Behind my new website

Apologies to my readers – Vivacom, the Bulgarian internet provider I have been using these past few weeks, has been unable to give me access since the weekend. They simply are not able to process my request for increased capacity after I hit their limit (in only 3 months real time). I use it for my blog and downloading the odd paper – no videos. Visits to their branches are pointless – the telephone calls I make to their helplines don’t achieve anything except promises and, ultimately, admissions that they just have to wait for the request to be “processed”. When I come back in October, I will cancel my sub - and go wireless…. 

This week I’ve been busy with preparations for the new website, drafting for example this (rather long) intro -

The site has been created by someone who has, since the mid-60s, been involved in various forms of “development” efforts – first “community” and “regional” development in Scotland then “institutional” and “capacity” development in Central Europe and Asia – but who, with many others, now questions the very concept of development….Indeed the title I gave my second (more autobiographical) little book in 1995 was …. PUZZLING DEVELOPMENT

It was some 15 years ago that I began to feel the deep unease about the direction societies with which I was familiar seemed to be taking – increasing privilege, systemic corruption, centralization, ecological destruction, “consumerism”, poverty, privatisation and a failure of European vision were the things I listed in a paper I circulated amongst friends in an effort to clarify where I should be putting the energies and resources left to me. I itemized the people and organisations whose work I admired; regretted the lack of impact they were having; and then explored what channels we seemed to have for making more of an impact. A decade later – after the bursting of the bubble – I returned to the subject and beefed up the paper – the results of which can be read at Draft Guide for the Perplexed

WHAT BROUGHT ME TO THIS POINT - 2008 was supposed to bring us to our senses – to give us the sort of focus we last saw in the immediate post-war years when social, political and commercial energies were building a better world; greed and flashiness kept then in check; and “government” was an institution for whose efforts we had some respect if not pride.

Six years on from the most recent global crisis, such hopes and expectations are in tatters… the façade of democracy has been ruthlessly exposed by the latest debt crisis in Europe… and governments seem hell-bent on creating a dystopia of privatized public facilities, repression and gross inequalities which put JK Galbraith’s indictment 60 years ago of “private affluence and public squalour” in the shade.
A world of gated communities exists cheek by jowl with those inhabited by crushed spirits of millions evicted from the formal economy or in fear of that fate; politicians, politics and the media are despised as lapdogs of what an American President in 1960 presciently labelled the “military-industrial complex”. Welcome to post-modernity!

This website aims to examine this condition, explore how it has developed and how it might be tamed….The website believes in the importance of what the academics have taken to calling “agency” – that is, of people coming together to try to improve socio-economic conditions. Such efforts used to be national but now tend to be a combination of local, continental and global. Some of the effort is driven by anger; some by more creative urges - but hundreds of thousands if not millions of people are involved in activities which have been charted by writers such as Paul Kingsnorth and Paul Hawkin. They include a lot of social enterprise and cooperatives of which the oldest and most inspiring is Mondragon whose various ventures now employ more than 25,000 people in a mountain area of Spain.

But all this does not seem able to inspire a common vision – let alone a coherent agenda and popular support - for a better world.The knowledge base drawn on in this site is European of an anglo-saxon variety – so we cannot (sadly) speak much about, for example, the Latin American experience of development which, patently, has a lot to teach us.

Some of the conclusions which have brought me to the point of setting up this website -

Political parties are a bust flush - All mainstream political parties in Europe have been affected by the neo-liberal virus and can no longer represent the concerns of ordinary people. And those “alternative parties” which survive the various hurdles placed in their way by the electoral process rarely survive.
The German Greens were an inspiration until they too eventually fell prey to the weaknesses of political parties identified a hundred years ago by Robert Michels.
More recently, “Pirate” parties in Scandinavia and Bepe Grillo’s Italian Five Star Movement have managed, briefly, to capture public attention, occupy parliamentary benches but then sink to oblivion or fringe if not freak interest.
What the media call “populist” parties of various sorts attract bursts of electoral support in most countries but are led by labile individuals preying on public fears and prejudices and incapable of the sort of cooperative effort which serious change requires.

NGOs are no match for corporate power - The annual World Social Forum has had more staying power than the various “Occupy movements” but its very diversity means that nothing coherent emerges to challenge the power elite whose “scriptures” are delivered from the pulpits of The World Bank and the OECD There doesn’t even seem a common word to describe our condition and a vision for a better future – “social change”? What’s that when it’s at home? 

