Organizing ourselves on a world scale

You and I are very much capable of working and living together worldwide in freedom, peace and prosperity. 100% horizontal, without a vertical world order, politicians or bosses.

“You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” Buckminster Fuller

The essence in ABC

ACocracy is an infinitely scalable organizing structure of 1) responsible individuals (@minds) that live and work together in free 2) association and in a 100% horizontal 3) relation to work and live together in their working and living communities and come together to make decisions for themselves around the #things that matter.

BWhenever a bigger #thing presents itself, they choose their direct 4) representatives from their midst, who come together in open 5) assemblies (#things) for alignment and agreement and are held directly 6) accountable by the represented.

CThis creates an unbroken chain from the smallest parts (individuals) to the largest whole (world), without any transfer of power.

The integrity of the chain is sustained by the communities themselves and they reap the individual, common and global fruits together: 7) freedom, 8) peace and 9) prosperity.

Why on a world scale?

Essentially, cocracy is meant for communities to organize themselves (on a small scale), but then often a false choice is assumed: either we must proceed with centralization into a one world order (monocracy) or we degenerate into uncivilized “savages,” ” randomness” and “anarchy“.

Cocracy demonstrates that there is a simple and fulfilling alternative with no transfer of power, minimal waste and enormous scalability.

By interacting with other communities, it is possible to learn from each other and scale up #things to move forward together.

It creates an infrastructure without a power structure, a social fabric, on which communities can build, based on the people themselves and their relationships.

We created a monster

Things aren’t working very well. All around us we see that “the system” is no longer doing what it is supposed to do. It is running squeaky and creaky. It has fallen into a free fall. Why? Because the “order,” which has been fundamentally unchanged for centuries, is completely obsolete and has proven not to be scalable at all. And this was actually always known, but has regularly been skillfully swept under the rug so as not to compromise vested interests in order to maintain the order (and its privileges).

Instead of turning our thinking around and focusing our creative power on a society and cooperations carried by the people themselves, we continue to build, layer by layer, as dependent agents on the terminal overorganization of the same, obsolete, global pyramid structure. With each additional layer, everything personal is made political, the order becomes exponentially more complex, incorporates everything and everyone of value and is no longer the solution, but is itself the cause of the problems. The mission for artificial unification and social engineering creates, through total encroachment and dehumanization, a power vacuum in which no one is accountable or responsible and only acts in a calculating way (what’s in it for me?). No one cares.

We are creating exactly what we fear: a monstrosity. The dominant operating system, the monocracy of the established order, tends to bundle powers ever further into a top to a monopoly (exclusive right) of decision making and enforcement (execution, which comes from the papal exequatur), a monologue from “top” to “down”, and a monoculture of uniform, obedient “citizens” walking neatly “in line” with a monotonous life and work. All to maintain order under the threat of violence. The result is that practically all thinking and organizing power is wasted in the megalomaniac bureaucratic administration of big government and big business and under the guise of ‘knowledge economy’ this is sold as positive, progressive, logical and above all, just.

This soulless and dehumanizing monster is the logical consequence of our most limiting beliefs surrounding the most powerful technology of all time, large-scale organization. We keep telling ourselves and each other, “We are naturally incapable of organizing ourselves on a large scale, so we must let ourselves be organized artificially.” As our rulers keep repeating these false pretenses, they, too, bundle the powers higher and higher. With which we are constantly balancing on the edge of fascism (“bundling of power”).

Meanwhile, we also keep telling each other, “This is the only way”, “There is no alternative”, “This is the way it works”, “We’ve never had it better” and “Not everyone can have a say in everything!” And else we make each other fear chaos (Greek for “void”), crisis (Greek for “turning point”) and anarchy (Greek for “leaderless”). But it is not true, they are all just stories. The reality is: it doesn’t “work” at all and there are very real alternatives to prevailing power structures. However, as long as we do not dare to face this fact, we keep falling back on the same “solution” out of an artificially instilled fear of disorder: more of the same, established order. We run in circles and limit our own creative power to justify the fact that others (a superior or sovereign) are allowed to govern, dominate and remote-control us as subordinates.

What is needed is to see that the enormously complicated, artificial order as we know it today does not work, has never worked and cannot work. Not on a small scale, not on a large scale, let alone on a world scale. The order creates disorder. And to see that it is not so much the rulers or the power structures themselves that are to blame, but the mindset, the persistent misunderstanding in which we imprison ourselves, that we are dependent on this order for our freedom, peace and prosperity, while it brings about exactly the opposite: slavery, strife and debt. And the only thing that continually keeps us trapped in this or keeps us from doing so are the people themselves who either choose to go along with this narrative or choose to do the right thing over and over again.

