Reform the System with Love and Power: A Call for Action

Power without love is reckless and abusive, 

and love without power is sentimental and anemic. 

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The system is broken. Our society appears to benefit a few, but those superficial gains are devoid of deep meaning. Moreover, most people are excluded. Worse yet, the whole system may collapse soon as society becomes increasingly top-heavy and destructive to the environment. For those reasons, we urgently need to build a nonviolent movement to reform our society fundamentally and comprehensively into a compassionate community dedicated to the common good.

To be successful, that movement must incorporate the dynamics of both love and power. Love backed by political power holds great potential as a source for social change. And political power rooted in love can promote economic fairness, care for the environment, social justice, and democracy more effectively than can efforts motivated primarily by anger.

Currently, a broad range of activist organizations do good work on a variety of important issues. Those projects are generally based on a similar set of humanistic values. But their impact has been diminished by widespread fragmentation. Those many organizations rarely support one another on timely priorities.

To help nurture the greater collaboration that is needed, it could  help to compose a brief vision statement that responds to the following questions:

1.      How can we best describe and analyze "the system"?

2.      What role do individuals play in maintaining the system?

3.      How do we need to change the system?

4.      What long-term strategies can help build a popular movement to achieve that goal?

5.      What short-term steps can we take toward that end?

By creating a vision statement based on those questions, we could affirm our core beliefs and make clear how they support a commitment that we can sustain over time. The ideas presented here are offered for consideration by anyone who wants to work on a declaration that articulates how we can reform our self-perpetuating, fundamentally flawed social system.

References to “the system” are common, and people have an intuitive sense of what the phrase means. When Elizabeth Warren declared at the 2012 Democratic National Convention, “The system is rigged,” she received a standing ovation. More generally, the percentage of voters who believe the government is run by a few big interests looking out for themselves increased from 29 percent in 1964 to 79 percent in 2013. That same percentage is also convinced that corruption in government is widespread. In fact, most Americans report they’re so upset with the “system” that they “would carry a protest sign for a day,” if the opportunity arose. Strong majorities favor major changes in national policy and believe that grassroots people power is needed to achieve them. Yet, despite all that support for change, there is no consensus among activists about how to reinvent our social system. We need to fill that void and build broad agreement on the underlying issues.

“The System” and How We Can Reform It

No one group controls “the system,” yet it is self-perpetuating. Our major institutions -- including our economy, government, media, entertainment, schools, and religious communities -- our culture, and we ourselves as individuals are all interconnected within it. Each of those elements supports all the others.  

The system’s primary purpose is to preserve the existing social ladder. As those who prosper pass on their advantages to their children, that ladder become more difficult to climb.

The system corrupts our culture and dehumanizes our people. No one escapes its impact, and everyone reinforces it. In particular, our hyper-competitive culture encourages harsh judgments of others and undermines our ability to collaborate with them. Instead, we learn to either dominate or submit.

Because the various elements of the system are intertwined, the only way we can transform it is to steadily change each element in it. We have to change our institutions, our culture, and ourselves.

Before undertaking those specific changes, however, we need to lay out a broad vision of lasting social transformation with a new mission statement that affirms a primary commitment to the common good of the entire Earth Community. We must make clear that we reject the proposition that climbing the ladder of success is our highest calling.

Becoming a Better Person

A primary objective for anyone committed to change for the common good, shared by many people, is to become a better person. To achieve that end, we need to more fully:

• Treat others as we want to be treated.
• Love ourselves as we love others.
• Avoid both selfishness and self-sacrifice.
• Respect ourselves so we can better respect others.
• Be productive and happy, have fun, experience joy, be of service to others, relieve suffering, and advance human evolution.
• Appreciate intangible spiritual realities, ponder or revere the mystery that energizes and structures the universe, and seek harmony with Mother Nature.
• Be honest, courageous, humble, free, generous, disciplined, responsible, firm, and flexible.

To strengthen ourselves and “be the change,” we need to honestly evaluate our mistakes and accomplishments, our strengths and weaknesses, while drawing on mutual support and peer learning. In this process, there can be great value in merely verbalizing the results of our own introspection to supportive allies who understand us. At the same time, of course, we must leave it to individuals seeking self-improvement to define their own goals. They don’t need to be told by others how they should change.

Overall, self-development efforts are most fruitful when they are intentional and consistent, rather than occasional and haphazard. To facilitate personal growth, we need to develop new methods for providing mutual support. One option, for example, is to design formats for soulful conversations that others can readily adopt with little or no special training or expert facilitation. In such groups, members can set aside time to dig deep, acknowledge mistakes, and consider how to avoid making the same mistakes in the future. By developing user-friendly templates that can be easily utilized by small, member-run sharing circles, these tools can spread widely. That would make it possible for large numbers of activists to engage more fully in steady self-improvement, and also increase our own effectiveness by helping us improve our ability to relate meaningfully to others.

Expanding the Activist Network to a Global Scale

If we can reach agreement on a long-term vision statement, small groups of endorsers could gather regularly to break bread and enjoy one another’s company. They could share a cultural experience that engages the heart, such as listening to a song, and report on both their self-development efforts and their political actions. Such circles could in turn attract new members through contagious happiness, and also occasionally gather in regional, national, and international gatherings.

If we tap our inner strength and courage, we can join with others to leave the world a better place for future generations -- in part by impacting national policies in our own country and also by supporting the efforts of people in other countries to do the same in their nation. Changing America’s policies must be our first concern, however, as they are often a principal cause of the injustices suffered by our fellow humans in other nations. We can help end injustice and prevent future ones by supporting efforts to eradicate their root causes.

By continuously expanding an interconnected activist network, and reaching out to the entire world, we can more completely ensure that:

• Everyone has healthy food, clean air, drinkable water, peace and quiet, economic security, a safe environment, rewarding social interactions, good friends, a healthy family, ongoing learning experiences, and a fair chance to realize his or her best potentialities.
• Working-age adults who are able and willing to work can find a good job at a living wage.
• Private businesses serve the public interest, treat their workers fairly, and refrain from damaging the environment.
• Workers are fully able to organize.
• Everyone is treated equally in the eyes of the law, while law and order are upheld.
• Legitimate authority is respected, but officials who abuse their power are held accountable.
• Individuals have a right to privacy as long as they don’t violate the rights of others.
• The principles of nonviolence, reconciliation, empowerment, partnership, cooperation, and collaboration are promoted throughout society.

With an equal emphasis on both short-term objectives and long-term goals, and a balanced focus on simultaneous personal, social, cultural, and political change, we can win victories that will build momentum for social change on a global scale, while recognizing that no victory or defeat is final. Such an approach, moreover, will enable us to inspire concerned individuals who want to do more than “tinker,” as well as those who want to see results.

It’s important to keep in mind that many people are passive in pursuing change not because they don’t want to act, but because others are passive. We must break that downward spiral with an upward spiral. As we steadily mobilize like-minded people, other concerned individuals will also be encouraged to participate. Then, by pushing for realistic positive change to advance the common good of the Earth Community, we can promote evolutionary revolution, meet neglected needs, build our collective power, and restructure our deteriorating society into a compassionate and truly democratic community.