in the decisions they will have made yesterday, last month, and in the last decade. When we discern that all human cultures have accepted failure as the cultural norm for organizations, governments, societies and whole civilizations, then the acceptance of perennial failure should sting our awareness to ask, “How is it that our species has sustained itself for so many tens of thousands of years?” And, “How would we apply those answers to our organizations so that they, too, become self-sustaining into the centuries and millennia?” What has been missing in order to answer those questions are the ultimate, timeless, irreducible, and universal values that underlie all human behavior — the source of sustainable decision-making and social sustainability. Using those three values will provide a constancy and consistency within the political dialogue that has been missing. Finally, the values that have sustained our species for over 250,000 can become the bridge for rational and effective dialogue between Progressives, conservatives, and liberals. It is our socially sustainable moral obligation to represent future generations as we dialogue about the design of socially sustainable policies and programs, today. Future generations must be represented in the discussions of the conditions and course of our future communities and nation. What is provided in The Progressive’s Handbook is an introduction to the socially sustaining empowerment of citizens, with pragmatic instructions how to form large blocs of public consensus. The security of civilization itself still rests on the growing willingness of one generation to invest in the welfare of the next and future generations.
species because they have driven our species with a hunger for an ever-improving quality of life that seems to never be satisfied. These values have incessantly driven us individually and as whole societies to explore our innate potential resulting in the progress of nations. b. The UNsustainability of Organizations. When we examine the history of human civilizations one startling fact emerges: All civilizations, societies, nations, organizations and their administrations and policies have failed. They all failed to survive! 2. Consider some of the causes for these organizational failures: None were founded on an intention to become sustainable. None were designed to become sustainable, either materially or socially. They failed because the three values that have sustained our species were not embedded in their founding documents and operational decision-making processes. Most importantly, all failed because they were not designed as “learning organizations.” Learning is the result of our urge to grow to improve our quality of life, individually and collectively. When organizations take on the three core values of social sustainability, (quality of life, growth and equality), they will necessarily become learning organizations to grow into sustainable organizations. They failed by not learning from their experiences, and did not keep functional libraries of wisdom to guide them. 3. All historic organizations failed to learn to adapt to changing conditions. Summary — The core values of social sustainability level the playing field between all groups of citizens in a democratic society. Being universal to all people of every nation, race, culture, ethnicity, and gender using these values prevents explicit and implicit biases in the processes of policy formulation and decision-making.
Do not be too alarmed if some of the spaces are at this point. Eventually it will become necessary to complete all the items. Because the project you are working on is already existent, your Team can begin working on columns 6, 7, and 8 simultaneously, if you so choose. The values in Column #10 always remain the same. They provide the final, unwavering criteria for challenging the social sustainability of every element of the project you are working on. In many ways, your work will be very similar to a post-mortem examination on existing policies or legislation; or, trying to examine a legislative bill or policy before it is taken out of committee and submitted to a vote. If you are a Progressive legislative consultant, you will then propose ways to amend the faulted bill or policy. In Column #8, you will want to identify the beliefs that brought the expectations in Column #7, and the criteria of fulfillment in Column #6. Having identified these elements in each column, now it is time to use the 3 primary core values, and then the secondary Value-Emotions to challenge each element as contributing to social sustainability or not. Sometimes you will come to a “Huh?” situation when you start discovering the beliefs that brought about this policy. When that happens, it is usually due to some unexposed assumption that was made as the policy or legislation was being written. Yes, this process is tedious, but it will provide lock-tight policies that will stand the test of examination by anyone in any nation, any time in the future. Sources of Knowledge and Wisdom — The sources of knowledge and wisdom used by the Design Team include: ● Using what the members know; ● Investigating historical and contemporary social research;