DEVELOPMENT OF ORGANIZATIONS AT THE HEART OF THE SUBJECT
Sociocracy is a difficult word to accept and use, business leaders and organizations in general point out to us. It was the philosopher Auguste Comte who used it first: “Deliver the West from an anarchic democracy and a retrograde aristocracy, to constitute, as much as possible, a true sociocracy, which wisely contributes to the commune regeneration of all human forces, always applied each according to its nature. ” (Positive catechism, 1852, p. 2)
When Gerard Endenburg, in the 1970s in Holland, qualified his social technology (inspired by systems theory), he nevertheless expressed the very essence of his vision: “socio – cratie = the power of the socio”, that is, the power of the people associated with the project. And in the Dutch culture, this word has all its meaning because the socio, the social fact, is a concept anchored for a long time. A collective conscience preexisted in the countries of northern Europe long before reaching other cultures today. It is therefore noble and natural and devoid of the negative connotations that could be attributed to it elsewhere.
From the 2000s, during the significant emergence of new levels of consciousness (green and yellow of The Spiral Dynamics) pioneers discovered this mode of governance, and they were keen to transform it and to multiply the appellations up to today: collective decision, shared governance, participative management, agile, etc. It was about making it digestible to communicate. However, the foundations remain the same. It is about transforming power structures to give back to the individual and the collective all its power and put it at the service of the entire organization.
This is why, we founders of sociocracy, we chose not to be afraid of this word and to remain faithful to the founding origins. We are, in fact, fortunate that its designer is still with us, to improve standards and practices.
Day after day, with humility and feedback from The Sociocracy Group, our organization, Gerard Endenburg digs, deepens, improves its science of the development of organizations to transmit it while keeping the original course: helping to transform the structures in which humans would be connected to itself and to all its environments, in freedom, respect and responsibility.
Sylviane Drevon