Academics are careerists - the groves of academia are still sanctuary for a few brave voices who speak out against the careless transfer by governments of hundreds of billions of dollars to corporate interests ……Noam Chomsky and David Harvey are prominent examples.

·         Henry Mintzberg, one of the great management gurus, has in the last decade broken ranks and now writes about the need for a profound “rebalancing” of the power structure - Rebalancing Society – radical renewal beyond left, right and centre

·         Economists who challenge the conventional wisdom of that discipline are now able to use the Real-World Economics blog.
·         Daniel Dorling is a geographer who focuses on inequalities eg his powerful Injustice – why social inequality persists.

 Think Tanks play safe – and….think
           Most Think-Tanks play it safe (for funding reasons) – although there are honourable exceptions. Such as -

·         Susan George, a European activist and writer, who operates from the Trans National Institute and, amongst her many books, has produced two marvellous satires – Lugano I and Lugano II
·         David Korton’s books and Yes Magazine keep up a steady critique.
·         Joseph Stiglitz, once part of the World Bank elite, writes scathingly about economic conventional wisdom.
·         The new Pope has the resources of the Vatican behind him; and is proving a great example in the struggle for dignity and against privilege.

How can a new website help? - It will identify the various efforts of the past decade to unite citizens under a common banner for the sort of civilization that rewards dignified work and effort. But it will also explore other, very different, visions – whether for political, community or individual effort – which challenge most of the conventional ideas about development and progress. 

Slow Books

I’m always on the lookout for good writing and liked a couple of sites I came upon in the last few days

First Public Books - a bi-monthly review “dedicated to books and the arts – created by and for a transnational community of writers, artists and activists”

Why, it asks, call a review “Public Books” when new publics and platforms are changing how we read and revolutionizing the book form?

Even as many bemoan its decline, the book is gaining new life as a symbol both for deep engagement and for the inventions transforming reading into an increasingly shared, fast-paced experience. The title Public Books encapsulates our goal of combining the liveliness, timeliness, and communality of public life with the craft, reflection, and care associated with books at their best.

This reminded me of the idea of “slow-books” which seems one whose time has not yet come. Although The Atlantic had an article about it in March 2012, nothing seems to have come of it. I offered a few months back a definition which I should perhaps patent–

"Slow books" (like slow food) stand against marketing and "commodification" and are about the relationships of authentic people - whether as writers, readers, craftsmen or suppliers. “Slow food" is an entire process - it is the preparation, production and consumption. And abhors the formulaes, specialisation and slave labour which the logic of modern production and ownership system require eg in MacDonald's and Amazon .

I would therefore suggest "slow books" have 3 distinctive qualities-

SOCIAL - the reading experience is shared, whether through book clubs, reading groups or blog sites. 

IMPACT – the book should make us see the world in a different way! All types of books should be included eg history, the arts and the social sciences - if written clearly and showing originality. We are talking artistic sustenance here!

INTEGRATED - seek to sustain the actual crafts and passions involved in getting a book to us ie including small publishers; book design, typeface and binding skills; independent and second-hand bookshops,

The second site worth a mention is Heathwood Press whose mission is three-fold:

1) To understand the fundamental human issues that prevent individual and collective harmony and well-being, and that impede social progress as well as the healthy development of Western civilization;

2) To identify catalysts for change on a fundamental level across the different spheres of society;

3) To engage with researchers, policy makers and most importantly the general public in effort to promote critical dialogue as well as active leadership and participation in the manifestation of social change

The military-industrial complex

I'm drafting the introductory text for the new website and found myself referring to Eisenhower's famous phrase "the military-industrial complex". Wikipedia tells me that Eisenhower began working in 1959 on his final statement in public life delivered in January 1960 . It went through at least 21 drafts. The speech was "a solemn moment in a decidedly unsolemn time", warning a nation "giddy with prosperity, infatuated with youth and glamour (a dig at Kennedy) , and aiming increasingly for the easy life."

We . . . must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering for our own ease and convenience the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.

The only General to be elected President in the 20th century, he famously warned the nation about the potentially corrupting influence of the "military-industrial complex". This is frequently characterized as a criticism of the arms industry, which it was not. He in fact declared such an industry to be necessary. His concern was of its potential for corruption:

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense. We have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security alone more than the net income of all United States corporations.

