Mutual Understanding, Common Ground, and Overcoming Divisiveness plus Two of My Favorite Words
July 4, 2022 Two entries today. The first is about making the world a better place. The second is about two of my favorite words (spolier alert: also, partly).
Hello It’s Complex Readers,
I hope all is well and that you are not too overwhelmed by complexity. This week’s newsletter is two newsletters. You can scroll down and see where each one starts. The first one is about how understanding people in terms of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes can promote mutual understanding, forging common ground, and overcoming divisiveness. Fitting topics for the US on July 4th! It builds on the 6/20 newsletter about understanding people in terms of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes. In case you missed that newsletter or want to read it again, here it is
The second entry is lighter and about two of my favorite words that promote thinking complexly and systemically: also & partly.
Please don’t forget to share It’s Complex with anyone and everyone. Thank you!
A Reminder for Familar Readers and an Orientation for New Readers
Here at It’s Complex we think about and deal with the world’s many complexities—from global issues to individual experiences. The world sure is a complex place and it is easy to get overwhelmed. We end up glossing over complexity and postpone thinking about it. But much is at stake for humanity and for individuals. Let’s stop postponing; let’s embrace complexity and deal with it. At It’s Complex, we think about and deal with complexity from a holistic systems perspective. A system is a wider whole made up multiple, connected, and dynamic parts. So, we think about and deal with any complex issue in terms of multidimensionality, connectedness, and dynamics.
Multidimensionality refers to how complex phenomena are made up of multiple parts.
Connectedness refers to the varied ways in which complex phenomena are connected or linked. Systems theory emphasizes interrelatedness—mutual and reciprocal connections between and among parts and wholes.
Dynamics refers to how system processes are ongoing and can be played out in stable ways, as well as in varied, changing, and sometimes unpredictable ways.
For further details (or as a refresher), check out some of the first newsletter posts.
Newsletter: Using Individual, Social, Cultural, Bodily, and Environmental Processes to Promote Mutual Understanding, Forging Common Ground, and Overcoming Divisiveness
Thinking about why people do what they do in terms of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes has implications for promoting mutual understanding and forging common ground among people. It further permits understanding how all people are always distinct individuals and simultaneously similar to others. In turn, such understanding can be a basis for overcoming some of today’s rampant divisiveness.
Mutual Understanding and Forging Common Ground
Thinking about what people do in terms of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes enables us to know and understand each other as the complex creatures that we are. Understanding oneself and others systemically in terms of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes provides a basis for people to understand each other as whole people who are more complex than a unidimensional demographic label (e.g., gender, race, socioeconomic status). People can start to realize that there is more to someone than meets the eye, and that in some cases, still waters run deep.
Understanding people multidimensionally in terms of how individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes have been and are played out for them is a way of understanding, being aware of, and being sensitive to them. It is a way of understanding and being aware of where someone is coming from when they do what they do. And there is also a basis for mutual understanding because people are understanding each other as complex whole people in terms of common processes. Although individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes may be played out differently for different people, they may also be played out in some similar ways. The commonality of experiencing the processes in general, as well as some similar experiences of them specifically are a basis for mutual understanding and empathy.
When people get to know each other in terms of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes, it can promote understanding someone as a kindred spirit, and people may just find that they have more in common than they thought at first glance. At the very least, people can start to understand that other people’s action is complex and also emerges through individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes. In doing so, they might start to see some overlap or commonality in their experiences. Maybe they have had some similar social experiences, or maybe they do what they do for the sake of some shared beliefs and values. Maybe they lived in similar physical environments. Maybe they have changed in some similar ways.
Restorative justice programs facilitate meetings between offenders and victims during which they discuss what happened and what can be done to enable victims to heal. In the summer of 2019, CNN aired a series called “The Redemption Project,” which showed meetings between victims and offenders. I remember one episode about a police officer who had been shot by a 17-year-old. For years and years, the wife of the police officer thought that the assailant was a horrible creature who deserved the death penalty. But when she met him, she realized that it was not so simple. It was not the whole story. He was a complex person with a complex life before the shooting. She realized that there were multiple causes of the shooting and multiple dimensions to the event. It seems to me that she was starting to understand the assailant by finding out about some of his individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental experiences. Maybe she was also understanding him dynamically, as someone who could change. From our systems perspective, human action is made up of ongoing dynamic processes that can be played out in varied and sometimes unpredictable ways. As such, people can act differently or in new ways. They can change.
As people see similar individual, social, cultural, bodily, or and/or environmental experiences, others become less alien and there is space for mutual understanding and also for forging common ground. As people see themselves and others as similarly capable of change, there is space for striving toward mutual understanding and forging common ground.
