Conflict and cultural wars are a part of society. It happens when different groups of people have different values and beliefs. These differences can lead to misunderstanding and mistrust. When this happens, it can spiral out of control and lead to violence.
The content of this article and video focuses on the Spiral Dynamics Integral theory of human development, proposed by psychologists Don Beck and Chris Cowan and based on the earlier theory of Spiral Dynamics by Clare W. Graves.
This theory has been used to explain various phenomena, including political changes and conflict, economic development, and crisis. It is essential for creating bridges in organizations, marketing, and decision-making.
Spiral Dynamics Integral is a tool that can help us understand these conflicts and cultural wars. It can help us see the different values and beliefs at play. It can also help us see how these differences can lead to misunderstanding and mistrust. With this understanding, we can work to prevent these conflicts from spiraling out of control and build bridges between people's views.
Never Confuse the map with the territory! SDI framework is called the theory that explains everything in some environments. A Framework Is Just a Propose View of the world, even if it finds explanations for things!
If we go back in history, we can observe that the fundamental problems of modern society are the same as in the past despite our scientifical progress.
People do not get along on a large scale or do not understand each other. We still have wars, ideological or military. We have hierarchies of power, poverty, inequality, and modern problems like an environmental crisis. It has been used to shape different organizations and businesses around the world.
The word behavior in modern society points to a manifestation in the outside world. But what drives that manifestation is more complex to identify. Behavior is rutted in our values systems which are the invisible hand that shapes our actions. We have beliefs, customs, and principles that guide us.
These value systems are the filter through which every one of us sees the world and make decisions.
Different value systems worldwide today and in history represent different ways of thinking about norms and values, philosophy, family, religion, fashion, music, literature, politics, sports, and lifestyle.
SDI introduces eight dominant value systems in 2 tiers identified through history from their inception and followed worldwide in today's society.
The framework is not a classification of people, but every individual could have a combination of different value systems in continuous dynamics. One value system is not better than the other.
By looking at these value systems, we can better understand why people think and behave the way they do and where the conflict comes from.
The modern scientifical fields, including psychology, and sociology, are seen as a construct of one of the value systems called SDI stage orange. They result from a value system view of the world and are in the framework, not outside.
An example of a linear reductionist framework is Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs used in psychology and marketing. This framework is concerned with the stages of personal individuals' development and introduces several hierarchies of needs.
SDI could be better understood using the emergence property of systems and synthesis procedure, which is in reverse than analysis method. This means we first determine the group's value systems observable in history and follow them into modern society.
Then using the synthesis procedure, desegregate these emerged value systems into each individual. Spiral dynamics could be translated as systems in continuous dynamics. This is in reverse of the linear reductionism approach, which first isolates the individual from external systems and then searches for an explanation for the behavior outside or inside.
I discussed in detail in the previous episode that you can find on the youtube channel Management Of Complexity the Sintethical Holism (Systems Thinking) view of the world. The emergence is the property of a group of collective systems you cannot find by looking at one singular system.
You can see this in the case of ants, bees, insects, and humans. The whole group of ants behaves in a way observable, but if you take an isolated ant, you will not find any trace of this. A stock of birds is not the sum of the birds. It's a new whole with a mind-blowing complexity found in the velocity of each bird, the distance between birds, etc.
The first tear is represented by the colors: beige, purple, red, blue, orange, and green, in this order. Value systems of yellow and turquoise represent the second tier.
Tier 1 stages have the main characteristic that each Stage is created in opposition to the values below. Individuals from these stages see their dominant Stage as being absolute.
The stages swing from individualistic values that shape the collective and individualistic values for the collective in their development.
Each Stage believes that if their value system is applied to others, society will have a solution for most of the problems. This is the generator of human conflict because more than 95% of the world population has one dominant value system from tier one, inherited or induced.
Tier 2 stages begin with SDI's yellow value system, which is a complete shift in how we see the world.
Synthetic Holism (systems thinking) and the property of holding multiple perspectives simultaneously in everyday life. People in a stage before a stage need help to understand the stages after that Stage.
People understand at their pace from their culture, jobs, education, and each value system from tier 1 believes that is maximal. Value systems before Orange, including Orange, create opposition with the SDI core as a framework and react to the content of the SDI framework in opposition or by ignoring it. Let's talk in detail about SDI tier 1 value systems.
Value System Of Beige
The first color, beige, emerged in the individualism of prehistoric humans. Basic animalistic needs represent this stage value system as a worldview.
In modern society, this Stage represents the children's basic needs when they are born or humans during a famine in war.
Value System Of PURPLE
Prehistoric humans emerge in clans and tribes as a necessary way of protecting themself. These clans were bound by natural conditions, traditions, and spiritual beliefs. This new value system color graded as purple is seen today in the last Amazonian tribes or African tribes. In the purple values systems, sacrifice for the sake of the tribe, and ritualistic sacrifice, are required.
