The Alchemy of Democracy
Restoring the Soul to Culture
A Report from the Praxis Peace Institute Conference
By Larry Barnett
At the edge of the continent in Asilomar, California, a small group gathers to discuss the collapse of Western Empire, and the perils and possibilities that accompany it.
Sponsored by Sonoma’s Praxis Peace Institute, the five day progressive “think tank” draws participants aged 17 to 92 from across the country, and an impressive list of speakers and visionaries at the cutting edge of exploring a New Paradigm for the coming age. From progressive politicians like Matt Gonzalez, Peter Camejo and Tom Hayden to Global Activists like the Hunger Project’s Lynn Twist and activist Ocean Robbins; from the media-savvy Moveon.org and Yes Magazine to visionary activist Caroline Casey, attendees and presenters alike explore the realm of the invisible, the future yet to come and our place within it. From the heart to the mind, the intellect to the emotions, the conference provides the beginning of the road map to the future that will emerge when the dominance and destruction of the present world regime finally gives up the ghost.
The evening welcome session begins with remarks from Praxis founder and Executive Director Georgia Kelly, who sets the tone of the conference with a call to reject absolutes and open ourselves to really listen to each other. The evening then features Sam Farr and Lynn Woolsey, Congressional representatives, and soon to retire John Vasconcelos of the California State Senate. They all discuss the “old politics of cynicism” vs. “the politics of trust” and how shared power, wealth and opportunity are life-affirming and constructive.
The first day begins with music or poetry; it’s too early to think, feeling is enough. Presenter Lynne Twist begins day one on just that topic: “Enough”. Highlighting what she calls “The Myth of Scarcity,” Lynne elucidates upon the theme; how we are told when children that there is not enough. Musical chairs, she reminds us, “is an early lesson in fighting for possession and dominating others; the childhood game is followed by a lifetime struggle to accumulate and consume since there is not enough money, not enough time, not enough food, not enough land, not enough, not enough, not enough!” No longer citizens, we are now consumers. We must learn and live the truth of “enough”, she advises; only then will we be able to finally enjoy what we have.
Ocean Robbins, whose father rejected the Baskin-Robbins fortune (for him, 31 flavors was enough) in favor of moving his family to the backwoods and nature, is next;. This 30-year-old man displays wisdom greater than his years, one born of living amid the joys of nature and the desire to bring his appreciation of our place in the natural world back to us all. Through story Ocean illustrates our interdependence and interconnectedness. His combination of exuberance and humility beguiles us all.
Riane Eisler, author of numerous books about the development of culture, follows. She says what we feel in our bones: that the culture of domination and control, of bullies and victims, is too primitive; human survival is at stake, and cooperation and partnership at a global level is now our only option. She points to the family and how authoritarian family models are replicated in our choice of governing structures. Her current attention is directed international efforts to prevent private personal violence. The theme of the conference is crystallizing: partnership is the only viable model for the future.
For the afternoon we break up into small “café” discussion groups, each given a different question; the answers will be gathered and compiled after the conference, and distributed to the participants.
After dinner, Barbara Marx Hubbard, whose ground-breaking work in modeling human systems provides a framework for the partnership society envisioned, addresses the group. We are moving towards “synergistic democracy” she opines, where individual creativity will be for the benefit of all. She observes an evolutionary process taking place, where emerging connectivity between people will create islands of coherence and will jump start societal systems to a higher evolutionary order. “Evolution optimizes,” she points out, and so it will be with the human species.
Danny Sheehan, Pentagon Papers attorney and lead council on the Karen Silkwood case follows. A polymath, Danny not only cites the title and author of his sources off the top of his head, but the page number as well. His talk, “New Paradigm Politics” ranges from an analysis of the clash of world views to a discussion of the limits of dialectic and the categories of pertinent discourse. Touching on ethical reasoning, Natural Law, and the history of western civilization, Sheehan dazzles us all with his breadth and scope. In an offhand moment, he announces that our work will be difficult during the Kerry/Edwards administration, and announces that Bush is “toast”; the conservative elements in the Republican Party have thrown him to the wolves as his neocon religious fanaticism frightens them more than the liberal capitalist Kerry. Danny goes on until midnight for those of us with the stamina. The chill winds off the Pacific hustle the assembled off to bed, minds swirling into a restless dream world of new paradigms and possibilities.
