From an article that came through the UN Development Program: a group of development workers spent some time studying Pasifika philosophy at Pasifika Communities University which underlies their approach to human development in the region. Here were some of the lessons they learned:
1. Relationality, not transactionality — Pasifika philosophies emphasize relationships over transactions. In global policymaking, this presents us an opportunity to move toward genuine reciprocity, whether between nations, communities, or sectors. In the Pacific, time is not measured in moments but in seasons and relationships.
2. Nature as kin, not resource — Pacific cultures often see the ocean, land, and skies as family. In the face of climate breakdown, this worldview offers a profound shift: protecting ecosystems is not simply environmental policy, but an act of kinship and responsibility to our Vanua*. It aligns with the principles of deep ecology and the principle of integration, which recognise the intrinsic value of all life and call for a holistic relationship with the natural world, one where human wellbeing is inseparable from the wellbeing of the planet, and our consciousness embraces every dimension of life.
3. Progress as continuity, not growth — In many Pasifika contexts, progress is measured not just by growth, but by cycles of regeneration. This stands in stark contrast to the relentless growth-at-all-costs mindset driving much of the global economy. Pasifika philosophies teach us that the beauty of Vakatabu (restraint) is not merely about the end results, but about the self-discovery in the waiting.
4. Consensus and Collective Stewardship — Decision-making in the Pacific often flows from principles such as the Fijian Veivakamareqeti (sustainability), which literally means to treasure or to keep and protect as something beloved. This care is held as a collective responsibility, a shared duty to safeguard what sustains us. Governance rooted in dialogue and consensus may move more slowly than top-down directives, but it works at the speed of trust, anchoring decisions in relationships, nurtures legitimacy, and builds long-term stability — qualities the world urgently needs in this era of polarisation.
5. Leading with Loloma (love) — In Pasifika philosophies, leadership is not a title to be worn as an ornament, but an act of service to the land and its people. True leadership is guided by loloma — a deep, relational love — anchored in connection to land, community, and spirit. Although love is rarely part of mainstream development discourse, overlooking it risks creating interventions without guardianship, autonomy, respect, and intergenerational connection.
6. Honouring Many Truths — Recognising that different perspectives can coexist without cancelling each other out. Pasifika philosophies teach us that mutual contradiction is not a weakness, but a space where diverse truths can live side by side. In this space, respect deepens, creativity flourishes, and collective wisdom grows, reminding us that value lies not in uniformity, but in the richness of many voices.
I resonate strongly with these lessons. These are core practices of dialogue work in human community and especially important values to practice and embed in work done in socially and environmentally threatened communities. The recovery of Indigenous worldviews, philosophies and approaches to land and community is essential in places where communities and land are in vulnerable states. Managerialism and exploitative capitalism sounds the death knell for these communities, both in local work, ecological sustainability and in the ways in which place like small Pacific islands bear the brunt of climate change. The voices that come from the Pacific are voices that plead for the world to change the way it think about life itself.
I live on a Pacific Island myself, within Skwxwu7mesh territory which lies beneath the imposition of Canadian law, regulations and the ways of life that have historically been at odds with the Indigenous worldview of this part of the world and the health of the ecosystems in the land and the seas around here. The recovery of the health of the inlet in which I live, Átl’ka7tsem, parallels the recovery of the strength and jurisdiction of the Squamish Nation, as prophetically documented in the book The Whale In The Door by Pauline Le Bel and Tiná7 Cht Ti Temíxw, a collection of writing from Squamish Nation members about the history and worldview of the Skwxwu7mesh uxwumixw.
In the UNDP report Upolu Lum? Vaai is quoted and I had a read through some of his work yesterday. For more of his philosophy, here are a couple of recent pieces. In Climate Change in Pasifika Relational Itulagi he writes
“This chapter argues for an ‘unburial’ of this neglected dimension [Pasifika philosophy, ethics and spirituality] which not only holds the key to constructive and sustainable solutions to the climate crisis, it also holds the key to a so-called ‘corrective balance’ of the whole human and ecological system, a kind of balance that activates self-healing and regenerative growth.”
In “We Are Therefore We Live” Pacific Eco-Relational Spirituality and Changing the Climate Change Story he explores these ideas more deeply an in the context of Christian theology as well.
Chris Mowles has a lovely post on the perils of an unquestioned commitment to directionality in complexity. Our work is never starting from scratch, and what does “going forward” even mean in a non-linear context?
…maybe there is more to uncover about complex experience than talking as if there is only one tense which is important, the future, and only the individual’s rationality and will to map it out. The future is important, and we are oriented towards it, but this shouldn’t prevent us from thinking about how we have become who we are, and what matters to us. What remains of the embers of the past from which we can still derive succour and find resource?
Rosa Zubazarreta has long been a curious “pracademic” – as she calls herself – about facilitation and deliberation. We have met a few times in the past, but I consider her a close colleague in the work of constantly trying to learn about how to host conversations and design group spaces in which dialogue and listening is maximized. She recently had a peer-reviewed article published called “Listening Across Differences” about deliberative “mini-publics” which are small democratic fora hosted in Austria. Her most recent blog post explores the role of AI in group facilitation, a topic about which she is deeply passionate, and about which I am very curious.
