Why weave networks now?

This blog originally appeared on the website of the Interaction Institute for Social Change.

“Connections create value. The social era will reward those organizations that realize they don’t create value all by  themselves. If the industrial era was about building things, the social era is about connecting people, ideas and things.”

– Nilofer Merchant (entrepreneur, business strategist, author)

Curtis Ogden, Interaction Institute for Social Change

Our new Communications Manager, Sandra Herrera, asked a great question the other day: “Why is network weaving needed now?” She wasn’t offering this as a doubtful challenge, but to help us to hone our messaging around why more people should consider the power of tending to connectivity in these times.

The first three things that occurred to me in answer to Sandra’s question were the following:

1. Isolation is hazardous to our sense of well-being; or viewed positively, connectedness is an important social determinant of health.
2. Crisis demands creativity and to be creative we need connections to others, and in particular to do bridging work with those of diverse experiences and perspectives.
3. Feeding other people with helpful and uplifting information and resources, and seeking this from those around us, can bring both light and warmth to a world that can sometimes feel is lacking.

To further flesh these thoughts out a bit…

We survive and thrive because of networks, both the ones that make up our amazing human bodies, as well as the larger social and ecological webs of which we are a part. These networks of different sizes and scales sustain us with everything from the circulation of nutrients to emotional support to the sparking of new ideas. When we are cut off, we can lose a sense of aliveness.

It is important to acknowledge that not every connection is necessarily good for us. We can be negatively impacted or harmed by those around us and by some of the information and energies that come our way. At the same time, it is also important to understand that we humans can be driven by a “negativity bias” that makes us overly vigilant about potential threats. While it might be wise to pull back into our comfort zone at times, hunkering down and only being with those who are like us sets up a trap of thinking and acting in predictable and limited ways. What’s more, if everyone pulls back, we lose access to latent potential and abundance.

Innovation happens through encounters with different experiences and ways of looking at the world. Sometimes to see clearly, we must over-compensate for our tendencies to shrink and stretch beyond our comfort zones to test some of our assumptions about the dangers “out there.”

The adaptive cycle (see image above) teaches us that as systems falter, unravel and release energy (which is necessary to remain vital and adapt to changing context), certain “critical connections” (to use the words of long-time community organizer Grace Lee Boggs) must be maintained. In addition, it is very important that investment be made in the seeding of new possibilities. In the human realm, this includes an infusion of positive exploratory energy. So-called “positivity” (see the work of clinical research psychologist Barbara Fredrickson, PhD) is not a pollyannish state removed from reality. Rather, it’s a stance of openness and curiosity that provides some balance to our negativity bias, which can help us to see possibility in other people and our surroundings for the sake of renewal and regeneration. In other words, the nature and quality of what we bring to and feed our connections really matters!

“Network theory suggests that what a system becomes emerges from the complex, responsive relationships of its members, continuously developing in communication.” 

– Esko Kilpi (sociologist, process management consultant)

All of this is especially crucial right now, as the forces that are consolidating wealth and power attempt to disrupt attempts to build solidarity across movements for justice, fairness and equity. The study of “flow networks” applied to economics shows that we have been in this kind of “oligarchic cycle” before. Oligarchies (rule by the few) and “oligarchic capitalism” (an economic system run by and for the benefit of the elites) maintain themselves in part through the spread of narratives that justify growing disparities driven by sociopathic and extractive practices. Ideas like “the divine right of kings / capital”, “supremacy”, and “survival of the fittest” still have many believing that those who have a lot (not to mention way more than they need) somehow earned / deserve it.

The antidote to this is sharing a different story rooted in the historical view that humanity has evolved over centuries through a sense of mutualism, sharing and pooling information, learning collaboratively and cooperating creatively. The “winner takes all” approach does not stand up to our understanding of what contributes to long-term human thriving. All the more reason to weave more intricate and robust networks of all kinds.

By: Curtis Ogden, Senior Associate at the Interaction Institute for Social Change