa for India. My contract and invitation letters arrived from India this morning. It is with a mix of pride, humility and curiosity that I observe the contents of my new contract. It’s strange that I wrote it myself. What does that mean for the extent to which the content is understood by those around me? Either way, my new job title is Development Professional on Organisational Learning and Capacity Development. My new salary is Rs.25,000. The job title is glamorous and is really something that I have been aspiring for for a long time now. 5 years perhaps – although I wouldn’t have known what to call it back then. I have gone through all kinds of thoughts in the struggle to make sense of what my new role and position will be, wondering how I will be perceived by my colleagues back at Seva Mandir. Will the higher salary change the way people think of or look at me? What about the Masters I am pursuing? Will this be positive or negative? How will it shape the way that I choose to present myself or respond to queries on the same? How will this affect the way people respond to me?

Such reasoning led my mind here and there and one of the thoughts that consoled me was that I could really do some saving with my new salary. In the space of a year I would be able to save something around £2,500 and this will definitely be helpful for me in repaying part of my student loan. But before I can do this I will need to look into the complexities that may surround getting Rs. out of India and into £s. Another thought that had been naggling me was to do with the idea of getting myself a little house not far from Devali. It would be a simple house, made of stone, with a wood stove; a place to make a little fire, and a small garden in which I would be able to plant flowers and vegetables. It would be the kind of little home that I could go to whenever I would want to be alone; to reflect, to read, to write, to think about the world and my own role in it; to dirty my hands with the soil and the work of growing food. Perhaps I could keep some tools there and begin doing some of that carpentry that I so often think about. Perhaps even some painting? And what possibilities might this open up for me in terms of engaging with the local community? Who knows. Is this just a dream? A fantasy? Is it something I will really do? How would I balance this with my work? Can I bring in the kind of balance that I desire?

As these ideas circulate in my mind, thoughts of my work at Seva Mandir grow closer. In the coming weeks I will be piecing together a paper outlining my action and learning plan for the coming year. The paper will build on the Analytical Paper, outlining how I intend to go about putting the various theories that I have come across into practice. I am already feeling excited about this paper, wondering what kind of a form it will take and how I will be able to express ideas of which I am still uncertain. I suppose it makes it all the more exciting!

Meanwhile, I have been saying goodbyes. More than that, however, I have been sharing stories, thoughts, reflections, opinions, with those around me. As my time runs out, the desire to engage ever more and ever more intensely with those around me heightens. I feel, at moments, a little as though I have essential messages to communicate and that my time for doing so is quickly running dry. Admittedly, this is a funny feeling, but it is not a bad one. The conversations I engage in often enable me to connect with new people and new ideas that open new windows in my work. Some of these windows can be quite exciting, offering possibilities that had not earlier even been on the radar. What will come of these remains to be seen…

I have also been reflecting on my experience here to date and sharing these reflections with many of those around me. Today, for example, I had a long interview with Skip, a DPhil student who has been studying our course as part of his research. Skip has not only been a great part of our classes over the last 10 weeks but also a great friend and wise sounding board. Skip has always been a wonderful person to be able to spend time with. Skip asked me a series of questions which I responded to like some kind of a fountain. The discussion ranged from explorations into my personal history – who I am, how I became what I am, what led me to do what I have done, what have I done, what have I gotten out of the course, what were my expectations, what do I hope to get out of my year in India, what is my own positionality, and so on…

Answering these questions, through my own style of wild forest rambling, was quite a revelatory personal experience. It was almost therapeutic as I tried to be honest with myself about my own thoughts and beliefs; what I had learned; what I believed in; and so on. I discovered, for example, that I held a very deep level of gratitude to Seva Mandir for the opportunity, support and space that it has provided me in my personal development. I also recognised that there were aspects of my work and life with which I was not completely satisfied. I felt the strong urge to travel again – to explore without bound, in my own manner, seeking out that which calls me – people, places, organisations, ideas, experiences – all that will take me to where I need to go. I was almost surprised by the candidness of my declaration that I hoped that I would be able to get some distance from Seva Mandir once this year was complete in order to allow me to pursue these journeying urges. Not that I would want to end the relationship completely – that would seem both unnecessary and sad. However, the idea that I might be able to feel that I was content with my time in Seva Mandir; that I had helped to contribute something of value or – as I said to Skip – that I had repaid some cosmic (or karmic) debt to the universe; and that I would leave the organisation somehow stronger and more effective than it had been when I first arrived; was a powerful one, because I already hear the wider world calling me to service.

Complexity Power and Learning: Confluences for a Facilitator of Organisational and Social Change

It’s finally done!

