Understanding the Genesis of Theories of Change

And Their Impact on Solutions

Merry Christmas 🎄🧑🏾‍🎄💝

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One of the most compelling questions for transitioning towards a regenerative future is the question of how to make change happen. We seem to know what we should do while we are perfectly unable to do so.

Our theories of change are determined by the worldview we have. As Bayo Akomlafe says “the way we respond to the crisis is the crisis.

If we have a worldview that is inadequate - or wrong - our approaches to change will also be inadequate - or wrong. The result: we stay stuck.

The dominant worldview that we find in the WEIRD (western, educated, industrialized, rich, democratic) world is a mechanistic worldview. In a mechanistic worldview, the belief is that the world functions as a machine and thus can be improved like a machine. The result is that I look at the individual parts and try to make them more efficient. If I have a mechanistic worldview, I likely equate progress with technological improvement and economic growth. This worldview also enforces the idea that I am a separate individual who can't change anything given the scale of transformations we can pursue for a more flourishing future. Many argue that this is the reason for the sense of meaninglessness many experience.

An alternative worldview is a relational worldview. A relational worldview understands the world as a complex system. From this worldview, the planet is self-organized. This means that there is no single authority that orchestrates the system, meaning that the world cannot be controlled like a machine. It also recognizes that the whole is more than the sum of its parts. I am more than just my organs and blood circulating my body. Something new emerges - me - through the interplay of all the parts in my body.

From a mechanistic worldview, I assume that change can be orchestrated, controlled and that it needs to scale. From a relational worldview, I assume that change emerges through self-repeating patterns and that it cannot be controlled. Instead of assuming that change needs to scale, I can understand change as fractal. That means that when something or someone changes on the micro-level, this change also affects change on the macro-level. Change does not spread in a straight line of cause and effect but rather as a field, similar to what Rupert Sheldrake calls morphic fields. He states, for example,

"The more people who learn a new skill, such as snowboarding, the easier will it be for others to learn it because of morphic resonance from previous snowboarders."

In my understanding, the morphic field is the ether of fractals. The micropatterns in my own life repeat themselves as the macro patterns of the world and vice versa. If I am greedy and competing with a colleague, I find greed and competition in the world. The more I practice greed and competition, the more likely it is that there is greed and competition.

What I appreciate about the fractal nature of change is that it puts me in full responsibility to take action, which gives me a great sense of meaning in my life. I am not a separate individual. But to the contrary, I am a relational being, always affecting the rest of the world.

A third part of my worldview regarding change is if I assume that change happens from the outside or from the inside-out. The former means that to fix the outside - such as CO2 emissions - I assume I have to change precisely that part - like reducing fossil fuels. From the inside-out means I take my inner world as responsible for making outside change.

Theories of Change

In the following, I will give six examples of theories of change that we often find in sustainability. It's not an exhaustive list. Instead, you will get an overview of some of the most common theories. All these theories are grounded in a mechanistic worldview.

OUTSIDE

1- Tech

Theory of Change: technology will fix it. Be it climate engineering or a supplement to make me healthy. I don't have to change myself. Technology will do it for me: progress = technological progress.

Worldview: mechanistic.

Responsibility: technology.

2- Authorities

Theory of Change: politics and people in power will fix this. Or a doctor / coach / therapist will cure all my problems.

Worldview: mechanistic (and pre-modern)

Responsibility: authorities.

3- Higher Power

Theory of Change: I am powerless, and a greater being has the power.

Worldview: mechanistic (and pre-modern)

Responsibility. God (or the Universe or whatever happens to be your cup of tea).

INSIDE-OUT

4- Healing Trauma

Theory of Change: I need to cure my trauma, and only then can I live in a more beautiful world.

Worldview: mechanistic

Responsibilities: the individual

5- Changing habits

Theory of Change: my behavior is determined by my habits. Habits can be manipulated (e.g., through nudging) and changed. Because I function according to a mechanistic schema (trigger - behavior - reward), I am a failure if I fail to succeed by applying this schema.

Worldview: mechanistic

Responsibilities: the individual

6- Mindfulness

Theory of Change: Whatever happens in the world is equally good and bad. If I can become an objective observer without judging others or myself, I become at peace with myself. And if everyone does that, the world will be at peace.

Worldview: leaning towards the relational

Responsibility: the individual

All of these theories of change work to some degree. Until they don't.

The most significant shared flaw is that they focus on parts - on single agents (individuals, politicians, technology, gods). If we want to transition towards the Ecocene, we need to build theories of change grounded in a relational worldview that takes all agents into account.

One such theory is storytelling. Storytelling is a relational practice. No story, such as this one, is that of an individual person. Instead, it is that of countless people, places, materials, non-human beings, the weather, music, etc. We just forget to give credit.

I want to live a multi-agential theory of change. My lifestyle experiments are embedded in a context that is unique to me. At the same time, new habits of knowing, being, and acting may self-repeat through the morphic field as fractal patterns. I have neither complete control of my experiments nor no control. I feel responsible for everything I do, while I acknowledge that others are not individually responsible for anything because they are co-constituted beings. My dividual actions are a foundation for telling a different story.

🐒 Something Fascinating About Other Beings

Some animals can have offspring without mating.

📚Things I Enjoyed Reading

• Walking Each Other Into Stewardship by @Anna-Marie Swan - she captures the challenge of living as a relational self.

• Posthuman Knowledge by Rosi Breidotti

• Journal Paper: Meaning-making in a context of climate change: supporting agency and political engagement by Christine Wamsler

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