Integral Concerns Part I: Group Think & Critics

After lots of interesting discussion from Matthew Dallman, Dan Allison and also folks over at Generation Sit, I’ve decided to voice some of my concerns with the whole ‘integral movement.’ I’ve been contemplating all of this for a while now and started voicing some of my concerns with my friend Matthew Dallman after he decided to resign from a position at I-I/IU. Recent discussions have fueled my thinking even more and I wanted to share of my integral concerns in a few blog posts.

'Group Think'

After reading a blog post by Matthew Dallman on the concept of ‘group think’ and how he believes a certain group he was once associated with (my guess is I-I/IU) was exhibiting this behavior, I felt compelled to write about my experiences. Once I read some of the signs of group think or herd mentality, I certainly saw a lot of it in my own identification with the ‘integral community’ and from my own observations of others in general. I’m not sure that any group would be able to avoid such behavior per se, but the sites listed by Dallman do give some ways to help recognize and prevent it.

One of those ways is to think critically and be able to play the devil’s advocate when participating in various groups. Now I don’t have first hand experience in the particular meetings and communications Matthew spoke about, but did have some interactions with a group (online class) interested in Ken Wilber’s integral theory. I personally did not feel that our group exhibited a herd mentality regarding Wilber or his ideas; in fact we had ample discussions and different points of view being voiced constantly. However, some people were certainly more and less interested in being open to criticisms of Wilber’s theory and other viewpoints regarding his work. I have read at the Visser Ken Wilber forum that in many meetings Wilber makes sure to have people playing devil’s advocate to offer differing views and opinions, although again that is not first hand knowledge. Wilber is a smart man and I would hope he’d be very aware of this phenomenon and its presence growing in those interested and contributing to his integral vision. He states in his ‘A Suggestion For Reading the Criticism of My Work’ that “But take a look at the scholars who are the hosts and cohosts of IU. Do you really think these people are ‘yes men’?” Is that truly accurate? I wonder if some may disagree.

I can see how easy it would be to be taken in by this mentality because I have myself been there and maybe still do fall into it at times. I have found myself defending Wilber and his work without considering someone else’s viewpoint or evidence, quickly stereotyping others with broad strokes of Spiral Dynamics colors, ignoring others that just ‘don’t’ get it’ and wanting desperately to be a part of the ‘IN group.’ I think some of this could be healthy enthusiasm and common goals/values and some of it is just plain pathology or naiveté on my part. I certainly don’t feel it is Wilber’s fault but I would hope that he is very aware of the phenomenon and the droves of young folks possibly dropping out of school, quitting their jobs and leaving to venture out to the Integral Shangri la that may or may not exist as we fantasize it to be. Maybe I’m the only one that has experienced this and it is only my baggage but for some reason I don’t think so.

Critics

Something else that has been bugging me is the whole issue of Ken dealing (or not dealing) with his critics. In general I know that many critics have misrepresented Ken’s views often and I can respect Ken’s desire to respond to people that do understand his model. However, there was a series of essays written by Mark Edwards regarding an alternate (to Wilber’s) take on states of consciousness. I being the nerdy integral type am very interested in theory and enjoyed Edwards’s point of view. I personally think he was off in several places regarding Wilber’s model, but he made some great points in many places.

Shortly thereafter there appeared a ‘Critics Corner’ audio at Integral Naked. It was billed as a ‘Ken Wilber responds to his critics’ type forum and this one supposedly addressed Edward’s recent work on states. Well in my opinion is was a very weak and poor attempt at best at a true response to a critics work. I mean first of all Wilber hadn’t even read the essay! He constantly complains about people accurately representing ‘his version of integral’ and now he is responding to a critic without even reading his work. Come on man! So instead we have this con call with someone trying to sum up Edwards essays in a few minutes (a 50 page two part essay mind you) and have Wilber address it. Now Wilber’s response was helpful in my opinion and helped clear up some of Edwards’s issues but the whole method was just totally lacking. I say don’t bill it as a ‘critic’s corner’ but just ‘Wilber discusses states and stages’ and then have a true critics corner with the actual critics present for dialogue/debate or at least read their work and then respond. So I totally agree with Edwards response to the Critic’s Corner and hope Wilber’s comment that “what we posted on Integral Naked was NOT an example of this; we will be posting dozens of hours of critical debate at IU, however” will hold true. However as a Beta tester of IU, I have seen this ‘Critics Corner’ on one of the domains, but I’m sure it may or may not be there once IU goes live to the public.

