The belief in the existence and relevance of social hierarchies must be suspended.

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

By definition, hierarchies confer power on specific groups and individuals, with immediate effects on the ability of a group to learn and adapt to a changing environment (Deming 1984a & 1984b). Any form of hierarchy or power indicates dampened feedback loops. Power can be understood as the privilegeTo not have conversations because they make you uncomfortable is the definition of privilege. Your comfort is not at the center of this discussion.Brené Brown Power can be understood as… More of not needing to learn. Evolutionary biologists David Sloan Wilson and Edward O Wilson (2007) frameWhen we successfully reframe public discourse, we change the way the public sees the world. We change what counts as common sense. Because language activates frames, new language is required… More the effect of social power gradients in terms of the tension between altruismAltruismIntentional action ultimately for the welfare of others that entails at least the possibility of either no benefit or a loss to the actor.William Scott Green They began by asking… More and selfishness:

Selfishness beats altruism within groups. Altruistic groups beat selfish groups. Everything else is commentary.

This insight was well understood for several hundred thousand years of human cultural evolutionShe tells of a radical fringe of scientists who are realizing that natural selection isn’t individual, but mutual—that species only survive if they learn to be in community.Emergent Strategy: Shaping… More. The social norms in egalitarian cultures create the psychological safetyPsychological safety is a condition in which you feel (1) included, (2) safe to learn, (3) safe to contribute, and (4) safe to challenge the status quo—all without fear of… More needed for altruism to flourish. Early farming communitiesWhat I have always been hoping to accomplish is the creation of community.Community is magic. Community is power. Community is resistance.Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century https://www.amazon.com/Disability-Visibility-First-Person-Stories-Twenty-First-ebook/dp/B082ZQBL98/ https://www.amazon.com/Disability-Visibility-Adapted-Young-Adults-ebook/dp/B08VFT4R9T/… More were based on egalitarian principles. Even throughout the last five thousand years of recorded history, if we make a conscious effort to leave behind the cultural bias from the modern industrial era, we have to acknowledge the existence of a rich tapestry of societies without rigid hierarchical structures.

As long as social norms in our modern societies are shaped by an economic paradigm that rewards social gaming, individuals can improve their odds of success by adopting psychopathic behavioural patterns, and by claiming and taking credit for the work of others. Depending on one’s level of empathyEmpathy is not an autistic problem, it’s a human problem, it’s a deficit in imagination.We all need to work on imagining things we have not been through.Empathy, Imagination and Autism… More, beyond the façade of social success, mental health suffers more or less in the process.

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

Autism is a crucially, vitally, urgently needed human variation—a powerful corrective and counterbalance to the hierarchical, dominance-based mentality currently driving human society and the planet off the rails.

It makes the strongest possible case that autisticAutistic ways of being are human neurological variants that can not be understood without the social model of disability.If you are wondering whether you are Autistic, spend time amongst Autistic people, online and offline.  If… More/neurodiverse thinking and collaborating styles have a critically important role to playThere is nothing more human than play. Humans were designed to learn in play. In fact, nearly all mammals evolved this way.Play’s Power At our learning space, we provide learners fresh… More as an antidote to the currently dominant neurotypicalThe existence of the word neurotypical makes it possible to have conversations about topics like neurotypical privilege. Neurotypical is a word that allows us to talk about members of the… More social-ranking/dominance approach—a critically important role to play in bringing modern society back into some kind of sustainable balance, functionality, social justice, and sanity (which had always been the human normNormal was created, not discovered, by flawed, eccentric, self-interested, racist, ableist, homophobic, sexist humans. Normal is a statistical fiction, nothing less. Knowing this is the first step toward reclaiming your… More for countless generations).

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

Because autists reject all forms of social power we end up traumatisedIn expanding our definitions of trauma, we must make sure we see trauma as a structural issue, not just an individual one. Scholars now recognize what people from marginalized communities… More. Unless we have autistic people in our environment that support and nurture our sense of agency and intrinsic motivations, trauma may prevent us from learning how to trustAutists conceptualise the world in terms of trusted relationships with unique people.The beauty of collaboration at human scale The Autistic way of developing trust is based on experienced domain-specific competence…. More others and build eye level relationships. Note that the concept of a “flat hierarchy” is a neuronormative oxymoron. Either you tolerate social power gradients or you don’t.

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

Healthy societies have cultural practices that actively maintain a psychologically safe environment and thereby catalyse the free flowEntering flow states – or attention tunnels – is a necessary coping strategy for many of us.Fergus Murray People need to feel appreciated and safe, to give themselves to an… More of new knowledge, new questions, and new ideas. All social power gradients dampen feedback loops and thereby compromise learning and the development of collective intelligence. The human capacity for language has co-evolved with our capacities for curiosity and mutual aidPut simply, mutual aid is a form of political participation in which people take responsibility for caring for one another and changing political conditions by building relationships, networks of reciprocity,… More, likely weakening the role of social dominance hierarchies in human cultures.