We can free ourselves from this by seeing that certain things do actually work. That despite all the centralized organizational violence, a lot does go well. And that this always comes from groups of people who simply do the right thing by themselves. We are indeed capable of organizing ourselves on a large scale. From the smallest part, the individual, to the largest whole, the world. It really can be done. This organizing structure (not a new political system) is called cocracy and has existed for as long as mankind has existed. What is unprecedented is that the principles can be scaled up infinitely and very efficiently to a global scale, with minimal cutting losses, because the execution is where it happens and is scaled up only where necessary. It no longer starts “at the top,” nor “at the bottom,” but from within. As small as possible. And as large as possibly necessary. But never ‘higher’ or ‘lower’.

Although technically it is child’s play to achieve global freedom, peace and prosperity, that is not what will practically make the difference. All along we were looking for the solution outside ourselves, but it turned out that it was always inside ourselves waiting to be liberated. To stop harming the rich complexity of people, it is no longer enough to put a new structure outside or above ourselves among a distant few, strict systems and complicated ideologies, but within ourselves and among each other. Based on the real world. Human work. These times require each of us to take our own responsibility, without compulsion or coercion. You and I now are to play our part. With each other. Co. Therein lies the key to true freedom, peace and prosperity.

Cocracy thus begins, on the one hand, with each of us, but, on the other hand, especially by putting it into practice. Gaining experience with self-organization and self-governance, without taught dependence on falling back on higher powers, such as markets or states. So the choice is yours. Because you decide. Only you. And nothing or no one else can do this for you. No, no new ruler or artificial trick, such as a new “universal declaration of human rights,” constitution or collective “declaration of independence”, is coming to your rescue. Therefore, it is time for an individual declaration of independence.

My individual declaration of independence

This statement is purely for yourself, for no one else. No record of it is kept and no one can derive any rights or obligations from it.

#1I hereby declare that, as cocreator, am an independent and undividable individual of flesh, blood and spirit. I am the only possible unit responsible for my inner and outer world and understand that it is impossible to shift my own burdens to anything or anyone else.

#2I hereby declare that, as cocreator, in free connection with my fellow humans, I can get to know them better and through them myself. No one need do anything for another except out of common or free will. I will not harm their freedom, nor impose or coerce my will.

#3I hereby declare that, as cocreator, can form living and working communities in a completely horizontal relationship with my fellow humans around the areas that matter and where there is something to do. No one can force me to recognize or tolerate a power or entity above me.

#4I hereby declare that, as cocreator, am willing to take on the direct representation on behalf of my fellow men who entrust me with it and deem me competent. I can derive no right or power from this honor over anything or anyone else.

#5I hereby declare that, as cocreator, I immediately call an open assembly, small or large, when a #thing arises on which I, my fellow humans or their direct representatives need to find alignment and/or agreement with each other.

#6I hereby declare that, as cocreator, I am willing to be directly accountable for my words, choices and actions. I take care of the integrity of the entire chain of direct representation and assembly, from smallest PART to largest whole.

#7I hereby declare that, as cocreator, by taking responsibility for myself and my world, I am able to live in full freedom and nothing or no one can deprive me or my fellow human beings of this freedom unless I freely allow it and can revoke it at all times.

#8I hereby declare that, as cocreator, based on all of the foregoing, I can attain inner peace within myself, my communities and the world. I do not perform or accept any act of aggression, intervention, violence or coercion from myself or others toward myself or others.

#9I hereby declare that, as cocreator, I heartily wish all my fellow human beings and myself this responsible freedom and peace and wish to work with them for prosperity for all, without abusing or misleading anything or anyone for their own or others’ gain.

Download declaration (PDF)

read the entire whitepaper

“A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked.
A complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be made to work.
You have to start over, beginning with a working simple system.” John Gall

The choice is yours

Cocracy is not something grandiose, but begins and ends small. Right where it happens. Among yourself and your community(s). The only thing each of us has to do is to right what is crooked. We all have a fundamental choice.

AI do not choose and continue to support the established “one” world order, based on rules, and participate (collaborate) as an accomplice (agent) in the inevitable unification and demise of the monocratic monster, with a select few elsewhere reaping the sour fruits of the slavery, strife and debt of the many.

BI do choose and as cocreator I will work with my fellow human beings on a sense of community, based on the plurality of us inspired minds ourselves, in which people work and live with each other in a 100% horizontal relationship and so can reap the fruits of peace, freedom and prosperity themselves.

The choice is yours. Because you decide. As the only one. And nothing or no one else can do this for you.

#NowWhat?
Organize a #Thing!

Many talk about “democracy,” but how can we speak of it when its beating heart, the People’s Assembly (#Thing), has been skillfully cut out and kept out?

Cocracy starts on a small scale in your own (local) community, where people start making decisions with each other again. And the #Thing is the key that opens the door.

This is how you organize a #thing