Viewing systems as a whole: an insight from the Dalai Llama about medicine, economics and morality

As I was posting the part of my sabbatical proposal dealing with systems analysis, a passage from a book I was reading earlier this morning came to mind.  The book is entitled, How to See Yourself as You Really Are (2006).  His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, is the author.  Here is the passage (from pp. 52-53).

In the field of medicine, ...it is not sufficient to concentrate just on one speciality.  The whole body needs to be considered.  In Tibetan medicine, the diagnostic approach is more holistic, taking into consideration interactive systems.

Similarly, in economics, if you just go after profit you end up with corruption. Look at the increasing corruption in many countries.  By considering all commercial actions to be morally neutrai, we turn a blind eye to corruption.  When, as they say in China, “It doesn’t make any difference whether a cat is black or white,” the result is that a lot of black cats - a lot of morally bankrupt people - are creating a lot of problems.

Sabbatical Proposal, Part I

It is a practice in many University Communities that faculty members may take a sabbatical every seven years.  In the preface to my most recent book, but one, Paradise Poisoned: Learning About Conflict, Terrorism and Development from Sri Lanka’s Civil Wars, I wrote this:  

Over the project’s life, additional time for writing was provided by three Sabbatical Leaves.  Academic professionals accept this time off - one year out of every seven - as a right, but such an entitlement is unknown, of course, in most professions.  I consider this tradition a great privilege and am grateful that the Trustees of American University continue to sustain it.

Not only are sabbaticals unknown in most professions, they are often viewed with a mixture of envy and resentment.  I am presently in the process of requesting a sabbatical, after eight years as Director of American University’s Center for Teaching Excellence. The process is elaborate and bureaucratic, as, indeed, it should be. At its heart is the ‘Sabbatical Proposal.’  I thought it might help throw light on the practice of sabbaticals if I shared my proposal.  Since the proposal is long, I will post it in three parts of which this is the first. Whether or not it dispels any feelings of envy and resentment will be for those holding such feelings within themselves to judge.  The first proposal excerpt follows.

Reinvigorating my System Dynamics modeling proficiency

Much of my professional work has used System Dynamics modeling as a point of departure. System Dynamics, developed by MIT’s Professor Jay W. Forrester, is both a theory that describes the behavior of complex dynamic systems and a modeling methodology. Nonlinear differential equations and control theory provide the mathematical foundations for the approach.  My contributions to urban systems analysis, my coauthored first model of eutrophication in a large fresh water ecosystem (Lake Erie), which became the basis of a major government study, and my global modeling work, under the auspices of the Club of Rome, were all based on System Dynamics theory and modeling methodologies.  During my 1983-1984 sabbatical year, I worked with Jay W. Forrester at MIT as a staff member of his US National Economic Model project and was chosen by Professor Forrester to make a major presentation of model results to the project’s corporate sponsors group. 

In 1984, with the publication of Ending Hunger: An Idea Whose Time has Come completed I began work on a new research path, focusing on dynamic linkages between conflict and development.  Completion and empirical testing of the model required nearly three years of intense work (I was between marriages for most of this period).  Model results, with applications to dynamic linkages between conflict and development in Argentina and Mexico were described in a seminal 1987 Futures article, ‘Violence and Repression: Unexamined Factors in Development Planning.’  This modeling work provided the theoretical basis for numerous other publications, including my most recent book, Paradise Poisoned: Learning about Conflict, Development and Terrorism from Sri Lanka’s Civil Wars (2005) and the Sinhala and Tamil abridgments, Lessons from the War: Consequences and Failures (2008).

Sustaining proficiency in a modeling methodology is like sustaining proficiency playing a musical instrument.  It requires regular practice.  Staying proficient at the cutting edge requires not only regular practice but disciplined engagement with an evolving literature.  During my tenure as CTE Director, I continued to teach System Dynamics Modeling to a small but enthusiastic clientele, but have not sustained my proficiency.  During my sabbatical year, I intend to change this by devoting a significant number of hours each week to daily practice.  

But practice without a specific project to practice on is less motivating.  Fortunately, I have such a project.  Some years ago, Professor Jay W. Forrester became briefly interested in international development issues.  He produced a prototypical generic model of development dynamics similar to his models of Urban Dynamics and World Dynamics.  I have Professor Forrester’s notes on this model, which exist as an unpublished MIT System Dynamics Group D-memo.  These notes will be used as the basis for a generic development model, focusing on the dynamics of sustainable poverty alleviation at the national level.  The model will also draw upon my own model of conflict and development and on the path-breaking dissertation research of my doctoral student, Mark Hamilton, on the role played by youth militant movements in the Global South.  This generic model will then be applied to a country-level, policy oriented case study focusing on the dynamics of sustainable poverty alleviation in Singapore.  

Quiet listening

Last week  I wrote about our weekly Anderson Hall meetings of Resident Assistants with the Resident Director and, in the background, me.  If one is seeking optimism about today’s young men and women, an Anderson Hall weekly staff meeting is a great place to find it.  It can also provide useful lessons about how old people should relate to young people.