Now this conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet, we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources, and livelihood are all involved. So is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

 These words should be splashed across the walls of all our nations......

100 years in Sofia

Nothing beats a good storm – when, that is, you are safely ensconced in an attic flat!

For spectacular rolling thunder, Sofia is almost as good as Sirnea, my old house in the Carpathian mountains. And this summer in Sofia has seen a lot of storms…..helped by the majestic Vitosha which towers over the city. Early afternoon, as we came back from some gallery viewings, the sky was beginning dark threats over the mountain but it took until 5pm to hit! Two and more hours later, the car alarms are still sounding... 

The British Embassy is celebrating its 100th anniversary here.

Amazing to imagine it opening in the aftermath of the two Balkan Wars - just as the First World War was starting. I’m no fan of such places – although I needed twice to register my presence within their stuffy walls. First in Uzbekistan 2001 when Al-Queeda gained mountain passes near its capital Tashkent (this was –sadly - before Craig Murray’s time); then in spring 2005 Kyrgyzstan (no Embassy) when there was a revolution and we were given special visas by the Embassy in Kazakhstan - then just across the border.

The encounters with the personnel of both places were very civilized – which is more than I can say for its representation in Bucharest!

But I have to say that the most impressive diplomat I ever met was Klaus Grewlich – then the German Ambassador in Bishkek. He had been the Ambassador in Baku between 2001-04 (I was there from 2002). I was planning a major Conference of its municipalities to mark the end of our 2-year project. He took a special interest in it as the Ambassador of the presiding EU Presidency of 2007 – inviting me first to his office to brief him; and then, on the day, catching me unawares by asking me to take over as Chair in the afternoon when he had to leave. He had demonstrated a superb grasp of the Road Map I was presenting to the Conference.
He became an active academic at various German institutions and wrote an interesting piece (in German) in 2010 on The New Great Game but died, very sadly, in June 2012 I have just discovered.....RIP

But back to the Brits - to mark its 100^th anniversary (who knows – it could be the last!), the Sofia Embassy is inviting ex-pats and visitors to contribute to a special blog. I’m now working on my draft – which has to be more on Bulgaria than Sofia

The painting is one from the superb exhibition which the National Gallery of Sofia has put on this summer of Alexander Moutafov's paintings......Hurry - it closes next week........

Openly Conspiring?

Good ideas come when I’m in the bath or swimming – and the pool this morning gave me another idea for the website name - “Open Conspiracy”……It appealed for three reasons
- I like the idea of people working – or breathing (spir) – together (con)
- the contradictory effect of the 2 words
- It has a more aggressive quality which “common ground” lacks

What I hadn’t realized is that it was the name of an HG Wells book which was variously entitled The Open Conspiracy (1928) and What are we to do with our Lives (1931)

The links give both editions. It seems to have elitist and rationalistic overtones which grate these days but his introduction to the later book includes this section which rings bells with me for my present endeavours 

I am a writer upon social and political matters. Essentially I am a very ordinary, undistinguished person. I have a mediocre brain, a very average brain, and the way in which my mind reacts to these problems is therefore very much the way in which most brains will react to them. But because it is my business to write and think about these questions, because on that account I am able to give more time and attention to them than most people, I am able to get rather ahead of my equals and to write articles and books just a little before the ideas I experience become plain to scores of thousands, and then to hundreds of thousands, and at last to millions of other people.

And so it happened that a few years ago (round about 1927) I became very anxious to clear up and give form to a knot of suggestions that seemed to me to have in them the solution of this riddle of adapting our lives to the immense new possibilities and the immense new dangers that confront mankind. It seemed to me that all over the world intelligent people were waking up to the indignity and absurdity of being endangered, restrained, and impoverished, by a mere uncritical adhesion to traditional governments, traditional ideas of economic life, and traditional forms of behaviour, and that these awaking intelligent people must constitute first a protest and then a creative resistance to the inertia that was stifling and threatening us.

