GAIA AND DEMOCRACY
The World Wide Democracy Network (WWDN)
will link people and organisations wishing to contribute to the development
of a new paradigm of democracy and citizenship based on soft-systems thinking
and complexity theory. This has to be a process of mutual learning.
In The
Gaian Paradigm of Democracy: Roy Madron outlines his vision of a new kind
of democracy. The Gaian paradigm takes its cue from James Lovelock's Gaia theory
of the Earth, which proposes that our planet is a self-regulating system. Roy
argues that, like the Earth, human societies are complex, self-organising systems
- and only when we are able think in this way will we be able to make rational
and positive choices at the ballot box.
A very important paper on the impact of Gaia-style systems thinking on the reductionist-based theories underlying free market economics is Complexity Theory and the fundamental challenges to democracy in the 21st century.
Chris Lucas provides a valuable coverage of Complexity Theory and Self-organising systems.
GAIA AND GOVERNANCE
Systems thinking relating to Governance is covered in a paper from Demos.
System Failure:
Why governments must learn to think differently by Jake Chapman