Where's the Movement? Democracy as Empathy and Our Capacity to Take the Initiative
Greetings Compassionistas!
Here is a remarkable article from George Lakoff. He is a master at understanding how we frame and don't frame our language in ways that are meaningful and effective. What we are doing with our 10 Year Campaign for Compassionate Cities is right in line with what George is talking about. They are starting a campaign in California - The California Democracy Act. In this article he reminds us that democracy is based upon empathy. In the words of Barack Obama:
Democracy is about empathy - caring about your fellow citizens, which leads to the principles of freedom and fairness for all. Empathy requires both personal and social responsibility. The ethic of excellence means making the world better by making yourself better, your family better, your community better, and your nation better. Government has two moral missions: protection and empowerment for all. To carry them out, government must be by, for, and of the people.
Enjoy the article and please join the 10 Year Campaign for Compassionate Cities.
You can enlarge the article below (click on it twice) or link to it here
Here is a remarkable article from George Lakoff. He is a master at understanding how we frame and don't frame our language in ways that are meaningful and effective. What we are doing with our 10 Year Campaign for Compassionate Cities is right in line with what George is talking about. They are starting a campaign in California - The California Democracy Act. In this article he reminds us that democracy is based upon empathy. In the words of Barack Obama:
Democracy is about empathy - caring about your fellow citizens, which leads to the principles of freedom and fairness for all. Empathy requires both personal and social responsibility. The ethic of excellence means making the world better by making yourself better, your family better, your community better, and your nation better. Government has two moral missions: protection and empowerment for all. To carry them out, government must be by, for, and of the people.
Enjoy the article and please join the 10 Year Campaign for Compassionate Cities.
You can enlarge the article below (click on it twice) or link to it here
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Comment by Sahila ChangeBringer on February 1, 2010 at 5:15pm
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democracy - one person, one vote... I think we will move forward faster when we begin making choices in our families, communities, cities, countries where we really give everyone a chance to have a say, when we have "empty-centred leadership and decision-making" ... See the work of Meg Wheatley and Robert Theobald. I think the problem is that we have fallen into the 'scale it up' trap of private enterprise, capitalist profit making... this world - including governance - will work better when we keep things small and local; we face diverse problems which do not have a 'one size/shape fits all' solution and to impose anything other than unique solutions to unique problems asks for the continuation of the situation as it now exists. Just look at the political structure in this country.... because you dont have proportional representation, you basically have a two-party state (and the differences between those parties is neglible) that is heavily influenced (some would say controlled) by corporate lobby groups, which will only get worse with the recent Supreme Court decision allowing corporations to fund/influence political campaigns. Where is the average citizen in all of this? Almost completely unrepresented....
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Comment by Ari Cowan on January 27, 2010 at 8:56pm -
Jon — Superb. It looks like it's time for us to get to work. It would be worthwhile for us to consider the True Patriot Network and read The True Patriot by Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer. They provide excellent guidelines for returning to the empathetic democracy that George Lakoff proposes.
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