Value System Of RED
This starts generating another individualist opposite values system color graded as Red. This is about individualism based on brute force, which led to the creation of empires and people who wanted to conquer things for their gratification of themselves.
Spiral dynamics stage red values are about the survival of the fittest, personal power, strength, brute force, displays of toughness, being the boss, being #1, winning at all costs to be competitive to crush your opponents, solving disputes with ruthless force, conquering one's enemies, domination.
This Stage is observable in today's society in terms of collective and individuals represented by warlords, dictatorships, domestic violence, contact sports category, drug cartels, inmates, fraud schemes, violent movies, etc.
Positive aspects of red value systems are brazen courage, bravery, heroism, daring, competitiveness, ambition, playing it big, respect, loyalty for friends, pragmatic, direct, no-nonsense, getting things done, taking the initiative & ownership, personal willpower, passion, action, decisiveness.
In modern culture, SDI stage red is found in the following catchphrases:
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger.
Desperate times require drastic measures.
No guts, no glory. Just do it!
An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.
Because red value systems are about fighting to win the physically strongest, it's about emotion projected outside directly, primarily through anger in fighting with no remorse for the consequences.
Value System Of BLUE
In response to the red individualistic type of values system that led to wars and the imposing of the physically strong, people grouped themself. They emerged into a new collective value system called blue, represented by the rise of religions, ideas of family, morality, and good or bad.
The core value of the SDI stage blue value system is that absolute truth cannot be questioned and is transmitted through religions, culture, tradition, heritage, bloodline, and elders.
Good and evil exist with the idea of clear right and wrong, the individual's sacrifice for the collective's benefit, and the afterlife's religious rewards. Belief and the local religious faith are seen as a certainty.
Other perceptions of blue are hard work, discipline, duty, family values, law & order, justice, stability, and security. SDI blue is about hierarchy through bloodline, in which women have restrictions and clear social order. The idea of god and country led to patriotism., enforcing the borders, national identity, and cultural superiority.
Blue founds offensive profanity, blasphemy, freedom of dress & hair regulations, questioning the strictly literal reading of the holy book of its religion.
Stage blue societies emerged in feudalism, monarchies, communism, and socialism. You will find the exact mandatory behavior in society and suppressed emotion for collectivity's sake.
Several sayings of spiral dynamics stage blue.
Practice what you preach.
Actions speak louder than words.
A promise is a promise. Better safe than sorry.
Value System Of Orange
In response to the absolutistic view of blue, which led to religious wars, crusades, and persecutions of heretics, a new individualistic opposite value system called Orange emerged.
It is represented by atheism, business, money, and the introduction of the scientific method (linear reductionist), which replaces religion as an authority. Blue is about afterlife rewards; Orange is about rewards here and now.
This value system gives us democracy, free speech, and personal freedom in politics.
It is characterized by efficiency, progress, productivity, confidence, optimism, optimization, action, results, pragmatism, and hard work. Business, entrepreneurship, the mass market, sales, mass production, industry, rationality, logic, science, technology, and materialism are seen as evolution.
The desire for personal achievement is also made through gaming the system, complex manipulation, creative exploitation, never-ending growth, and winner-take-all mentality justification.
Orange imposes his view on the world as progress and truth through capitalism, the idea of competitive marketplaces, deregulation, and denationalization.
In modern society, physical appearance, consumerism, brands, celebrities, social media, growth and money, and scientific-based education represent Orange.
Linear reductionism science is based on the analysis method and sees its results as factual: through data, analytics, models, and peer-reviewed studies.
A corporation is the construct of SDI Orange, which uses strategic planning, risk analysis, innovation & creative thinking, results based on the bottom line that matters most, and hierarchy based on competence.
SDI orange value system alters all the other stages because it's the dominant system in the world through science, economy, financial market, capitalism, mass production, and the idea of money.
So to survive in the orange system, the other reacts in opposition or the integration of orange values.
Red can be confused with Orange because the power is in money, and respect is in brands, dress codes, and luxury cars.
Blue react without understanding how money works and tries not to spend the money using restraints from things they not considered necessary. They believe you can have money only through luck schemes and inheritance from others or good pay at the job.
In the next Stage, green can exist as a stage in societies where Orange has old roots or in corporate environments where good living is already there.
Catchphrases of Orange:
The sky is the limit.
They are learning while doing.
I can't entirely agree with what you say, but I will defend your right to say to the death.
We can kill two birds with one stone.
SDI Orange is about rationality, so it deals with emotions by ignoring them or chasing external pleasure to compensate.
Value System Of Green
In response to the Orange individualistic system, which has no remorse for the consequences created by chasing personal achievement, a new collective value system called Green emerged.
SDI Green value systems share ideas, feelings, dialoguing, teamwork, love, heart, soul, empathy, intimacy, kindness, compassion, liberalism, and social progress. Equality: gender, race, social conscience, supporting humanitarian causes, activism & protests, diversity, multiculturalism, cultural relativism, relationships, peace, finding common ground, harmony, and femininity.
