How well do environmental groups work?

What’s the biggest issue for me right now? Effective action, and how to work with others. Recently, 3 members of our local sustainability group met to talk informally about future directions for the organization. Although all 3 of us are interested in sustainable development, we had 3 very disparate views about how an organization goes about carrying out a mission.

One wanted to focus on leadership development, helping people learn about systems thinking. Another wanted the organization to continue operating on an informal, adnoc basis, investigating the potential for various renewable energy projects. I expressed an interest in relocalization planning, an effort that has been launced in a number of communities around the world to respond to the ramifications of peak oil.

In a previous blog I discussed spiral dynamics and how it explains some of the variations in value orientations among people. Our sustainability committee members clearly have a Green value orientation. According to Spiral Dynamics, people with a Green value orientation:

• Explore the inner beings of self and others
• Promote a sense of community and unity
• Share society’s resources among all
• Liberate humans from greed and dogma
• Reach decisions through consensus
• Refresh spirituality and bring harmony

Sounds like sweetness and light, doesn’t it? However, 25 years ago I worked for another organization that clearly had a Green profile. All decisions were made by consensus, including the very difficult decisions of who to fire, due to the loss of a substantial amount of funds. The decision-making process was agonizing and inefficient. When I became director of the organization I knew we could not survive if we continued in our egalitarian decision-making mode.

Now, 25 years later I am again connected to an issue that I have long cared about. In the absence of meaningful action on the federal level, voluntary organizations are sprouting up around the country to work on community responses to sustainability. Renewable energy development, tree planting, and sustainable transportation are some of the initiatives that local folks are taking on. If we are to be successful, we must learn to capitalize on the strengths and overcome the inherent weaknesses of Green thinkers. On the strength side, Greens will be inclusive, welcome the expression of feelings, and idealistic about what can be accomplished. On the weakness side, the Green’s desire to please all people will make it difficult to move to action.

Despite these worries about the weaknesses of groups, there are positive things coming from some of the internet models. The development of Wikipedia is an example of distributed intelligence, where a large and diverse group of people come together to create a constructive resource. I am very curious whether the benefits of distributed intelligence can somehow be marshaled for community-based sustainability solutions. Stay tuned, I’ll report what I find out.