Building a national identity - a solution for ethnic violence?

Ethnic cleanising and ethnic conflicts are still commonplace on parts of the world. The pain and cost of it is not at all commonplace. The UN estimates 8 million children to die out of lack of food in 2014 if any intervention is not made. In some other parts of the world, a single death is the cause of an uproar on governance. I dont need to speak more about the condition of poverty because of ethnic violence. It is a horrific data we cannot bear to comprehend and hence better left unsaid and undealt with. ..syadly.

On the other hand, lets explore what helped some countries/communities emerge strong and stable. In 15th and 17th centuries, many of the developed countries of today emerged as a nation from being a bunch of fragmented comminites - tribals, peasant communities, settlements or communities with conquestorial interests. In nearly all cases, there are hereoes/heroines, a major movement - peaceful or violent which develops a sense of what it is to belong to that nation. 

The above makes sense when you look at examples - Germany was united under Bismark, French by the wars with Britain, Napoleanic wars and French Revolution, USA as a land of promise from settlers with roots in Free Masons, UK from accession agreements with Scotland and Ireland based on understanding of commonnality and differences in culture, India, China and several other countries with a struggle for independence from colonial powers.

Another major factor has been renaissance, industrialisation, freedom struggle, etc

Factors I call to attention in increasing order of importance -

- conquest by stable monarchs, under whom a common identity is felt

- legends, hereoes and heroines that form the common binding culture

- historic struggles that question status quo, cause churning and bring meaninfullness. In this process, they also establish new legends, heroes and heroines.

- Renaissance, industrialisation, freedom struggles, communist movements debunked the beliefs of fixed places for individuals in society based on their birth.

All this together helped developed a unique national identity that gave the people an identity and cemented them as a community. This is what we have come to identify as a nation of people distinct from a country (country's definition is limited to being citizens of a politically defined region.). The development of this identity heralded a common vision in which everybody finds a stake and this provides a stable environment in which this vision can be pursued.

This is effect an Organsiation Development perspective developed from applied psychology for small groups and organsiations.

Now by extending this model, can we examine what processes can be set , communication to be developed that can help small sub saharan, western african communities to develop national identities in ways that allows them to retain a tribal identity along with a national identity like India has language, caste, ethnic, regional identities co-existing with national identity.

What are the legends, struggles which are common in communities. The communication of challenges in such ways that it brings communities together to face them in a struggle that develops national identity.

The Invisible Feminine in the Organisation

I have been in discussion with a friend past month regarding how 'uninclusive' today's corporate organisations are of the Feminine. The Feminine with a capital 'F' is my way of saying not women or females but the aspect of nature. That one which is part of the Masculine-Feminine duality which is present everywhere, in both man and woman. We, me and my friend, and a lot of others we talked to, agreed that there is a need to include the Feminine, value it, etc. We were convinced of its utility even. But the challenge was to describe the function and the contribution of the Feminine in the organisation, or even to fully describe of it works,the aspects of an organisation that falls under the Feminine nature. This definition should then help us to understand how it contributes to the organisations and how an organisation is doing on those aspects. As we continue to dialogue on it, I had an interesting metaphor to describe the way the dichotomies play which shows how difficult it is to describe the Feminine.

The metaphor is that of an object and its background.
From time immemorial we have admired, respected, valued  a finished work like a construction project - bridges, buildings, a product of literature - poetry or novels, fiction and non fiction,  theories on physics, psychology and all else. All of these come under the definition of success as we understand it. Or rather I should say production of such an entity is what we call success. Then we further had to measure it with wealth, fame and other associations that we make with success.
We naturally understand the struggle which goes behind the production of such an entity. The vision, planning, skill, knowledge, hardwork. This is what is the basis of calling it a success, of respecting it and of the sense of pride.
All is fair, so what is my point. My point is that these entities are always the fantastic object in the foreground. We never notice the background. In reality it is the background which inspires, nourishes, supports, gives a context based meaning to the foreground object. Imagine a beautiful picture of a black swan is meaningless in a black background. One of the most fascinating aspects of Monalisa is its variation of the background. The foreground is that of a woman with a slight smile, but what holds you to the painting without you becoming aware of it is the background of it. On one side near and on the other far. But for the conscious mind, we only see the foreground object of the woman with the smile.

Similarly in each of our supposed achievements, our successes, we rarely look at the background. There is a commons saying - Behind every successful man there is the hand of a woman. While we may recognise a woman as an inspiration, the credit of the success is still given to the man. Unless that unclear 'hand of a woman' is articulated more, it will remain a mystery and never credited.

In organisation setting, I see this as the culture, the values, the relationships, etc which form the context of the individuals to work in. When we assess an organisation we asses its IPs, its fixed assets, its clients, its orders, its inventories, etc. How do we value the more subtle context in which these exist? It is impossible to get the full meaning of the assets without its context. What do you think will happen to the company which asseses another company on its fixed assets, IPs, clients and orders, accordingly buys the company. But having not fully understood its context, culture, relationships, can this company integrate it into its own?

Without the right context, can creativity, ownership, commitment from employees exist?

Modern management science has put all this in the area of HR and OB and then put HR and OB into the back seat. How many people do you know who were HR VPs and gone ahead to become CEOs? This is depsite many companies declaring that our people are our assets (interestingly, the one person I know who went from being a VP HR to COO and then CEO is a woman -Anne Mulcahy of Xerox. See this link -http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_18/b4176133023904.htm).
The lack of psychology applied in organisation is indicated in this - A sound plan to deal with employee turnover is to have back-up for your key people! This is an HR practice with no application of Psychology to employees, only of Project management. What happened to creating a space where employees would like to work, building relationship with employees such that they have commitment to the company, to the project and may even help in finding, grooming replacements for themselves. Which is the strategy followed in your company?

For me personally this is how the Feminie in the context is difficult to see, value and quantify to grow. It is like the what we see in a Shiva temple. How often do you notice the Yoni around the erect Phallus?