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Participatory practice
which are, in turn, sustained by the third characteristic of ecosystems: cooperation, partnership and co-evolution. These latter characteristics appear somewhat at odds with the notions contained in Neo-Darwinism’s focus on the survival of the fittest, where the emphasis is on competition and profit that underpins the free market forces of globalisation. By contrast, cooperation, partnership and co-evolution are processes of integration and connection necessary for a flourishing world. These processes are further sustained by the characteristics of diversity and flexibility that enable ecosystems and communities to survive and adapt to change. Ecosystems are always in constant flux but there are certain limits to change beyond which the whole system will collapse. The aim is to reduce the long-term stress in the system: maximising a single variable will eventually lead to the destruction of the system as a whole; optimising all variables will create a dynamic balance between order and freedom, stability and change. This means accepting that contradictions within communities are signs of diversity and viability. However, this can exist only where there are strong and complex patterns of interconnections. A healthy community needs members who are aware of the need for interconnectedness, so that information and ideas flow freely through the networks to create a flourishing whole. Rather than a naïve notion of social capital that assumes homogeneity in community, it calls for an understanding that communities are contested spaces that flourish when practical strategies knit them together as part of a diverse, cooperative, interconnected whole.
Towards collective health and well-being through participatory practice The world will be different only if we live differently. (Maturana and Varela, 1987: 245) The overall aim of participatory practice is to promote a flourishing community that thrives in terms of health and well-being. This is the calyx of the flower whose petals we have unfurled in this chapter. Health and well-being are a matter of balance. The word ‘health’ itself means, in Anglo-Saxon, to make whole. To promote a flourishing community that thrives in terms of health and well-being we need a process of salutogenesis, that is, a process that revolves around making whole (Wahl, 2016: 143). Historically – at least for the last 200 years – Western society has viewed health as something that can be fixed, to be treated piecemeal. The body is separated from the mind, and the body is composed of parts, each of which is treated in isolation of the other, entirely material with no reference to the spirit or the unseen and unmeasurable. Moreover, an individual’s health is treated as if they are independent of the society of which they are a part, although, in the last 30 years, the idea of the social determinants of health has now much more traction and is well researched (WHO, 2008). However, while there is much known about the relationship between the health of a society and the health of 33