Of course Wilber’s stance on dealing with critics has be pretty controversial as of late as many wonder where is the peer review and confirmation of AQAL going to come from? Enter the AQAL Journal of Theory & Practice, which will accompany IU and will have, I presume, scholarly work and applications. The question in my mind is, will this journal be open to the many integral voices out in the world or just those that are ‘AQAL kosher’ or ‘integrally informed’ as defined by Wilber and associates? It starts to make me wonder how can you develop a true university, ‘integral learning’ community and academic journal if it only revolves around the model of one man?

Part II to come…

Comments

[Vince]

Great post Dashh!

A few comments on your post:

1) I really appreciate your honest reflection of your own tendency to be "attached" to the model that Ken lays out. To me, that reflective capacity is at the heart of any true person (or group) that is trying to become transparent to him or herself.

2) As far as the group think goes, I really don't see that as a fundamental problem in the developing community. The problem I see is with people becoming attached to the model, not actually taking up transformative exemplars, and basically being dogmatic "integralists." I believe that is farily easy, AND, I feel like many of the people I work with DON'T come from that place! Part of the reason I think that is, is because we are basically around Wilber and his ideas all the time, and that seems to quicken the pace at which we disidentify with those ideas. Seriously, most of the people I work with are NOT group thinkers, and given the context we're in, we rarely get caught up in Integral jargon, OR dogmatic conversations. I appreciate everything Matthew Dallman has said about this issue, AND I feel like a lot of what he is saying is being filtered through his personal anger and what seems like an intention to "grind some axes." Also, although Matthew was involved with a lot of non-local communication with Ken, he wasn't actually physically involved with the day-to-day operations of I-I, nor did he have much contact with our work community, and for that reason I think a lot of what he is claiming about I-I as an organization is understandably misinformed and flawed. That isn't to say that there isn't some truth to what he's saying, because there is, but the strength of his statments (especially on his blog) are not congruent with what I've experienced.

3) Personally, I agree with you that the "Critics Corner" talk was neither helpful nor fair. I'm also hoping that IU becomes a little more OPEN in it's capacity to receive and use feedback and criticisms of Wilber's AQAL model. Shit, hopefully it will actually facilitate the emergence of a more accurate and useful map, not to mention help practioners put into practice the potentials that the "integral map" points towards.

I don't think that's going to happen without the "integral shadow" being dealt with (ie. becoming transparent to itself), and this shadow I think is just a much a reflection of our own tendencies as it is Kens. Fortunately none of us have claimed to be without fault, and for this reason I have a lot of optimisim about what we're doing here in Boulder, and what other thinkers/practioners are doing worldwide will have a positive impact on the world-at-large.

Keep on doing it dawg!

[Shawn]

Hey Vince,

Thanks so much for you thoughtful post. I really appreciate you sharing your experiences, especially since you are at ‘ground zero’ so to speak. I guess it would help for me to qualify my concern on ‘group think’ and say it is something I’ve experienced myself and get a sense of from the online integral community at times. Dallman seems to be more or less diagnosing I-I, and although I agree and value many of the points and experiences he has shared, I myself have had limited direct experience with I-I and those working there. Given that, I would not extend my observations to I-I itself, but it still would remain a concern and something to be conscious of as I-I/IU continues to grow and expand its influence.