Forging common ground is difficult in this age of divisive political rhetoric, tweeting, viral videos, cultural conflict, tribal identity affiliations, and the quick judgments of cancel culture. Discerning how individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes are played out for particular people may be particularly useful for forging common ground among people who disagree or are at odds in some way. Depending on your political inclinations, have you ever wondered why in the world someone would believe anything QAnon espouses or why in the world anyone would believe what one or another politician says? Have you struggled to understand why people may not want to get a Covid-19 vaccination? It is possible to understand and it has happened. It does not have to be divisive. Do you wonder if you could ever empathize or forge common ground with a criminal, including a murderer? It is possible and it has happened.
As pointed out with regard to systemic racism (in the three examples of systems newsletter: systems examples) research in psychology has long shown that prejudice and negative views of others can be overcome through direct contact and cooperating to pursue common goals. Engaging directly and cooperatively potentially provides opportunities for people to get to know each other in terms of the complexities of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes. In doing so, they can understand each other and forge common ground based on some shared individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental experiences.
Overcoming Divisiveness
Our systems approach to why people do what they do has implications for overcoming divisiveness because it provides a way of dealing with two fundamental dimensions of human functioning: 1. we are all distinct individuals and 2. we are all human beings who share some common humanity. These dimensions can both be understood in terms of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes. As distinct individuals, everyone’s distinct or unique structuring of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes contributes to their individuality. As human beings who share some common humanity, individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes are sources of our similarity and common humanity. Understanding someone in terms of how individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes are played out for them also enables us to see how people differ. It thus enables us to see and understand human diversity in terms of how common human processes are played out for different people in different particular ways. In other words, a way of understanding diversity is that it involves variations on human similarity.
Diversity is a complex aspect of the world that is certainly a hot topic today. During the course of the coronavirus pandemic, I learned that there were between 1.5 and 1.8 billion people in the world during the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918 (https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/1918-pandemic-h1n1.html https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/1918-pandemic-h1n1.html And now in 2022, 8 billion people populate the world!! I must admit that both the massive number of people and the massive rate of increase over just one century absolutely stunned me and still do. It certainly makes for a lot of diversity. In his book, Ten Lessons for a Post-Pandemic World, international affairs analyst, Fareed Zakaria (2020) posits that the post-pandemic world “is going to be far more diverse than ever before, with ever more types of ideas, industries, jobs, companies, and people. And these people are going to be of all backgrounds, races, colors, and creeds, believing in all kinds of gods or none at all. To succeed in this world, we will have to learn to manage diversity and gain strength from it, rather than feel threatened by it” (p. 143).
Unfortunately, diversity is all too often a source of divisiveness. Divisiveness occurs when people only see how others are different, assume that differences are problematic, and are threatened by others whom they see as different. Of course, many many people embrace diversity, see it as a source of strength, and are open to learning from people who are different. Nevertheless, seeing diversity negatively is entrenched in the world. If people understand each other as both distinct individuals and as similar human beings who experience common human processes, there is room for overcoming divisiveness.
Thinking about human functioning in terms of individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes provides a basis for overcoming divisiveness because doing so involves recognizing that all people experience these processes. Moreover, thinking systemically about individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes includes recognizing that they can be played out in varied or diverse ways. Maybe then people can see how diversity is suffused with similarity and that one way of structuring individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes does not have to dominate or come at the expense of other ways.
In addition, overcoming divisiveness can be fostered by considering how diversity and commonality can be played out in mutually supportive ways. For example, diverse individuals can contribute to common goals and some shared ways of structuring individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes. In addition, diverse individuals can mutually support each other as they pursue some common goals, as well as some distinct individual goals. The same goes for groups. Diverse groups can mutually support each other as they pursue some common goals, as well as some distinct group goals. It does not have to be a zero-sum game in which one group’s or individual’s success means that another group or individual has to lose out in some way. Instead, one individual’s or group’s success can contribute to the common good of the wider world in which diverse individuals and groups live and share some common humanity.
Some Questions to Think and Comment About
What do you think? What interested you, what struck you, what surprised you?
How can you apply any of this? How can you start to understand and engage with someone you disagree with? What are some individual, social, cultural, bodily, or environmental experiences you might share?
Try asking someone you disagree with about their lives to see if you actually share some individual, social, cultural, bodily, or environmental experiences. And even if you don’t share much, does knowing about their lives in terms of these processes help to foster some understanding?
What questions do you have about any of this?