In a psychologically safe cultural environment the neurochemical rewards for collaboration are greater than the neurochemical rewards for dominating others. Perhaps the evolution of collaborative and highly egalitarian cultures was catalysed by the presence of autistic people. Autists lack the drive to dominate, as well as the corresponding drive to comply with the demands of higher ranking primates. Autists retain higher levels of childlike curiosity (neoteny) than their neuronormative cousins.

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

The widely held belief that social dominance hierarchies reflect an unavoidable law of nature is a convenient ideological tool for maintaining paradigmatic inertia rather than a universal truthJustice, equality, fairness, mercy, longsuffering, Work, Passion, knowledge, and above all else, Truth. Those are my primary emotions.Very Grand Emotions: How Autistics and Neurotypicals Experience Emotions Differently » NeuroClastic https://youtu.be/uPRa6G2a48E… More. The following dictionary definitions are helpful to dissect and expose the myth:

hierarchy : (a) a system or organisation in which people or groups are ranked one above the other according to status or authority (b) an arrangement or classification of things according to relative importance or inclusiveness

authority : the power to give orders, make decisions, enforce obedience, and influence others

network : a group or system of interconnected people or things

There are two key differencesOur friends and allies at Randimals have a saying, What makes us different, makes all the difference in the world.Randimals We agree. Randimals are made up of two different animals… More between hierarchies and networks as defined above: ​

1. The connections in a hierarchy form a directed tree, whereas the connections in a network may form any kind of graph ​
2. A hierarchy always depends on a socially acceptedAcceptance means training mental health service providers to look at autism and other disabilities as a part of a person’s identity, rather than a problem that needs to be fixed. Acceptance… More ranking or prestige metric, whereas a network only depends on the formal definition of a graph

In other words, hierarchies always have a human social and political aspect shaped by human perception and culture, whereas networks need not. Whilst undoubtedly hierarchies have been part of the social furniture throughout written human history so far, the following observations are worthwhile considering before elevating hierarchy to a fundamental law of human nature, biology, or perhaps even physics:

1. Most of what we know about pre-historic human societies points towards highly egalitarian forms of organisation, and to strong social norms against any individual attempts to gain power over others
2. The digitally networked world has fundamentally altered human patterns of interaction, and has created information flows that do not adhere to any ranking or prestige metrics – even if there are some who actively attempt to reverse this emergentEmergence is the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions.Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds Emergent strategy is a way that all of… More behaviour within digital networks
3. By definition, a hierarchy is a social construct, and like all social constructs, it only functions to the extent that members of a group believe in its relevance and have a shared understanding of the specific rankings within the hierarchy
4. All human observations of the biological world are biased by our human perspective, including current cultural baggage relating to hierarchical forms of organisation
5. Referring to spatial containment in the physical world as a hierarchical form of organisation is a reflection of human grandiosity bias rather than a reflection of human dominance over the universe

The real challenges with hierarchical forms of organisation result from cultural inertia and from the extreme level to which humans are shaped by specific cultures.

We do not yet have enough evidence to know to what extent it is possible to transform large hierarchically organised social groups into non-hierarchical networks, but there is no shortage of examples (Laloux 2014) of groups that have emerged over the last few decades that operate on a set of principles that do not include a social ranking or prestige metric. It is conceivable that a shift towards non-hierarchical forms of organisation is a generational cultural shift that is only accessible to digital natives and those who are not deeply embedded in traditional pre-digital cultures.

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

A hierarchical organisation is the antithesis of a learning organisation.

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

A hierarchical organisation is the antithesis of a learning organisation.

This observation is backed up by evidence from thousands of organisations that strive to improve or establish a culture of innovation. All effective approaches for continuous improvement (such as Kaizen, Toyota Production System, Waigaya, etc.) and innovation (Open Space, collaborative design, etc.) share one common principle: The belief in the existence and relevance of social hierarchies must be suspended This is no accident. By definition, hierarchies confer power on specific groups and individuals, with immediate effects on the ability of a group to learn and adapt to a changing environment. Any form of hierarchy or power indicates dampened feedback loops. Power can be understood as the privilege of not needing to learn.

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

Power can be understood as the privilege of not needing to learn.

The Beauty of Collaboration at Human Scale: Timeless patterns of human limitations

Further readingThere are three types of reading: eye reading, ear reading, and finger reading.The Dyslexia Empowerment Plan: A Blueprint for Renewing Your Child’s Confidence and Love of Learning Most schools and… More,