The poetry of Sophocles, recited beautifully by Sebastopol Vice-Mayor Larry Robinson, begins the next day. The subversive wisdom of the ancients resonates with the architects of the future.
Corrine McLaughlin and her husband/partner Gordon Davidson, two of the architects of the intentional community movements of the 70’s, offer a discussion of “transformational politics.” True leadership, they note, “melds elements of hierarchy and inclusiveness to create the new institutions, using best practices to solve problems.” Outlining the elements for the new leadership, they note it will includes: non-divisive approaches, non-violence, long-term sustainability, whole-systems thinking, preventative approaches, internationalism, multiculturalism, equity and justice, promotion of self-reliance, transparency and accountability, and matching rights and responsibility. Real change takes time despite our “civilizational chronic fatigue.”
James O’Dea, former director of Amnesty International, and now President of the Institute of Noetic Sciences, brings his Irish wit and wisdom to the group in a discussion of “Social Healing.” Speaking of the need for the creation of a new grammar, a new paradigm, he notes an aboriginal saying: “We sing the world into being.” The center is everywhere, he notes, the “omnicentric universe” of 16th century philosopher Giordano Bruno. We really must listen to the heart and move away from “inattentional blindness.” “Causation,” he says, “governs; our new science is one of giving, forgiveness, conviviality and intimacy as we come to understand the molecules of emotion and how we interact with each other on the level of peptides.”
Meanwhile, at the beach, it’s high tide. We are off to another very intense day, and it is only 11:30 a.m! Minds are reeling; one speaker after another knocks our socks off as the level of discourse never drops, never diminishes, never falters.
Sarah van Gelder of YES Magazine, a publication devoted to the positive trends and events in the creation of our new society, speaks next. A co-founder, she catalogs the happenings; in every aspect of human undertaking the new paradigm is taking hold. The change is taking place, but the major media have no interest in telling good news. YES Magazine, she points out, tells the story we all need to hear so we know we are not alone.
The last presentation before lunch is given by Van Jones of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. Van is a 30-year-old African American activist working to change the dynamics in the “punishment industry.” Noting that the U.S., with only 5% of the world’s population, incarcerates 25% of the world’s prisoners, he goes on to offer that in the U.S. in 1980 there were half a million prisoners, versus the six million today. California, he reminds us, leads the nation in prison population. Of the prison population, 80% are non-violent drug offenders, and a disproportionate number are African Americans. He completes his remarks by announcing that this is his last public speech before the birth of his first child. He chokes up, his eyes fill with tears; “My first child will be a boy born in Oakland,” tears roll down his cheeks. “I won’t be able to tell him that he can be what he wants, can go where he wants or will find justice in his life.” We all are now crying with him. He ends to a standing ovation. We wander out into the sunshine and salt air, stunned and silent, wiping our eyes.
After lunch, Muslim psychotherapist Aftab Omer speaks about “Learning to Meet Hatred.” “Hate is part of the mystery of love,” he begins, “because the soul has a passionate nature.” He goes on to discuss the fact that hate is the soul’s reaction to unmet helplessness, and that human evolutionary strategy is built on helplessness. Accordingly, “the myth of independent individualism is tied to our rampant consumerism.” Hate, he says, is a profound state of self-absorption, in which the “other” is “disappeared.” True democracy requires the recognition and engagement of our differences. We must carry our own hatred, not project it onto others; we must “befriend our hatred if we are to overcome it.”
Fred Luskin of The Stanford Forgiveness Project helps us to find the way. His comments, delivered in a gentle, lilting manner, ask us if “we can be kind in an unkind world?” Anger and hatred, he explains, are not the natural state of self; in fact, all medical research shows that such sustained emotions take a terrible toll on health, as corticol and adrenaline ravage the body’s organs and systems. Happiness, on the other hand, lengthens life and improves health. “It is the power of forgiveness, practicing kindness, that creates happiness,” Fred concludes.
By now, the middle of the afternoon on the second full day, the alchemic brew is stewing in us all. We are no longer strangers. We are beginning to manifest the very process that we have been describing. Our oneness, our commonality, our goodness begin to overflow into the peptide realm described by James O’Dea. Just being with each other feels wonderful and healthy.