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Newsletter: Here are Two of My Favorite Words
Also – in addition to, as
Partly – to some extent, not completely
“Also” is such a great word and I use it a lot. From a systems perspective, it is absolutely necessary because systems consist of multiple parts. Thus, “also” provides a way to emphasize multidimensionality. After identifying one part of a system, I can emphasize that it is not the only part and that the system also consists of another part, and also another part, and maybe also another part. Depending on the system, “also” could be repeated many times. It’s kind of funny because I used to assiduously avoid repeating “also” too many times in a paragraph, and I really worked to not use it in two sentences in a row. I thought that it was not good writing to use the same words too often in succession, or near each other in a paragraph, or on a page. But I am over all that now. I now find it quite useful to write “also” repeatedly to emphasize multidimensionality. I might even try using it more than once in a single sentence!
To emphasize that one part is not the whole story because the whole complex systemic story also consists of other parts, the word “partly” is also quite important. When thinking about one aspect of some complex phenomenon, we can say that from a systems perspective it “partly” contributes to or influences the phenomenon. And “in part” is a good alternative. For example, when it comes to individual, social, cultural, bodily, and environmental processes, “partly” enables us to emphasize the none is prior or primary. Each process partly contributes to human functioning. Each process contributes in part to what someone is doing.
While I’m at it, I will add that I also like the prefix “co,” because it also conveys multidimensionality. If something is made up of multiple parts, each one contributes to it. In other words, each one CO-contributes. Each one is a CO-contributor. I had a colleague who always said that he does research on “how the brain creates consciousness.” I have heard social psychologists say that they study “how the social context determines behavior.” I balked every time I heard either of those statements. I want to know how the brain CO-creates consciousness, along with other processes, such as cultural, social, individual, environmental, and also other bodily processes. I want to know how social processes CO-create behavior, along with other processes, such as cultural, individual, environmental, and bodily processes. (I won’t get started on problems with saying that any process “determines” behavior. We can grapple with causality another time.)
Insofar as consciousness is a dimension of human functioning, and insofar as human functioning is a complex phenomenon that emerges systemically through multiple processes, then consciousness is CO-created by multiple processes, rather than created by the brain alone. I asked my colleague about culture a few times and he always said that yes of course culture is involved. But then why didn’t he say CO-creates? I can understand focusing on one or another part of a complex phenomenon. But why not acknowledge from the get-go that it is one part and eschew unidimensional ways of speaking? The same goes for social processes—explain that you are interested in how behavior involves many processes, and your focus is on social processes. I know that it takes more time and energy to explain that the brain or social processes Co-create functioning along with other processes and that one’s focus is on one or another process. But it is worth the time and energy for the sake of complex understanding.
More generally, speak in ways that leave room for thinking about how multiple processes partly co-create any complex phenomenon. And if you are thinking about multiple processes, you can also think about how they are connected, and also how they are dynamic.
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Some Questions to Think and Comment About
What do you think? What interested you, what surprised you, what struck you?
What are some of your favorite words? Why do you like them?
What words annoy you? Why?
What are some other ways of speaking that promote thinking about complexity in terms of multidimensionality, connectedness, and dynamics?
What questions do you have about any of this?
This is great stuff. I was very moved by the reference to the documentary in which victims meet perpetrators. I am always so deeply humbled by such stories -- when victims and perpetrators are able to see that they are both human, they can sometimes forgive. I can't imagine something more difficult.
I was also taken by the idea that diversity can cause divisiveness. This is very true. The concept of multiculturalism is a noble one. But we forget, I think, that multiculturalism is about diversity within unity. We tend to focus on the diversity part, but not the unity part. We tend to think that "if we only had tolerance for one another" then we could have peaceful diversity. Tolerance is necessary, but not sufficient. Within diversity comes conflict. Without a mechanism to coordinate differences and/or resolve conflict, diversity can descend into divisiveness.
We tend to pursue diversity for diversity's sake, under the presupposition that diversity is good unto itself. It is not. Diversity is a means to an end. In evolution, diversity leads to natural selection and the evolution of novel forms. In debates, diversity leads to the proliferation of ideas and thus to the construction of new and better ones. In society, if people interact and coordinate with each other, diversity can lead to a better society. In each case, diversity is not the end; it is a means toward a larger or greater end. We don't focus on those ends enough.
I think that many of us know that the reasons for why people believe or think what they think are complex and that our differences have to do with so many different things. Can you give us some ideas about how we can use this knowledge once we have it to forge compromises or how we can bridge these differences? For example, how can we bridge the huge divide between the pro choice and the anti-abortion way of thinking? I have been reading many articles about who the anti-abortion people are, where they are coming from and the diversity among them. I understand why they think what they think and where they are coming from, but that doesn't lead to a solution about this issue. It doesn't help us figure out how to reconcile two very different concepts of what freedom means. How do we create systems that can encompass such a wide range of beliefs and values?