I have observed some Asian families that get it right.  When I lived in Honolulu, many years ago, my first wife and I often dined at a local Chinese eating place  with an improbable name, the McCully Chop Suey Restaurant.  Often, the only other diners would be Chinese, including large Chinese families, sometimes spanning four generations. Sitting in a place of honor would be and old grandfather, or grandmother, or both.  New arrivals would greet them deferentially.  A small child might sit close to them for a moment, before rejoining her sisters, brothers and cousins.  A young man might proudly introduce his new girl friend, who would smile shyly.  The old persons rarely spoke, but it was clear they were part of the gathering, included and respected.

Perhaps the memory picture I have painted is idealized.  Every family has its tribulations and I know that multigenerational Asian families - Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Sri Lankan - are no exception.  But I like to think that the old people I saw had earned the respect they were tendered by schooling themselves to be quiet listeners.  

A quiet listener, of an older generation, who has learned how to be an accepted and welcomed, but scarcely noticed part of a young people’s gathering will hear things that are banal, amazing, disturbing and surprising, but mostly reassuring.  It is rare that I do not leave such gatherings with renewed energy - and optimism.

One up, one down

Most Tuesday nights, from 8:30 until about 10:00 PM, the Anderson Hall Resident Assistants gather with their Resident Director and me for weekly staff meeting.  I rarely contribute to these meetings.  Often I am not even on the agenda.  But it provides a great opportunity to immerse myself, unobtrusively,  in the culture of undergraduate life.

This evening, we ended the meeting with a simple team building exercise, ‘one up...one down’.  Everyone was tired.  Even though Spring Break had just ended end-of-semester pressures seemed to be weighing.  Several students mentioned that they still had papers to write after leaving the meeting.  At least they would be returning to private rooms - a prized RA privilege - to write them, but they were unlikely to be at their most creative.

Here were some post Spring Break one ups and one downs.

I had just got a new car...but I have to go back home to pick it up

I’m exhausted....but I enjoyed spending time with my family next week

I’m excited about summer plans... but I have a paper to write tonight

I’m looking forward to spending the weekend with my boyfriend... but I have a paper to write tonight.

My own one up and one down....

I’m exhausted (I had been going since before 6 am) ...and I’m looking forward to my sabbatical next year.  Students wanted to know what I would be doing and were interested in my writing plans.

With a bit of energy injected into the room and the connections among members of our small community strengthened, we went our separate ways.

I was glad I didn’t have a paper to write.

Dreams from My Father...

Monday evening, I finished reading President Barack Obama’s autobiographical memoir, Dreams from My Father.  It would be a powerful, important book even if it was not written by the man who is now the first African-American US President.

Before reading Dreams from My Father, I wondered about the degree to which President Obama, being from Hawaii and from mixed race parentage, identified with the African American experience.  After reading, there can be no doubt.  Amerca’s pervasive racism was an ever-present reality in his life and a strong influence in the personal search for identity he writes about.  His work as a Chicago community organizer immersed him in the politics of poverty and racism of that city.  

I particularly recall a passage he wrote about five and six year old children who attended primary school nearly Altgeld, the Chicago South Side housing project where he worked (p. 233):  

“I thought how happy and trusting they all seemed, that despite the rocky arrivals many of them had gone through – delivered prematurely perhaps, or delivered into addiction, most of them already smudged with the ragged air of poverty – the joy they seemed to find in simple locomotion, the curiosity they seemed to display toward every new face, seemed the equal of children everywhere....”  

“Beautiful,” Dr. Collier (the Principal) sad.”

 “They really are”

“The change comes later.  In about five years, although it seems like its coming sooner all the time.”

“What change is that?”

“When their eyes stop laughing.  Their throats can still make the sound, but if you look at their eyes, you can see they’ve shut off something inside.” 

71st Birthday

March 12th was my 71st birthday.  As faithful dormgrandpop readers (if any) will know, my 70th birthday was spent in Sri Lanka. My hostess kindly organized a small party for a few close friends.  We sat on an outdoor patio looking out on a walled garden, softly illuminated by spotlights.  Sri Lankan homes in better-class districts all have such gardens.  They provide a welcome respite from the congestion and pollution that have become the norm on main Colombo thoroughfares.  Colombo was once referred to as ‘the Garden City.’  Now, only vestiges of the verdant beauty that gave Sri Lanka’s capital its name are found in interior gardens, protected by high walls.  

When my friends and I gathered in Colombo, I was deeply immersed in the tribulations of Sri Lanka’s International Centre for Ethnic Studies, where I had seved as a Director for many years.  Soon afterwards my term of service ended.  This freed me from frequent emails and 11PM Skype calls from Colombo that had been a preoccupation for many months.  Relieved of this responsibility, I was able to seek out new opportunities in Sri Lanka, to complete the translation project for my book and to begin rebuilding ties with the University of Colombo.

