From Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr.‘s speech at the Democratic National Convention, in Denver, last night:
“The well being of the “We” depends on the well being of the “He” and the “She”.”
How about the other way around also? The well being of the “I” depends on the well being of the “We”. This is especially true for the global environmental crisis facing us.
Lately, I have been giving lots of thoughts to this:
The “I” triangle is inspired from Maslow‘s. I just added a ‘want’ layer on top. This is to account for the fact that much of our Western behaviors are not so much influenced by needs, as by wants.
The “We” circle covers the world’s needs we need to address collectively.
The conventional wisdom states that individual interests are at odds with those global needs. While that may be true to a large extent, let us not forget the space where the “I” and the “We” overlap. This is where I think we should focus our attention. Translating global needs into desired individual behaviors, and see which ones amongst those, can be immediately matched with existing individual wants and needs.
In my next post I will explore what that common space looks like, and what it means for behavioral solutions to climate change and other global sustainability crisis.
La Marguerite 
Another most interesting post Marguerite, congratulations !
I see you did your graph with Microsoft Word (or an equivalent?) , which doesn’t seem to like the world biodiversity…
Colleen’s view on the perception of the transition from “I” to “we” is nice. Visually it is similar to the famous Steinberg maps – increasing distance in closeness (which may not be physical distance) greatly reduces the strength of the tie and the need to do something.
So she would say she cares a lot about her family and friends (even though they are scattered), her neighborhood, her beach, perhaps her town. At the state and country level she finds it more difficult to get engaged and the world is very difficult.
Part of this is the perceived ability to make an impact. She can help a friend and realize something wonderful along with a lot of feedback. Cleaning up liter on the beach makes a much bigger impact in her world than making a change than impacts global warming.
The relation between I and we is very non-linear.
So she concentrates on the local/import we because it means something to her. The reasoning is that collectively something good will happen on a global level.
It is probably difficult to motivate someone to do an action that is not part of their perceived we.
I agree with her. She articulates this better than me, but you get the rough idea.
Edouard, I used Keyword – by the way a real easy way to do graphs like these . . .
Steve, thanks! You are ahead of me as I am just now starting to work on next post, to do with the specifics of the “I” and the “We”. I am thinking along different lines, looking at personal needs and wants, and itemized desired behavioral actions from global perspective, and then figuring out overlap. The point of this approach is to bring the “We” needs closer to the “I” needs and wants, not the other way around. The example you give of your friend taking a walk on the beach with her friend while picking up liter, is exactly what I have in mind. Pollution is a global issue, but it can be translated into a list of desired individual behaviors, including that one. Here the individual needs addressed are friendship, physical well being, morality, and problem solving.
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