Friends,
Here in Nova Scotia we have just had a particularly brutal budget
passed, with major cutbacks to social services, and government, business,
and the social sector are at each others' throats. It occurs to me that
we are poverty-stricken by a language of fragmentation that makes it
difficult for each side to imagine cooperation with the other. For
example, to many in business, the great mass of unemployed are "whiners'
seeking "entitlement." We have no ready language to distinguish, and thus
envision, the "unwillingly unemployed" from the "gratefully unemployed."
Similarly, the social sector attacks "business interests," failing to
distinguish between compassionately pragmatic and greedily defensive
points of view.
I would appreciate any pointers towards work on specific and pointed use
of language to provide the groundwork to enable a systems-based view to
root and flourish in society.
With thanks in advance,
Michael Chender
--Michael Chender <mchender@netcom.ca>
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