1 Participatory practice

1

Participatory practice

Jane Springett

To be denied the capacity for potentially successful participation is to be denied one’s humanity. (Doyal and Gough, 1991: 184)

‘May you live in interesting times’ goes the old Chinese saying, and certainly that has been the case for us all recently. During the last 40 years, we have seen an increase in inequality in health and well-being, with wealth and power being concentrated in the hands of the few and, most seriously, an assault on nature in such a way as to undermine the very existence of life, including that of humanity itself. At the same time, we have seen rising demands for social justice with the emergence of movements such as #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter, reflecting a general rise in citizen organising supported by the internet. Former colonising powers are being asked to face up to their past, but at the same time, social cohesion seems to be breaking down as people become polarised, angry and frustrated, whipped up by those whose aims are to retain power for themselves, rather than for the many, through creating division. Add a pandemic to the mix and we were able to see the cleavages in technicolour and the contrasts highlighted by the differential impact of the virus on population groups, alongside excess profiting by already privileged individuals and corporations, but at the same time, an outpouring of self-organised care and support by communities and people for each other. Historically, humanity has been here before, wealth has been accumulated in the hands of corrupt tyrants, division has been fomented by dictators and civilisations have collapsed due to ecological disaster and disease. However, it is the global scale at which this happening that is so unprecedented, and for those who live in the privileged West, it seems that the advances made in the middle of the last century with regard to social justice are slipping away. We appear to be at a point of no return. For the last 300 years we have developed institutions and systems that have been increasingly based on the story of selfish ‘man’, and those institutions that have been created reflect that dominant story, reinforced by a particular interpretation of economics – the ‘free market’; also of science – Newtonian; and, finally, of religion – man is sinful, all based on the notion that humans are basically selfish. As Europeans colonised the world, this story went with them and this Western mindset was imposed on others, taking away what had previously been shared and appropriating the collective into private ownership. Increasingly, power has been concentrated in the hands of

the few: largely sociopaths who, as they acquired power and wealth, felt less and less connected to humanity (Bregman, 2020: 204), while encouraging those they dominate not to trust one another. Such is the pervasive mindset that appears to be co-creating the future at this moment in time.

Another world is not only possible; she is already on her way. On quiet days I can hear her breathing. (Attributed to Arundhati Roy and posted on www.ThisSpaceshipEarth.org on 29 March 2019)

This book is about how to co-create that future. A future that is different from the one we seem to be heading towards. It is about how to change the way we think about our relationships between one another – and also between ourselves and the natural world – and, therefore, the way we act in the world with others. It aims to make visible and encourage an alternative view of humanity, one that builds on the reality of human being. A reality that is based on kindness, love, empathy, connection and cooperation. The focus is on community transformation through participatory practice, which we see as the bedrock of moving forward to create systems and communities in which all our needs are met, for the many, not the few. How do we enhance diversity and connection, not by some constraining top-down authority but grounded in a participatory democracy? How do we acknowledge how we value each other, and how do we regenerate society and move from damage to wholeness? We create this alternative future by living with intention and visualising a different reality from the one we are seeing. Through raising our consciousness to a new level of awareness and understanding and, in doing so, coming to act in the world in a different way, we can bring into being that alternative future. To draw on a well-worn phrase: we have to be the change we want to see in the world.

For us, social justice goes hand in hand with ecological balance, and so we will be drawing not only on critical theory and community development thinkers such as Gramsci and Freire, but also on ecology for creating a road map towards a participatory consciousness and consequently participatory practice. We are not offering a toolbox for, as Bateson (1972) argued, ‘the map is not the territory’, but rather bringing to the fore a way of thinking about reality and, thus, a way of acting in the world. Our purpose in this book is to take you on a journey that transforms your thinking about participation. Our aim is that, in turn, this will transform your practice in the world. We believe that in becoming more critical of our thinking, our perceptions of the world around us change. In other words, becoming critical, developing a questioning approach to practice, challenges the taken-for-grantedness of everyday life. Attitudes that have been sold to us as ‘common sense’ no longer make any sense at all, and we begin to see beneath the surface-level symptoms that often distract practice to discover, in turn, an interconnected network of power relations that create inequalities. This is a hopeful and inspiring process. In that process, we become more aware that change is possible, and how it can be achieved.

On the journey, we will provide many examples of how participatory practice has been applied so far, in all its flaws, in the real world. These green shoots or seeds for change help to show what is possible. When we seek to regenerate a garden, we often have to clear the land. To do so we need to know what to keep and what to discard. We can then plan what we want to plant. But deciding where to plant or put our seeds is not enough, the soil needs tending to. In the last 50 years, it was thought that this was best achieved through tilling the soil and applying fertiliser and pesticides, but that is the worst thing you can do. You need to replenish the soil with mulch and compost which you lay on the surface. Then the myriads of insects and bacteria can participate in the process of improving the soil, to create an environment that is rich in humus and nutrients. In time the plants with their roots, flowers, seeds and fruits themselves contribute to the soil and gradually the system comes into balance. Underpinning the process of regeneration is a set of natural principles without which the seeds for growth would not flourish. Such a natural area is complex, there is much hidden; indeed, only now, for example, are we beginning to know that trees talk to one another, that fungi help to transmit nutrients from one plant to another. So, too, is the way current society operates. Much is hidden and complex.

Moreover, there is a great deal of difference between a garden that someone else has planned and executed than one that you have created yourself. When you create a garden yourself you no longer see it as an object but you are in a relationship with the plants and soil by the mere process of co-creation with nature and as a participant in the ecosystem. This is the essence of participatory practice. In this chapter, we will introduce you to some of the key themes that are interwoven throughout the book and that make up a participatory practice ecosystem. In doing so we will be creating a counternarrative to the one that is currently dominant, one that reflects and creates a different interconnected reality. These themes are the seeds for change, which in Figure 1.1 we present as the petals of a flower around its calyx, becoming whole. Each of the petals (or themes) contains some aspects of the other petals, and together they all contribute to the whole, the flower.

By the end of the book, as we develop these themes, the seeds will have become more recognisable plants, which you will be able to use to co-create, with others, your own garden, your own participatory practice. Before we explore those themes, we invite you to think about what participation actually is.