These people I imagined would say first, "We are drifting; we are doing nothing worth while with our lives. Our lives are dull and stupid and not good enough."Then they would say, "What are we to do with our lives?"And then, "Let us get together with other people of our sort and make over the world into a great world-civilization that will enable us to realize the promises and avoid the dangers of this new time." It seemed to me that as, one after another, we woke up, that is what we should be saying. It amounted to a protest, first mental and then practical, it amounted to a sort of unpremeditated and unorganized conspiracy, against the fragmentary and insufficient governments and the wide-spread greed, appropriation, clumsiness, and waste that are now going on. But unlike conspiracies in general this widening protest and conspiracy against established things would, by its very nature, go on in the daylight, and it would be willing to accept participation and help from every quarter. It would, in fact, become an "Open Conspiracy," a necessary, naturally evolved conspiracy, to adjust our dislocated world. 

I have thought and written a lot about this Open Conspiracy since first it dawned upon me as being something that was bound to happen in people's minds and wills. I introduced it in a novel called The World of William Clissold, in 1927. I published a little book called The Open Conspiracy in 1928, into which I put what I had in my mind at that time. It was an unsatisfactory little book even when I published it, not quite plain enough and not quite confident enough, and evidently unsure of its readers. It already looks old-fashioned to me now. Yet I could not find out how to do it better at the time, and it seemed in its way to say something of living and current interest, and so I published it—but I arranged things so that I could withdraw it in a year or so. That I have now done, and this present book is to replace it.

Since that first publication we have all got forward surprisingly. Events have hustled thought along and have been hustled along by thought. The idea of reorganizing the affairs of the world on quite a big scale, which was "Utopian," and so forth, in 1926 and 1927, and still "bold" in 1928, has now spread about the world until nearly everybody has it. It has broken out all over the place, thanks largely to the mental stimulation of the Russian Five Year Plan. Hundreds of thousands of people everywhere are now thinking upon the lines foreshadowed by my Open Conspiracy, not because they had ever heard of the book or phrase, but because that was the way thought was going. 

The Open Conspiracy conveyed the general idea of a world reconstructed, but it was very vague about the particular way in which this or that individual life could be lived in relation to that general idea. It gave a general answer to the question, "What are we to do with our lives?" It said, "Help to make over the New World amidst the confusions of the Old." But when the question was asked, "What am I to do with my life?" the reply was much less satisfactory.

Of course, if you tap "conspiracy" into a search engine, you will attract some peculiar sorts....but perhaps "openly conspiring" has a more liberal tone? 

Dealing with Sofia's Past

The day started early with the urgent chimes of the venerable Church Cyril and Methodius and the 5 disciples – whose birthday it apparently was.

I’m not normally in Sofia in summer – although the currents around the Vitosha mountain and the trees in its streets and courtyards do offer relief from the summer heat which has not been as evident as usual. Lots of rain – indeed severe hailstones at the beginning of the month. Cars were banged shapeless.

The flat I’ve been renting (from December 2012) is a West-facing attic flat in a very central (Khan Krum St) classic 1922 building – with a leafy courtyard, gratefully populated by cats who are well looked after by the city’s older citizens.

The Sofia City Gallery has now introduced entry charges - but at such a reasonable level I can forgive them. 1 euro for adults – 2 euros for a family ticket – and free for senior citizens. So I had no problems parting with 5 euros for a book about “unknown artists from one picture” which focuses on a famous 1952 painting by one Asen Vasiliev of some 20 Bulgarian painters examining and discussing a painting. The magisterial figure of Vladimir Dmitrova – known as “the Master” – dominates the group and the book identifies each of the painters, sketches their lives and gives an example of their work.

The book is exceptional, however, in being the first I know to detail (in English) the circumstances of the cultural crackdown in the late 1940s on Bulgarian painters. But it does so in the strange elliptical fashion I have begun to recognise as the true Balkan way…..

I know something about the events – and the artists affected…..starting in the early (but vicious) days of the September 1944 communist takeover with the unexplained death in prison of graphic artist Raiko Aleksiev and soon affecting such famous artists as Boris Denev, Nikola Boadjiev and (royal aquarellist) Constantin Shtarkelov – none of whom figure in the book. Instead the text focuses on Alexander Zhendov, a good communist satirist who strongly objected to the wooden bureaucrats who were foisted to lead the cultural struggle against modernism…..Other good communists such as the great Ilyia Beshkov are simply not mentioned………
The nepotic (or "Balkan") nature of the editorial process is still evident in many of the new art books produced here.....eg the large one celebrating 120 years of art produced by the Bulgarian Union of Artists a couple of years ago. The images are great but the text tells us little beyond of the dates of the various artistic Associations, some of the names of the key artists and vague hints of struggles and conflicts.....And some curious omissions - perhaps these were the more independent-minded artists who weren'y "belongers"?