It’s happening and I’m certainly willing to explore it more in deliberative contexts. I have run a couple of small experiments using AI to summarize vast amounts of narrative information and advice submitted by citizens to create high level summaries of advice, high level articulations of dissenting opinions and so on. This becomes material for further deliberation. I have been toying with a design where members of a group all spend time feeding information to different GPTs, querying the data in different ways and bringing their insights to a conversation. It’s about how to make vast amounts of opinion accessible, and generate a learning conversation that everyone can participate in.
This is becoming an interesting field and I notice the twin poles of curiosity and resistance in myself. My friend Jeff Aitken sent along a link to Metarelational.ai which feels like a true TRIP to explore. There are several varieties of trained chatbot there. I have seen and explored some of these, each one cultivated like a garden, each one designed to do something a bit different. Honestly, after a hour or so in a session with these tools, it’s hard to know what terms like “relational” mean. I am firmly in the world of knowing and working with human-to-human relationality. The work at Metarelational seems to at times to evokes a kind of eschatology of human relationships stemming from our own design, and a sort of surrender to AI and machine intelligence that feels religious. It uses religious and spiritual terms and language like “agape” and “right relationship” and “interbeing.” I joked with Jeff the other day about when a new religion might sprout up around an AI chatbot. It’s a joke, but given the proclivity for human beings to seek a higher intelligence that has all the answers, and to be led in a course of action “forward” at any costs, I think there is a serious question here.
When he was Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney presided over the release of a remarkable report called “Money Creation in the Modern Economy” which skewered the idea that governments print money and create inflation when it is actually private banks that do that. David Graeber’s 2019 paper “Against Economics” came at a time, perhaps the last time, when I think we could have retooled economics to redistribue wealth through policies more in line with the ones that created the prosperity of the 1950s and 1960s. Alas. The populists and oligarchs have now combined to divide up the world and everyone else is scrambling for cash. Carney knows better, but the coming federal government austerity is just what the richest want: make credit cheap so that more money is created that eventually ends up in their pockets. We are not on a track to create a prosperous society let alone use the money we have to reverse the social, educational and climate crises that require resources and public infrastructure investment to address. (H/t to Harold Jarche for the links).
While following a thread about systems thinking I was led to this blog called Perspicacity from cognitive researcher John Flach. Flach has recently co-authored a book called “Do Systems Exist: A conversation” which I am interested to read. I think there is a lot more to say about this, but if you were to ask me the question right now I would say “yes and no.”
I’m in Canoe Cove this morning which is a small boat harbour near Swartz Bay on the northern tip of the Saanich Penisula near Victoria, BC. This is a popular destination for the road bike riders who come up the peninsula from the City on a weekend morning. While having an espressos I. The very good Fox and Monocle bakery cafe, I saw a woman in a bike shirt that read “Samsara” on the sleeve. I am unsure if this is an ironic branding.
The view from the ferry this week as I headed into Vancouver.
This weeks notes and noticing:
- July 14, 2025: transform: transforming conflict, dialogue and community
- July 15, 2025: people doing things they are good at: handy apps, polymaths and women’s football
- July 16, 2025: seeing the treasure: local placemaking and the Golden Ratio
- July 17, 2025: I’m in awe..: complexity, constraints, governance and amazing medical science
- July 18, 2025: the threat to beauty: AI, and the threat and promise of true creativity.
Let your curiosity carry you. And if you are a blogger sharing links and little notes like this, the part of me that chases rabbit holes would like to add you to my blogroll.
Restorative justice is the promising pathway to restoring community, and my friend Sally Swarthout Wolf is in the final stages of finishing a book on the topic. This is a collection of stories from the field, and having had a first peek at the galleys, it is a promising illustrative collection to show and inspire what is possible when we put relationship at the heart of conflict resolution. Pre-order it now.
If you don’t live in Manitoba, PEI, British Columbia or Yukon, your provincial government has not yet enrolled in the national Pharmacare program and you are being left out of funding to support drugs and medications you are otherwise paying more for. All Canadians fund this program. All Canadians should have access to it, but it requires provincial governments to get on board. (Most of the provinces not yet enrolled are led by conservative and populist parties, who are not good on public health stuff, PEI being the refreshing exception).
My enduring curiosity about complexity and constraints extends every day to public policy realms. Looking through a complexity lens helps me to understand governance and how we might address public policy challenges (and why we get it wrong, so often). Brian Klass today has a really fascinating read on dictators, central bankers, decision-making and constraints.
My enduring curiosity also extends to the night sky, and I’m not the only one who looks up, obviously. What I didn’t know until now is that a species of endangered moth uses the Milky Way to guide its migration to a place it has never been before. They have been determined to be the first invertebrate discovered to use celestial navigation.
Growing little brain avatars by reversing time in skin cells to create the building blocks of neural networks sounds – possible? It’s being done right now at Stanford University. This is where complexity takes us, pure experimental research into living systems, and watching how self organization can enable researchers to discover new treatments for brain issues.