THE PARTNERSHIP WAY
by Riane Eisler and David Loye
For a long time many of us have been aware of something basically wrong
in our lives, but have found it difficult to do much about it since
we could not even name it or clearly visualize another way of being.
Indeed, most of what has been taught to us as history seemed to indicate
there is no other way. The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future
(by Eisler) takes us back to a time before these assumptions became
embedded in our psyches and our culture. It shows us there is an alternative:
another way of living, of loving, and of creating a world that is both
safe and exciting: The Partnership Way.
These are some thoughts from our new book with this title, written
to show how the ideas of The Chalice and the Blade can be put to use
through persona! study, group discussion and personal and group action
to accelerate the shift from a dominator to a partnership way of life.
Most of us are familiar with what The Chalice and the Blade identifies
as the dominator model. We may not have called it that, but we have
certainly experienced the pain, fear, and tension that come from a way
of living based on physical or psychological control.
Such control is part of the dominator model. This model lies at the
root of both war and the war of the sexes, both wife beating and child
beating, both the exploitation and rape of other humans and of nature.
The partnership model is somewhat harder for us to identify, because
we have only experienced it in bits and pieces and in fleeting glimpses
of what it might be like to live a different way. We have had few guidelines
for living in partnership through our schools and universities or our
art, books, and other media. On the social level, partnership is the
alternative to both patriarchy and matriarchy. On the personal level,
all interactions have the possibility of partnership, because interaction
based on mutual respect and empowerment, which is the essence of the
partnership model, can happen with all kinds of people in all kinds
of different settings. Partnership can be between a woman and a man
or between a number of women and/or men. It can be between women and
women, men and men, parents and children. It can be between organizations,
communities, and nations. It can even be with ourselves, as when we
decide that we are going to do everything we can to live in harmony
with our bodies and minds. And if we treat nature with respect, recognizing
our interconnectedness with our natural habitat, that too is a way of
living in partnership.
But how do we learn to live, work, and love in partnership when much
of what we have been taught -- from ideas like "a man should be
the boss in his home" to stories and pictures idealizing "heroic
conquest" -- are thought-and-action scripts for domination rather
that partnership?
The first step is to re-examine what has been presented to us as "traditional"
stories and images, and at the same time learn about very different
traditions that lasted for many thousands of years. This gives us a
new contextual framework, offering us alternatives to what we have been
taught as "just the way things are. "
The second step is to use this new contextual framework to create new
stories and images with which to write for ourselves new thought-and-action
scripts.
We can all think of examples of changes we've managed to effect in
our personal lives-like quitting smoking, or eating less fat or sugar,
or regularly doing some kind of exercise. Similarly, even the most entrenched
social attitudes and social institutions can be changed-like the once-prevalent
idea that slavery is only natural.
But to make these changes, it is not enough that we analyze and discuss
what we want to change. We must go beyond this vital first step and
learn by doing! Here are some specific ideas for partnership action.
* Media Action. Social observers increasingly recognize how much
of what we see in films and on TV reinforces destructive attitudes
and behaviors. The barrage of "fun" violence, mechanical,
conquest oriented sex, and the consumerization of all aspects of human
interaction serve to deny the reality both of human suffering and
of joy. Call yourselves the Partnership Media Action Group. Print
yourselves an impressive letterhead. Look for the good articles and
shows that express partnership themes. They do appear -- all the time!
Collaborate in writing letters of praise to the writers, producers,
network, local newspaper, sponsors-whoever and whatever will encourage
more of this.
* Art Action. The same dominator messages that win so much of the
media also provide the underlying messages of much of modem art. The
currently fashionable deconstructionism, parodying a despised materialistic
mass culture, is underneath its veneer of social criticism another
means of asserting that nothing can be done. Bring together several
local artists whose work seems to express partnership art. Work with
them to define for yourselves what partnership art is, then stage
your own pioneering partnership art exhibit.
* Education Action. How about the joint redesign of course curricula
at all educational levels? Whatever the area, work with sympathetic
teachers with experience in building curricula, then involve open
minded PTAs, school superintendents, and school board members.
* Economic Action. To encourage positive changes in the corporate,
government, and nonprofit employment sector, plan a partnership action
project on how the redesign of the workplace and the movement toward
a partnership family go hand in hand. For example, you can focus on
how if men are to share with women the caring for and nurturing of
children, parental leaves and on-site child care are needed.
* Environmental Action. The mix of the dominator model and high technology
is at the root of our growing environmental crisis. Action is essential
to raise consciousness about rain forests (the lungs of our planet),
the health risk of pollution and holes in the ozone layer, saving
dolphins, and resource depletion through wasteful overconsumption.
But as long as the notion of humans' right (and need) to dominate
and conquer nature prevails, we are like the legendary boy putting
his finger in the hole in the dike. Work to get across the basic partnership
idea that what is needed is a fundamental shift in consciousness about
the connectedness or linking of all life forms on this planet and
our responsibility in our cultural and technological evolution to
act in harmony with nature, rather than just to exploit it.
* Personal Action and Community Building. Remember, a group begins
with two. Choose a personal project, such as the creation of a partnership
relationship with someone you live or work with, a friend, and so
forth. Keep a progress journal to review together. Or together carry
out research, like making a list of partnership literature, movies,
or TV programs, and disseminate it through schools, churches, and
other organizations.
* If you have formed or are forming a partnership group, another
personal action project would be to have the members of this group
commit to form an ongoing personal and family support system. This
is not a new partnership idea, as it has been an important component
in many social movements, from Quakers to women's support groups.
It is a very effective and practical way of providing concrete personal
and family support, such as helping to care for one another's children
and bringing food and medicine if someone is sick. It is also a very
effective means of partnership community building. These local partnership
communities could eventually come together and form national and international
communities of mutual encouragement and support. Such links with like-minded
and like-hearted individuals and families are wonderful as a way of
enriching our lives and feeling more comfortable and secure, for example,
if one is traveling. Most important, they can be the basis for concerted
and lasting social action and positive change.
This article is adapted from the authors' latest book The Partnership
Way: New Tools for Healing and Learning, Healing Our Families, Our Communities,
and Our World.
It is in an easy-to-use workbook format and hundreds of churches, community
and women's groups, corporations, colleges, 12-step programs, and peace
and environmental activists are finding it a valuable tool.
Riane Eisler is a researcher, author, teacher, legal and social activist,
international lecturer, and community organizer. She has taught at the
University of California and Immaculate Heart College in Los Angeles.
She is especially known as a peace researcher and educator. Her book
The Chalice and The Blade: Our History, Our Future has inspired an international,
grassroots partnership movement. She is currently researching the further
implications of the themes raised in her previous two books, especially
the need for "softer", more "feminine" values such
as empathy and nonviolence to be manifested in parenting, education,
and the workplace.
David Loye is a social psychologist, futurist, systems theorist, and
author. His books are: The Healing of a Nation, The Leadership Passion:
A Psychology of Ideology, The Knowable Future: A Psychology of Forecasting
and Prophecy, and The Sphinx and the Rainbow: Brain, Mind, and Future
Vision. For nearly a decade, he was Director of Research and a professor
for the Program on Psychosocial Adaptation and the Future at the UCLA
School of Medicine and is a founding member of the General Evolution
Research Group, an international, multidisciplinary group of scholars.
Currently, David Loye is developing a new theory of moral sensitivity
in the light of new discoveries about the grounding of moral sensitivity
through brain research, human prehistory, and the systems dynamics of
human cultural evolution. He is completing two new books on the subject.
The authors are Co-directors of the Center for Partnership Studies in
Pacific Grove, California.
Copyright © 1996. The Light Party.
|