I had hoped to see the exhibition in the Vaska Emanouilova Gallery – a largely unknown branch of the Sofia City Gallery in a lovely garden beside Boulevard Dondukova. It was supposed to be open – but wasn’t. Coincidentally, the Loran Gallery was showing paintings of Shtarkelov and Boadjiev and will mark September 9 1944 with an exhibition of banned artists.   

Going to the Dogs

I stayed in Koln last year for almost 3 months and was a regular visitor to its various bookshops and bookstalls. One post looked at the fairly negative picture of contemporary German society which was to be found then in the pages of the books on the shelves of these shops.

On the same note, Der Spiegel has a nice little feature in its current issue on the atmosphere in the towns and villages on the route of this year’s Tour de France, making the point that

Stacks of books at a local bookstore are dedicated to a new genre in French literature: the downfall. It includes titles like "Reinventing France," "France, a Peculiar Bankruptcy," "If We Only Wanted To, "When France Wakes Up," "A Dangerous Game in the Elysée," "Fellow French, Are You Ready for the Next Revolution?" "France, A Challenge" and many, many more.Around two dozen such titles were published last month alone. They always seem to have the same central message as well -- that things can't continue as they are and that France is in decline. It seems like the term "déclinisme" has already emerged as its own school of thought.

Two dozen sounds an amazing number….I well remember the blitz of critical books with titles such as “The Stagnant Society” which hit us in Britain in the early sixties. They clearly helped pave the way for the election of a Labour Government in 1964 after 13 years of post-war Conservative rule.

Nowadays, such books are just water off a duck’s back.

As a genre, I think I prefer the social histories – which give a better sense of perspective or books which plot the development of literature over significant periods of a country eg post-war Germany

Seeking common ground; puzzling development???

The website name – and its “tags” – are clearly crucial choices for a new website which actually wants to attract traffic. So far the tagwords I’ve suggested are

Capacity development, Civil service reform, citizen action, Community development, corporate power, democracy, democratization, governance, institutional Capacity, local government, machinery of government, media, modernizing government, protest, public administration reform, training, Central Asia, Bulgaria, Germany, Romania, Scotland, Bulgarian painting, Romanian painting, social democracy, social change….

You can see my problem!

I was pondering “Conviviality” as the website name not so much for of its epicurean connotations as the link with the writings of the sadly forgotten Ivan Illich of the 1970s – particularly his “Tools of Conviviality”

I choose the term “conviviality” to designate the opposite of industrial productivity. I intend it to mean autonomous and creative intercourse among persons, and the intercourse of persons with their environment; and this in contrast with the conditioned response of persons to the demands made upon them by others, and by a man-made environment. I consider conviviality to be individual freedom realized in personal interdependence and, as such, an intrinsic ethical value. I believe that, in any society, as conviviality is reduced below a certain level, no amount of industrial productivity can effectively satisfy the needs it creates among society’s members.

And I also have a weakness for words with a Latin root – such as “com-panion” (breaking bread with); “con-spiracy” (breathing with) etc Perhaps Illich is not so forgotten – The Atlantic Journal had a piece about him only 2 years ago  

But I’m really looking for a name which reflects my interest in establishing a “common ground” or agenda amongst social and political activists with which the power structure and elites can be challenged in a sustainable manner. “Exploring Common Ground” is an obvious one. And I’ve looked at various metaphors relating to borders – one of my favourite writers EG Hirschmann entitled one of his books “Essays in Trespassing” and the concept is discussed here. It seems increasingly difficult - and yet necessary - for people to cross intellectual disciplines/borders and the word "trespass" is such a negative one that "bordercrossing" might be better.
But "exploring/seeking common ground" has a head start on the other names......

Except that I recall the titles of the two little books I produced in the 90s - "Puzzling Development"; and "In Transit". 
I still like both - the first for the play of words - the first can be either adjective or verb!
And "in transit" connotes movement and travel - indeed I used it as shorthand for "transition". 
Unfortunately the website name is taken - but "Puzzling Development" is not - and, in my time, I have puzzled -
- regional development
- urban development
- community development
- institutional development
- capacity development

More recently, I have been daring to question the whole concept of development. Perhaps I should run with that one? Except that the direction I want to go now is seeking/exploring (the) common ground.....