Proper Change – A Path, Not a Destination

Proper Change . org dedicated website – click here

Proper change is a continuous process. “Change is the only constant”, and a well founded human society incorporates this truth into the foundations of its structures.

There are three important points to grasp about the ‘proper change’ that LIFE is proposing:

• The reform of our social and economic structures is to provide more effective delivery mechanisms, and at the same time are more accessible and available to the process of change in the future.
• The objectives that we propose are not imagined as final destinations, but rather as the next best radical evolution that we can imagine now.
• Our proposals are deliberately non-prescriptive in various matters, precisely because we understand and expect that the specific solutions to the specific manifestations of those problems will vary, and will be best prescribed in the place and time that they are experienced. Our determination to empower local communities is derived from this understanding.

LIFE’s primary objective is to create a more sustainable human society, and sustainability is dependent on resilience, and resilience is the ability to cope with change. As described quite elegantly by Mr Unger at the RSA, a “high-energy democracy” is vital, because it is the manifestation of humanity’s highest evolution: communal decision making. Our ability to make diversity work for us in collective decision making was forged in the adversity of evolutionary change. And LIFE’s proposals for the reformation of our democratic structures aim to bring us closer to the effective practice of high-energy democracy – not for it’s own end, but because it is a means to adapt and change without depending on crisis as a catalyst.

Proper change means focusing on the structures that shape our lives, with the understanding that those structures determine the framework within which all else is settled. There are millions of good people doing excellent work on the many problems that we have in our society, but we all need structural change to facilitate proper solutions. LIFE intends to provide the rallying point for everyone who can see that structural change is needed, and that structural change is what will enable a multitude of good works to bear fruit.

LIFE’s proposals are not a “blueprint” for modern society; they are a line drawing in B2 pencil, and they are supplied with extra paper, rubbers and pencils for all. (International editions are supplied with erasers.) The flexible, devolved, high-energy democracy that we propose is our guarantee that many solutions will evolve, and we will all be free to adopt and adapt the best solutions for ourselves. We propose reformation of our structures that enable radical evolution, and expects further reformation of the structures themselves.

Proper change does not acknowledge a closed list of options, and LIFE rejects the notion that we have to choose between revolution and the status quo. We believe that there is a nexus of aspiration and realism, we see that we can engage in proper change that builds on what we have, and is not constrained by where we have come from or define where we can get to.

Proper change will raise the ordinary lives of ordinary people, and that will be the criteria by which it can be judged. That standard is not confined to a material realm, but rather a greater ambition for more generalised involvement, empowerment and engagement by one and all in the common fortunes of all. Deeper participation in our common democracy, more abundant contributions of art and innovation, and the development of a common sense of purpose and outcome will be the true measures of proper change.

Join us to build a path to a future worth living.