The rWorld

Building a Relational World

  • About this blog

    Humans flourish, and human endeavors succeed, in a context of healthy relationships.

    This blog puts a 'relational' perspective on current affairs, culture and technology. We go beyond platitudes to highlight basic and essential dimensions of relationships illustrated in the topics we cover. Our hope is that a better understanding of these dimensions will influence policies, practices and personal decisions that effectively enable productive relationships between individuals and between groups or institutions.

  • Dale Kuehne’s Blog, Signpostings

    As the visionary and co-founder of the rWorld, Dale will be an ongoing contributor on this blog. If you're looking for his blog related to the book it has moved to http://signpostings.wordpress.com

Archive for the ‘General’ Category

Talks this Thursday March 1st, Boston – “Taking Relationships Seriously”

Posted by Simon on February 28, 2012

Poor rWorld blog could do with a bit of attention from its owner! One day this will be a hive of activity, you’ll see!

In the meantime, there are two talks at an event I’ve arranged this Thursday March 1st. The first at noon is on “Relational Thinking”, by Michael Schluter, who has pioneered not just Relational Thinking but relational practice, for 30+ years. The second, at 1pm, is from Jonathan Rushworth, from their report “Tranforming Capitalism from Within: A Relational Approach to the Purpose, Performance and Assessment of Companies”.

If you’re in Boston on Thursday please come along! Tweet me at @sifowler if you think you might come. Details below.

Taking Relationships Seriously

Lunchtime brown-bag presentations and Q&A with Michael Schluter and Jonathan Rushworth

Thursday March 1st

Park Street Church, Boston (entrance on Park Street)

12:00-12:45 An Introduction to Relational Thinking

12:45-1pm Coffee & Mingle!

1:00-2pm A Relational Business Charter

Relational Thinking: Personal and social wellbeing depends upon the quality of relationships within families and communities, and within and between organizations. This presentation and Q&A will introduce you to Relational Thinking; an approach to society’s challenges that places relationships – not individual rights and freedoms or material wealth – at the center of our decision-making, purposes and actions.

You’ll hear how thinking relationally can lead to innovative and practical solutions to these challenges. For over 30 years Michael Schluter has taken the relational heart of “love your neighbor as yourself” and applied it to domains as diverse as conflict resolution in Sudan, Sunday trading in the UK, organizational stakeholder assessments in South Africa, the impact of work-life balance on family breakdown in Australia, philanthropic investment vehicles in the UK, and more.

Relational Business Charter: Since the financial collapse of 2008, there has been much economic and political hand-wringing about what is to be done to address systemic economic instability. The typical solutions are through regulatory or tax responses. In this presentation and Q&A, Jonathan Rushworth will argue that these problems can be addressed if companies put relationships with stakeholders at the heart of their operations. The presentation summarizes their recent report: “Transforming Capitalism from Within: a Relational Approach to the Purpose, Performance, and Assessment of Companies.”

I welcome you to join either or both of these presentations and encourage you to come at 11:45 or 12:45 to mingle with each other and meet Jonathan and Michael.

Please RSVP to me, Simon Fowler (simon.fowler@virgin.net). I encourage you to pass the invitation to others you think may be interested and ask also that they RSVP to me. If you are unable to attend but are interested to know more about Relational Thinking please also contact me!

Jonathan Rushworth was a partner with a major City of London law firm for 26 years, specializing in company and finance law. He retired from practice in 2007 and is Chairman of Relationships Global.

Dr Michael Schluter CBE is an economist, author, and social entrepreneur. He worked as an economist with the World Bank and a Research Fellow for the International Food Policy Research Institute. He founded the Jubilee Centre, Relationships Foundation and Concordis International. He is now Chief Executive of Relationships Global.

Posted in General | Tagged: , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

rWorld values

Posted by Simon on September 20, 2011

Personal and social wellbeing depends upon the quality of relationships within families and communities, and within and between organizations. Rooting ourselves in the relational values of the Judeo-Christian tradition,
we believe that building a society that sustains relationships requires recognizing the importance of the following :

1. Family networks – for the love, support and welfare of the individual.
Stable family life benefits adults and children in terms of both emotional and practical support. Families have a wide range of care and welfare responsibilities, particularly for children, partners and elderly relatives. The extended family has a vital role in supporting marriage and the nuclear family, and as a mediating institution between individuals and the state.