The venue for my 71th birthday was more prosaic - room 101 Anderson Hall.  I spent the day trying complete assignments and readings for a graduate course in International Development I am teaching.  After an eight year hiatus, much of the material is new.  Class preparation requires major time commitments and I have been scrambling to stay ahead of my class members for most of the semester.  This is also a time of transition.  I have announced - not yet publicly - that I will, after nearly nine yeers, be standing aside from my management responsibilities as Director of AU’s Center for Teaching Excellence.  This ‘passing the baton’ too, is opening up new possibilities .  I have, planned, and begun to eagerly anticipate a year-long sabbatical.  Two book projects are in the works.  There will be time to refurbish my fading computer modeling skills and to visit my grandchildren.

As Sri Lankan friends congratulated me on completing my 70th year, I remarked that I was not sure passing this milestone was something to celebrate.  “If you are in good health and still looking to the future with enthusiasm, that, indeed, is something to celebrate,” my hostess replied.  Her sentiments still rang true on my 71st birthday.

Leadings - powerful messages that may be available to those who listen.

Most mornings I am able to set aside time for quiet reflection, reading and, most recently, Tibetan Buddhist meditative practice.  On rare occasions, during these times, I seem to experience what Quakers call ‘Leadings.’  (For those interested in Quakers’ views on leadings, information can be found on the website of New York Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, http://www.nyym.org/leadings/ ).  ‘Divine Guidance’ is how some define a Leading.  However I am not entirely comfortable with the notion that an anthropomorphic Divine Being (God) has taken a personal interest in me.  This seems presumptuous.  My preferred definition of Leadings is  ‘powerful messages of guidance that may be available to those who listen.’

In my life, Leadings have been few, but defining.  The decision to embark on an entirely new research direction, studying the relationship between conflict and development, responded to a Leading.  So did my decision, nine years ago,  to become Director of American University’s Center for Teaching Excellence.   Two years ago, I received a leading to change the direction of my research once again; to begin focusing on the question how do nations that transition from high to low levels of poverty, over time, achieve that goal.

Soon after visiting one of the nations I propose to study, Singapore, this summer, I received another leading.  I was reading the magnificent autobiography of Singapore’s former Primer Minister, Lee Kuan Yew,  In a concluding chapter, he wrote of his decision to step down as Prime Minister.  He explained how he observed the energy levels of some Cabinet colleagues, who had been at his side since Singapore’s founding, flagging. Though still vigorous,  Lee recognized that his own energy level, too, was less than it once had been. Soon afterwards, he announced his resignation from the Prime Ministers post, accepting, instead, the position of “Senior Minister.’ In this role he has continued to attend cabinet meetings and provide policy guidance, but has distanced himself from day-to-day decision making.  

Reflecting on Lee’s words during a period of quiet reflection (I was then in Malaysia) I received the Leading that it was time to step down as CTE Director.  Soon I began exploring, through reading and meetings with my personal management consultant, how I could effect a transition that was both seamless and sustained the Center’s eight year trajectory of growth and high performance.  I remembered an aphorism taught me by my mother (who was a virtually inexhaustible source of aphorisms): 'always leave the stage while the audience is still applauding.'

Leadings provide direction. I believe they must be taken seriously.  But the scenario to which they point can be uncertain... ambiguous.  The scenario that is now unfolding, following my announcement that I would be ‘passing the baton’ (Lee Kuan Yew’s phrase), is different than the one I might have hoped for.  Leadings can point us to new directions, but life’s realities periodically remind us that we can not fully control the destinies of others or even our own.

On forgiveness

Forgiveness has long been important to me.  I think it was brought home to me when I was doing the Est Training.  The Training  is not primarily about forgiveness but does offer guidance on how to forgive and why it is important.   For a long time a framed picture of Pope John Paul II forgiving the man who tried to kill him has graced my office.  Another framed picture shows Yassir Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin together at the time the peace accords were signed.  Former President Bill Clinton is between them.  

I see forgiveness as a selfish act.  The principal beneficiary is the forgiver, himself or herself, not the one forgiven.  The latter may not even know he or she has been forgiven, or care.   Hatred or resentment is like a bag of rocks that one carries about on one’s back.  For twenty years or more my mother carried such bag on her back.  For most of that period we were estranged.  The ‘rocks’ in the bag were accumulated resentments about the way I had lived my life.  

It was not that my life was a disaster.  I was, a tenured full professor at American University with an international reputation.  One day, during one of our rare visits together, my mother and I  got into one of those pointless arguments in which parents and their adult children sometimes engage.  Suddenly the back of rocks she had been carrying since my adolescent years was unloaded - on my head.  The Est Training had taught me that such unloadings are possible and that when they do the best response is “would you be willing to forgive me.”  When I asked my mother whether she would be willing to forgive me, her response was “I don’t know.”  But she did.  After that memorable day, our twenty year estrangement ended.  

Here is a passage from Bishop Desmond Tutu I have been meaning to share.

‘Forgiveness does not mean ‘forgive and forget.”  It stares the beast in the eye, names the hurt and refuses to return it, seeking not to punish but to heal.’