SDI Green is about noble causes protecting the vulnerable, redistribution of resources, inclusiveness, tolerance, open-mindedness, cooperation vs. competition, creativity, beauty, art, crying, expressing vulnerable emotion, intuition over logic, and health.
SDI Green is represented by Vegans, vegetarians, liberals, progressives, Democrats, LGBTQ rights, gender pronouns, protecting minorities, post-modernism, feminism, and healthy work environments.
The catchphrases of stage green are:
You must be the change you wish to see in the world.
Love conquers everything.
All you need is love.
Let things run their natural course.
The green value system is about expressing emotions in opposition to the other value systems, Red(project directly out), Blue (suppress for the collective), and Orange(Ignore).
Because SDI Green is the last stage of tier one, this Stage should be obtained by integrating the positive aspects of other stages before. Different countries in the world have reached the SDI green faster by creating societies of green values, which led to new generations not integrating the stages prior.
This creates a lack of understanding of the complexity and mechanics of orange systems, which could lead to the rise of a canceled culture zone based on emotion, causing opposite consequences than the intent.
The natural SDI stage green is easier to identify with tier 2 understanding from SDI yellow. Stage red could create schemes to collect money for the causes pretending they are green with no remorse for the benefits of these causes.
SDI blue may look like Green because fighting for others enhances morality and is a collective stage, but they are not genuine for the causes of Green.
SDI Orange could use green values in companies to make more money to promote philanthrocapitalism causes so they can escape taxes and gain marketing, using green values to fight for.
Tier 2. Value System Of Yellow
The tier two stages begin with the value system of yellow, which focuses on wisdom and understanding, having multiple perspectives at once and shifting between them.
This Stage emerged 60 years ago with the development of Holism, Systems thinking, Synthesis, and nonlinear dynamics.
SDI Yellow it's about sustainability, the big picture, technical analysis, holistic analysis, creativity, outside-the-box solutions, ecology, and open-mindedness.
SDI Yellow sees that the modern conflict is caused by the rigidity and fixed vision of the truth of tier 1 stages, which cannot question their dominant vision.
Because the value systems of tier 1 are in opposition, their definition of evil and evil is also in opposition between stages. Fixed truths applied in mass are not solutions but the causes of problems.
Meeting people where they are in the spiral and building bridges between spiral stages is essential.
Sayings of Spiral dynamics stage yellow are:
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used to create them.
Imagination is more important than knowledge.
There are no facts, only interpretations.
Now let's talk about how each Stage sees a leader.
For SDI, Red is the powerful type of leader, physically intense and robust, direct with no nonsense., with money and an imposing look.
For SDI, Blue has moral values, traditions, and religious beliefs in the same way as the culture.
For SDI Orange, the CEO type, the entrepreneurs, the persons who made money using rationality, and people with academic degrees.
For SDI Green, the leader must talk about equality and compassion and connect with you. Must fight for causes like climate change, woman's liberation, and LGBTQ rights.
SDI yellow is about not searching for the leader before establishing the environment. A leader Is about not being bound to fixed rules and holding multiple perspectives simultaneously, masterievilemotions and rationality. All types of leaders should be taken into account, including everyone.
Now let's see how tier 1 stages see each other.
Red Stage sees Blue as hiding behind rules and fake morality. Orange manipulator and selfish hides behind politics and logical schemes to control others, with no guts to face combat. Green has no action, complaining and avoiding direct talk, and emotions as a weakness.
SDI Blue sees red as irresponsible and disturbing the community. Orange has no morality, respect for elders, an immoral dress code, and uses improper sexual language. Green destroys morality and religious belief with multiculturalism and LGBTQ rights, the definition of the devil against the scripture.
Orange sees Red as stupid with no rationality, just impulsiveness, the definition of narcissism. Blue has fake morality, fixed rules, immovable, not taking responsibility, and religion as a thing of the past. Green is dangerous because it interferes with endless growth, but easy to manipulate.
Basic Orange could not understand Yellow, a complicating factor seeing connections that are not even there. However, Orange will use the knowledge of Yellow and systems thinking for particular purposes in complex systems which require innovative competitive products. The climate change models, aviation, cars, and aerospatial industries use Orange-Yellow Thinkers.
Green experiences red as a dictator. Blue, with fixed religious rules, reduces people's freedoms, and Orange is impersonal and uninterested by the people in the organization. Yellow as cold individualists (confusing with Orange).
SDI Yellow cannot be distinguished by red, blue, or Orange. When the orange transition to Green, it is possible to understand the benefits of SDI yellow. An explanation for the modern conflict in workplaces and societies is represented by the transition between blue-orange values (conservators) and orange-green values (liberals).
Tier 2. Value System Of Turquoise
coming soon
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