2. Personal and family rootedness – to build strong communities.
Rootedness involves developing a sense of belonging and practical involvement – in cities, towns and neighborhoods. Rootedness is important for personal wellbeing, access to support networks, and for the ability to participate fully in community life.

3. A shared national culture – to foster inclusion and cohesion.
A shared culture which can embrace diversity and includes respect for liberty of conscience is needed to support both cohesion and inclusion.

4. Justice and reconciliation – as the basis for achieving peace and social harmony.
This applies to personal, corporate, regional, ethnic and international relationships. Building peace requires encouraging reconciliation, restoring relationships and addressing the many factors that contribute to their breakdown.

5. The wide spread of political power and economic assets – to promote accountability and community development.
Distant decision making and financial dependence can inhibit both responsiveness to local needs and responsibility for addressing them. The desire for greater local responsibility can be in tension with the concern for ensuring quality and equity at a wider level. Where decisions or controls need to be located at higher levels, this should be done in ways that support local capacity and responsibility.

6. The use of money and other resources, and the structuring of financial systems – to foster healthy commercial, social and international relations.
Finance shapes relationships in many ways, for example through the impact of debt, capital flows, investment and spending patterns. Ownership involves responsibilities, and resources should be used in ways that strengthen relationships rather than undermining them.

7. Influencing organizations to think relationally – to uphold a social environment in which relationships thrive.
Relationships can be fostered or undermined by government, and by public and private sector organizations’ policies and actions. The strategy, structure, culture and working practices of an organization should be conducive to the flourishing of relationships, both within that organization and in wider society.

8. Fulfilling duties – particularly to those who are disadvantaged either relationally or materially.
Rights must be balanced by duties and obligations. People are responsible both for their own relationships and for the impact of their actions on others. Relational deprivation is as serious as material deprivation, and there is a particular duty to care for those who lack supportive relationships.

Posted in General | Tagged: , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

rWorld Objectives – Building a Relational World

Posted by Simon on September 19, 2011

These are the objectives for the rWorld. It’s a big, bold vision to foster a comprehensive relational vision. What do you think? What questions do these objectives provoke? What other organizations or movements do you know of that concur with this vision?

1. To promote a society that values the importance of relationships in all aspects of life and recognizes the important role of relationships in quality of life, both private and public.

2. To develop an awareness of and to promote the advancement of relationships in families, communities and organizations.

3. To undertake research on topics associated with relational wellbeing and use those research results to develop a framework to help influence the building of strong relational institutions, individuals, families, organizations and communities.

4. To promote, through education and training, the framework for organizations, families and communities to think relationally and to develop business practices, adopt family activities and endorse social institutions that enhance and create stronger social networks.

5. To promote better provision of public services through effective relational practices, working within the constructs of businesses and public and social institutions.

Posted in General | Leave a Comment »

Building a Relational World

Posted by Simon on September 16, 2011

Welcome to the rWorld blog!*

The rWorld is a non-profit organization with an ambitious objective, to put relationships at the heart of American life!

Our unique contribution is to provide a robust framework of thinking and acting relationally that is grounded in principle, in research and in 20 years of application in contexts ranging from urban finance, health care, conflict resolution, to work and family policy and more. Every human endeavor impacts, and is impacted by, relationships. The rWorld seeks to show exactly how, and what to do about it.

Over the coming days we’ll be introducing you to our goals and our values. We welcome your questions, thoughts and suggestions! Follow us on twitter, follow us on LinkedIn, or like our facebook page! Better still, if you’re in Boston, MA or Manchester, NH, come and see us in person!

Dale Kuehne, Simon Fowler and the rWorld team.

*Dale will be an ongoing contributor on this blog but the blog related to his book, Sex and the iWorld, has moved to http://signpostings.wordpress.com

Posted in General | Tagged: , | Leave a Comment »

 
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 194 other followers