I have traveled to Boulder, as you know, and met many of the great folks (unfortunately missed you!) working with I-I and did not in my limited exposure feel a ‘herd mentality’ was present. I’ve also talked many times with I-I’s CFO Huy Lam about a possible part time job opportunity and have had nothing but positive experiences with him. In addition, I’ve done a lot of research volunteer work with Barrett Brown of the Integral Sustainability domain of IU and again, a great experience that I’m continuing with to this day. I just wanted to make that clear and also say that it is very reassuring to know that I-I employees like yourself, Paul, Mel and others are very aware and have similar and other concerns about the overall community.

As for the concerns you see as paramount, I couldn’t agree with you more as my Part 2 alludes to some of those issues. I’m very glad that others are thinking about these things and airing their own opinions and observations to help us all become more aware of our own tendencies and blind spots when it comes to integral endeavors -whatever and wherever they may be.

Shine on,

shawn

p.s. Love Gen Sit by the way, great stuff over there man…

[elementstew]

As a resident devils advocate and harsh critic of the integral movement within IN (on the forum), I'm deloghted to see these kinds of posts. I hope it is just the beginning as I think there's a lot of work yet to be done. This is just a scratch on the surface, imo. I usually just refer to Boulder as the black hole as I've seen too many active posters go off to Boulder never to be heard from again. Hell, I even started sending them warning e-mails when they announced their intentions.
I haven't been to the belly of the beast, but I can read the writings on the wall and between the lines as well.

elementstew

[Vince]

Stew,

I would suggest before that before make any definitive judgements about the "belly of the beast" or "black hole", that you actually visit and get your own sense of what it's like. Otherwise your "reading between the lines" is virtually useless....

[Vince]

My previous comment is not meant to be harsh, but having lived and worked here for over a year, most of these kind of judgements (ie. people with little to no real physical exposure) seem totally incongruent with my (and others) experience.

[ebuddha]

Shawn,

I appreciate this post, as it is good to air and have doubts answered.

I remember reading, and I believe posting, on Matthew Dallman's post - I didn't quite understand what upset him, and the further idea that he mentioned (and I paraphrase - please correct me if I'm wrong) "integral is out there in the world, just build an integral theory place, no need for an integral university" made no sense to me.

I do agree with you about critics of Wilber - it's funny how many critics "don't understand" him - (according to Wilber)! (And thanks for the information about Edwards.) However, I can understand his feeling that he is ready to establish a concrete university, to move forward with integral ideas and promising lines of research, rather than always tread back around to answer critics, again and again. I suppose it is a balance.

Also of concern was Dallman's recent post about Ken "making it up as we go along". The one issue with spiritually based organizations that I've seen happen again and again, is that the leader/founder starts micro-managing all decisions, and doesn't allow an organizational process for ideas, solutions, fixes, etc, to bubble up from below. "What does Ken think?" being the then operative phrase, rather than "what will work?". I have no clue, of course, my exposure to IU and Ken being books, Integral Naked, and what I read online. I'm fairly optimistic that the "Deans" of the various areas of the University will have a lot of autonomy.

But Shawn, let's turn this around, as a thought experiment. Given that:

1. No organization is going to be absolutely perfect. Groupthink happens everywhere.
2. Integral discussions, practice, etc, is something you are very interested in contributing to WITH others -

what type of integral organization would make you very enthusiastic, yet realistic, to participate in, talk about, and be proud to be a member of? What would be different, in the power structure and feedback mechanism?

For me, it's an interesting question. And when I start saying, "well I'd do this, or I'd do that", when I actually follow this through to planning, I realize, that sometimes that wouldn't be so practical to do.

For example, (this is a devil's advocate view here) say that more attention is given to the Critic's Corner. How much time should a CEO, let's say, spend answering his critics? Once a quarter, like with shareholders? (And lots of questions will be repetitive of course.) Every week? You have to have time to build something new, right?

At any rate, just some thoughts and ruminations. Thanks again for the post.