A quote from Col. Boyd taken from the comment section of Shlok Vaidya’s Thinking:
“On the other hand, if the group cannot or does not attempt to overcome obstacles deemed important to many (or possibly any) of its individual members, the group must risk losing these alienated members. Under these circumstances, the alienated members may dissolve their relationship and remain independent, form a group of their own, or join another collective body in order to improve their capacity for independent action.”
Quote from the commenter of Shlok Vaidya’s Thinking:
I believe we can build a lot of theory off of this concept. That we are all trying ‘to improve our capacity for independent action’, and with the information age fueling momentum, we will very well see that quest for independent action being achieved, or at least getting pretty damn close. We will see it in warfare, we will see it in business, in communities, in nations, etc. etc. Hell, we are already seeing it take it’s various forms now.
Anyhoo, back to the timeline… Interesting stuff Mr. Vaidya, and I will ponder my industry’s place on that diagram you have put together. Cheers.
via Shlok Vaidya’s Thinking » The History and Future of Warfare.
Col. Boyd is describing the relationship between the leader and those behind him/her. I have mentioned before that the enemy is behind the leader and not in front. It is that relationship of alienation and dissolving of relationship, of those behind the leader, in trying to remain independent, that makes them the enemy of the leader. The leader represents the orientation that is formed in an attempt to position themselves to an advantage of their environment. The leader, and those behind him/her, orients towards an advantage in the environment that is indivdually observed.
This conflict, between leader and those behind the leader, may or may not be primarily violent. However, as Tilly points out in the two quotes below from his Powerpoint, “violent conflict stems from relations that may or may not be primarily violent.” As those behind the leader continue to hold intergroup tournaments (Howard Bloom’s Global Brain) to judge the advantage that their orientation holds, those behind the leader can go independent. It is this independence (or the possibility of going independant) that makes them the enemy of those leading the orientation. Through intergroup tournaments, those behind the leader can conform to their (and not the leaders) independent orientation or generate diversity within the orientation. Both options make them the enemy of the State of orientation, which the indivduals resides.
•Violent conflict stems from relations that may or may not be primarily violent.
The second paragraph of Tilly’s Powerpoint shows just how dangerous, to the leader, humans can be.
•“…humans turn out to be interacting repeatedly with others, renegotiating who they are, adjusting the boundaries they occupy, modifying their actions in rapid response to other people’s reactions, selecting among and altering available scripts, improvising new forms of joint action, speaking sentences no one has ever uttered before, yet responding predictably to their locations within webs of social relations they themselves cannot map in detail. They tell stories about themselves and others that facilitate their social interaction rather than laying out verifiable facts about individual lives. They actually live in deeply relational worlds. If social construction occurs, it happens socially, not in isolated recesses of individual minds” (Tilly 1998).
via Tilly powerpoint slides
Tip of the hat to: orgtheory.net
In today’s world there are two ways a leader can react. The first is to Isolate the orientation from outside contact from the world. The second method, open their orientation to transparency. Transparency can be a strategy as well as a state of being.
The first method is used by States such as Myanmar. The second method is used by the forces for Globalization.
Transparency as a strategy can be used to hide what is inside an orientation. Transparency, as a strategy against the enemy, works because of two elements that are common to transparency (the state of being) complexity and corruption. The leader can use the complexity and corruption of the internal forces to adjust the friction between human interactions. What leaders cannot do is change the orientation.
All change takes force and all force, within an orientation, is internal and between individuals. This internal force is what builds structure and it is this structure that the leader needs to change. The leader cannot change structure. •“…humans turn out to be interacting repeatedly with others, renegotiating who they are, adjusting the boundaries they occupy..), boundaries are the structure of the movement. Those behind the leader are the ones building the structure, the leader is not.
The leader has force of command, but the force of the movement is in control of those indivduals behind the leader. The leader in todays globalized world uses the complexity and corruption of the movements internal force to control those behind the leader/s.
This complexity and corruption works with today’s connected world, not against.