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Value Memes at work in the Israel/Palestine conflict

 

I’ve been sharing an exchange offline with one of my newer and more frequent commenters, ScrewDriver, about memetics in social change.  The topic of Israel/Palestine came up as an example of a social challenge; could a better understanding of memetics work in this situation?

 

Quite possibly, in my opinion.  It’s not the first time the concept has been applied; it's been used with a modicum of success in South Africa, for example.

 

Here’s my personal take on “value memes”:

 

Values are an aggregation of beliefs that a particular cultural group adopts; in other words, a set of values are a collection of memes through which a culture expresses itself and its state of consciousness and emergence.  Conversely, a culture’s consciousness and state can be identified through its values. 

 

“Value memes” is a label created and applied by Don Beck and Chris Cowan in their text, Spiral Dynamics.  Value memes essentially are the same as a set of values, ethics, motivations that a cultural group has at any point in their development.  Beck and Cowan both based their work on Spiral Dynamics upon Gravesian psychology.  Dr. Clare Graves’ theory of human emergence has been described as "the psychology of the mature human being is an unfolding, emergent, oscillating, spiraling process marked by progressive subordination of older, lower-order behavior systems to newer, higher-order systems as man's existential problems change."

 

Note from the table below the phases of human emergence and the traits by which they are marked.  Of extreme importance to Graves’ and Beck’s/Cowan’s work is the understanding that human emergence is fluctuating and dynamic, fluid.  The history of the United States can be clearly seen through this Spiral Dynamic’s prism; we are now in the pendulum swing between red-blue and orange-green levels.

 

For example, humans both as individuals and as cultural groups can advance rapidly under the right conditions, or devolve even more rapidly under times of extreme stress (examples: Donner party, principle at work in “Lord of the Flies”, individuals regressing to childhood behaviors).

 

In particular, Palestinians have moved to a level of instinctual fight-or-flight (beige-purple levels) because of the severity of conditions under which they live.  At one time the Saracen (Muslim) world to which Palestine belonged was the global center of knowledge and erudition, at a time when Europe plodded in Dark Ages; what was it that caused this thriving, golden culture to contract over the course of a thousand years?  This regression and its potential causes exemplify the fluidity of emergence.

 

Israel exists at somewhat different levels (red-blue levels).  It has emerged from a state where its existence was always in jeopardy, to where it is threatened with damage but its existence is more assured.  Its economy also mirrors that state.  (Palestine, on the other hand, has virtually no independent economic power; it is not recognized in financial and property values any more than it is in politics, outside of its recognition for terrorist groups’ violence.)  Unfortunately, with each violent attack against Israel, Israel also regresses to fight-or-flight behaviors; the greater the violence, the greater the regression.  It becomes an unending downward spiral of regression between both parties.

 

It is the challenge for those that are in more secure, higher levels of emergence, to understand this pattern of emergence as well as its state of flux.  It is a challenge to find a common ground upon which conflicting parties can work; since values mirror states of consciousness, it is entirely possible that another culture is completely unconscious – does not SEE – another culture.

 

Albert Einstein once said, “No problem can be solved out of the same consciousness that created it.”  Until all parties in a conflict are in the same space of consciousness, find a common space of values, it is virtually impossible to resolve their conflict.

 

In this case, Israel must reach out and come to terms with the Palestinian consciousness; Palestinians must stretch and find that common space to meet Israel.  Can they find common place when they clearly exist in entirely separate states of consciousness, virtually separate worlds?  It will require sacrifice and effort by each party.

 

A potentially useful tool in situations where two groups do not share the same value memes is an intermediary who can “translate” between the groups.  The U.S. serves as that intermediary; it has a greater capacity for swing between the Israelis and the Palestinians, being able to communicate at both a level of physical and economic threat and a level of emotional belonging and conformism.  Recognizing this strength helps the U.S. make better use of this skill; seeing this flexibility as merely an application of carrots and sticks is tantamount to a reduction of negotiating tools. 

 

A challenge to the U.S. as a facilitator is its own emergent state; if it regresses too much, it runs the risk of not being able to function at the higher level of the two other parties it serves.  The U.S. has swung to red-blue value meme levels since the dot.com bomb, the beginning of a recession and 9/11; the 2002 elections may have been a symptomatic and reactionary shift to rebounding conservatism.  Will this contraction last?  Should it last, if we are to be able to take risks in order to grow?  Will the U.S. be able to serve as a flexible and highly diverse facilitator in world crises like Israel/Palestine?

 

We’ll have to wait and see; rather, we’ll have to consign this to our current consciousness, and be prepared.

 

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Stratified Democracy: The Cultural Dynamics of Nation Building in Afghanistan – presentation by Don Beck, contains an overview of Spiral Dynamics and may shed light on Israel/Palestine

 

Spiral Dynamics website – link-rich website with many resources related to SD and Graves

 

Dr. Clare Graves – excellent website covering Graves’ theory of emergence.

 

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Levels of Existence as Seen by Dr. Clare W. Graves
from... "Human Nature Prepares for a Momentous Leap," The Futurist, April 1974

 

Spiral Dynamics’ based Value Memes parallel Graves’ levels of existence

 

(Table split for ease of posting)

 

Level	Learning System	Thinking	Motivational System	Specific Motivation
A-N	Habituation	Automatic	Physiological	Periodic physiological needs
B-O	Classical conditioning	Autistic	Assurance	Aperiodic physiological needs
C-P	Operant conditioning	Egocentric	Survival	Psychological survival
D-Q	Avoidant learning	Absolutistic	Security	Order, meaning
E-R	Expectancy	Multiplistic	Independence	Adequacy, competency
F-S	Observational	Relativistic	Affiliation	Love, affiliation
G-T	All learning systems open	Systemic	Existential	Self-worth
H-U	All learning systems open	Differential	Experience	??????

 

Level	Means Values	End Values	Nature of Existence	Problems of Existence
A-N	No conscious value system	No conscious value system	Automatic	Maintaining physiological stability
B-O	Traditionalism	Safety	Tribalistic	Achievement of relative safety
C-P	Exploitation	Power	Egocentric	Living with self-awareness
D-Q	Sacrifice	Salvation	Saintly	Achieving ever-lasting peace of mind
E-R	Scientism	Materialism	Materialistic	Conquering the physical universe
F-S	Sociocentricity	Community	Personalistic	Living with the human element
G-T	Accepting	Existence	Cognitive	Restoring viability to a disordered world
H-U	Experiencing	Communion	Experientialistic

  5:03:02 PM    comment []

Slow-moving Saturday

Looks like I have company this morning! 

Thanks for dropping by, pull up a seat and share your thoughts about GE/GM foods if you'd like.

I'll be hosting a chat from 12pm-1pm (as you'll note in the previous post), so blogging will be slow for a bit.

Doesn't help, either, that I've been watching James Bond movies with the kids until now.  Breakfast is now brunch -- grab a pancake while they're hot.  Want chocolate chips in yours?

 

  11:47:58 AM    comment []