Beyond Leadership: Balancing Economics, Ethics and Ecology, Revised Edition

New-paradigm Thinkers: a Profile

The following are characteristics of new-paradigm thinkers.

Thinking in open systems in contrast with fixed, ideal states

Fixed-state thinkers believe there is an ideal condition that, once put into place, will solve problems now and in the future. Once the ideal condition is achieved, it must be defended at all costs. The fixed-state advocates carry the banners of fundamentalism, Marxist egalitarianism, free-market consumerism, western capitalism, and “New Age” communalism. Whenever fixed-state advocates become zealots for their particular cause, they lose perspective regarding the nature of change and become frozen and partisan in their view.

New-paradigm thinkers think in flow states and recognize that society passes from one plateau to the next. In doing so, they integrate what is appropriate from the past with what will be congruent in the future to move the organism and its respective subsystems along the human trajectory to greater complexity.

Integrating natural differences in an evolutionary flow

Millions of people are passing through different levels of development simultaneously. There are effectively different futures for different people. Across the globe, different segments of the population are looking into different “final states” at the same time. And for them, at that stage, the state is “ideal.” It is not ideal for the entire organism, however, not for the total human parade.

New-paradigm thinkers therefore search for the integrated ...