My Analytical Paper ‘Complexity, power, learning: confluences for a Facilitator of Organisational and Social Change’ – the one I outlined here – is finally complete and available on-line, here. It has been quite a pleasure to write although I can’t help but feel that the depth I have been seeking just isn’t quite coming through. If only I could have written another 50,000 words…

On an other but related note, all my communciations with Seva Mandir have gone wonderfully and my new contract and letter of invitiation are most probably making their way to England as we speak. I am getting more excited by the day about the work I will be able to do when I return to Udaipur!

Now I must head off to hand in my paper…

Complexity and inter-disciplinarity

My first assessed essay during my time here at IDS was on the topic of how an inter-disciplinary approach to development can contribute to the development research and practice. I took advantage of this opportunity to write about the insights from complexity science into the workings of the world and then to point out that the real issue is to do with espitemology – what gets considered as knowledge – and whose knowledge it is. This leads in to a little rant about different forms of knowing and argues for a call to embracing the participative paradigm as a way of liberating the process of knowledge creation from its current fragmented predicament.

Click here to read!

What I’ve been doing

The way that can be described is not the absolute way…

— Lao Tse

It’s been a while since I last posted and so I feel the need to explain my absence from the blogosphere to the world. The basic justification is that I have been immersing myself in my MA in Participation Power and Social Change and, more specifically, the preparation of my Analytical Paper. The Analytical Paper is, essentially, supposed to be a kind of concept paper that can be used to frame the work I will be doing when I return to Seva Mandir. It will combine a contextual analysis, a conceptual framework and an overview of how I plan to go about addressing the questions that I intend to ask.

I won’t go into the context just here, but the conceptual framework seems worth sharing. Essentially, I will be locating my action research project at the theoretical intersection of three main domains: complexity, power and learning.
There are plenty of theories related to each of these domains and I have been seeking out the particular ones where they converge. This has led me to a number of texts that have quite significantly contributed to the way that I think about my participation in the universe – and particularly in social life.

So far my learning journey here at IDS seems to have given me a much more solid understanding of the more philosophical dimensions of the work that I am involved in. In particular, I have come to gain a more solid understanding of the idea of ‘epistemology’ – a word I had often heard, sometimes used but whose definition (and importance) I had never understood so completely. I have also manged to explore the linkages between knowledge and power and understand how participatory action research serves to transform power relations by engaging people in the creation of new knowledge.

I have also had the opportunity to explore Mezirow’s work on Transformative Learning:

“the emancipatory process of becoming critically aware of how and why the structure of psycho-cultural assumptions has come to constrain the way we see ourselves and our relationships, reconstituting this structure to permit a more inclusive and discriminating integration of experience and acting upon these new understandings.”

Combined with Hayward’s (2000) reconceptualisation of power as ‘the network of social boundaries to action’ and the very important observation that the very idea of negative freedom is absurd (she argues instead for a positive and political form of freedom), all this has amounted to a rather powerful set of concepts that have been making me continuously rethink the nature of and my engagement in the world.

On top of all this, I have been trying to familiarise myself with Ralph Stacey and the idea of complex responsive processes. Stacey has perhaps provided me with the most radical worldview of all. Three papers, all available for free, can be downloaded from his university website:

• The Emergence of Knowledge in Organisations
• Learning as an Activity of Interdependent People
• Affects and Cognition in a Social Theory of Unconscious Processes

Together these provide a fairly powerful explanation of the relationship between the individual and the social, consciousness and unconscioussness, meaning, knowledge, learning, identity, power and communication all from within a complexity-based framework. I have been doing plenty of learning by explaining and this has really helped me to internalise some of these new ways of seeing the world. I really don’t think I can think about anything the same way again!

In that fuzzy space where complexity theory, power theory and learning theory intersect, I will be conducting my action research; exploring the ways in which I can engage in conversations that bring about positive transformation in human organisations (both Seva Mandir and the communities). I think it’s going to be a lot of fun! The essay, however, which will only be 5,000 words, is going to be a bit of a challenge. So much to say, and so little space!

On a somewhat different note, I have been having a lot of really great conversations. Feedback – and the need for it – has been one of the recurring themes, as has the need to explore power relations within our learning group, and my Analytical Paper (of course)… Tomorrow will be the second complexity world cafe in which we will recap the last session, go over the concepts that had not been covered previously and then have some further conversations to explore what some of this might mean for practice… It will be interesting to see what kind of energy is present in the room as it will probably be my last opportunity to participate in one of these sessions for sometime I can’t help but hope that this process of exploring complexity gets the wind under its wings!

It is now way past my bedtime! Sweet dreams!