Café discussions take up the rest of the afternoon, as our small groups of five or six become a new family, sharing who we are, how we feel, and what we imagine. It’s lovely. After, we walk to dinner chatting like old friends.
David Korten, author of “When Corporations Rule the World” makes the evening address. “Plutocracy,” he explains, “is what we’ve been served, not democracy.” Democracy has been trumped by the almighty dollar, feeding imperialism. Step by step, he diagrams the inexorable progression of the dominance of the dominators.
Tom Hayden, founder of SDS and former state senator, speaks last. Like some of us, he’s turned gray and has some heart trouble, but is still a committed activist. His current focus is on the danger of the growth of a “garrison state” in large part fueled by a global gang movement. Filled by the ranks of traumatized young men, the gangs are the “byproduct of the failure of the civil rights movement to address issues of poverty.” He also focuses his time on a growing global economy supported by sweatshops. He awaits the next major social movement, which, he believes will “emerge from the chemistry of mystery and surprise. They (social movements) begin at the margins and then move to the mainstream, finally providing their own ‘meaning’ in the process.” He and a small group retire to continue the discussion late into the night.
Wednesday is dedicated to all-day workshops; we choose either: “Coming to terms with the energy of fear” or “Conflict Transformation Skills.” After dinner, Swami Beyondananda (AKA Steve Bhaerman) provides some welcome comic relief for us all with his humor, insight and word-play intermixed with culture and politics as he illustrates America’s “Electile Dysfunction” in “Shift Happens.” By now, the alchemy is self-perpetuating; the information and experience are transmuting our personal elements, not an entirely pleasant process as our own “blocks” and inclinations color the brew.
Thursday brings added heat to the process, as Peter Camejo, former Green Party candidate for Governor takes the stage. Not one for mincing words, Peter pushes all the buttons. John Kerry, he says, is “corrupted.” He (Kerry) does not disagree with what Bush has done, “just the way he’s done it. He’s the latest in a round of non-candidates in non-elections.” Unless the winner-take-all system is changed to an Instant Runoff system, he notes, we will continue to “elect” presidents with less than a majority of voter support. “When will we stop falling for the lesser-of-two-evils system and demand substantive change? Would MoveOn.org,” he asks “run anti-Hitler ads in support of Mussolini?” The assembled group sits in stunned silence for a moment…in our hearts we know he’s right, but our heads are not yet convinced. We are in agony.
Carrie Olson of MoveOn.org takes the stage, and concedes the system stinks. But her organization cannot tolerate George Bush, and despite Peter’s objections, prepares to continue the attack. MoveOn.org is bottom up, she notes. What comes next if Kerry wins, she cannot say.
Matt Gonzalez, President of the SF Board of Supes, and almost elected Mayor, proudly defends his Green party membership, and sees his near victory as no small feat. Cool and calm, Matt strongly supports Instant Run Offs. In this he agrees with Camejo, since the current electoral two-party winner-take-all system is designed to propagate itself. The morning session ends with everyone tied into knots. For some, it’s the tipping point; there’s no turning back, the alchemical mixture floods our hearts and minds.
The rest of the day is spent in a wide choice of workshops; the day ends with dinner and a party. Most gyrate to salsa, the dance finally providing an opportunity to shake and mix the thoughts and feelings brewing in us all.
Friday we say “thank you”, and close with Caroline Casey, who invokes the spirit of the compassionate trickster. Caroline, just back from Syria, is dressed as a Syrian. She looks like the Priestess she is: mysterious, alluring, powerful, magical. She speaks smoothly in a stream-of-conscious, cross-culturally interconnected web of myth, astrology, politics, humor and invocation to the gods. She welcomes the coming age, speaks of the forces aligned in favor and the “Dementors of Doom” resisting change. She reminds us that nothing can be done without help, (but also that we must ask for it), that our communion with the divine and the spirit that joins us all ties us to our past and future, our humanity and transcendence. She is a bubbling fountain of refreshment for the thirsty soul. She is Sheherazade. We are entranced, intoxicated, changed, in love. The Alchemy is complete.
