Spiral Dynamics is a system of interpreting psychological development in terms of successive phases based on the ideas of Clare Graves. Chris Cowan explains how peer to peer can apply at different levels in different ways:
“Successful P2P models require minds at a level where ‘peer’ includes both
information systems and emotive relationships among people. That doesn’t
necessarily mean a collapse of all into an egalitarian horizontal plane
– there are still more knowing and less knowing, more capable and less
capable – so a vertical dynamic remains in play. In addition, there’s
what we call an oblique dynamic which indicates the relative
ability/willingness to change and an openness to new knowledge, not just
information. It seems that FS (Green) views are the move-toward state of
many of the proponents of P2P as an escape from the dominance of ER
(Orange).
I do think it’s possible to have a version of P2P at the fourth level –
equals centralized around a universal principle that directs them and
which they live to serve – and perhaps a version at the second – equals
through kinship as collaborative parts of a whole in a hive-like
structure. That’s not what you’re working on, but all of Graves’s
deny-self systems (the cool colors) have a peer component within the
thinking. It’s the definition of peer that differentiates things, as
well as the expansiveness, abstractness, and remoteness of the field in
which the peers function.
The presupposition of many P2P discussions at your level seems to be
collaborative, open minds with a shared goal of building better systems
capable of adaptation and knowledge gain with individual ambitions
attenuated while individual rights increase. The pitfall is that open
systems nearly guarantee a mix of minds with multiple agendas – a hard
fact often unacknowledged. Some motives are overt while others are
cloaked. Thus, the motive field is a complicated one, and it is part of
the whole when the system is open to all and the distribution of systems
is ‘normal.’ Motive recognition and management is a challenge in the P2P
arena quite as much as the knowledge spread.”
(from a personal email comment)
Comment from Sam Rose, via email:
I know from studying over your work over the past year or so that you are familiar with the work of Clare W. Graves. I have been studying Graves’ work for about 5 years now. I appreciate your multi-layered approach to the concept of cooperation. I see Graves’ work being related to your 4 intersubjective types of inter-relating or cooperating.
I think there is not enough work done yet to know for sure whether the emerging “P2P” paradigm matches up with what Graves observed and labeled “F-S” internal/external systems. It seems to be a close match, though, IMO. Graves talked about how “F-S” valued honesty/trust/transparency. He described F-S as “Sacrifice (self) now in order for all to ‘gain’ now”. This has traditionally seemed irrational to people used to living in a world dominated by E-R-leading-D-Q industrial/market paradigms. That is, until technologies became increasingly accessible to the average person that made it more feasible for people to “sacrifice self now in order for all to gain now” in a truly decentralized F-S way, and made the benefits of doing so more tangible.
Howard Rheingold recently referred me to Steven Weber’s “The Success of Open Source” (http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/WEBSUC.html), and to the idea of a “hybrid between the networked, open, non-hierarchical,
self-elected pool of contributors and the much smaller and more
traditionally hierarchical final editorial selection” in open source projects. I think this may relate to many aspects of cooperation, P2P, peer production, open knowledge, open design, knowledge and information commons-based economies, etc. The smaller, traditional hierarchies in this paradigm only rule what *they* do with the resources they are refining from the commons, and the systems are st up so that what they do cannot destroy the commons, but only add to it. The smaller, traditional hierarchies emerge out of commons-based human ecologies and exist to accelerate refining and applying the evergrowing ocean of
human knowledge commons. But, the “hierarchy” way of human organization does not appear to be able to successfully dominate on a large scale cultures based around commons or “P2P” principles. Rather, the social hierarchy appears to be employed voluntarily on a small scale as a tool to gain sustainable benefit from the commons. Even businesses that seek to gain profit from P2P organization must face and accept the holism of themselves with the whole system of everything they are connected with. They must turn from “push” to “pull” models. And, they must learn to cooperate and collaborate with their customers, and their employees. They have to learn to turn them all into one big interconnected system. That is how Google, Ebay, and Amazon have all succeeded. Douglas Rushkoff talks about this in the beginning of his book “Get Back In The Box”. He talks about how an emerging paradigm in business is centering around this interconnectedness. Rushkoff uses the example of a holographic plate, and how if you break a holographic plate, each piece still possess the image in it’s entirety that was on the original plate. This is “parts reflecting the whole” seems like an emerging direction for business, for politics, and even for general post-industrial era life.