User:DesignForLove

The historic Blue Marble photograph.

The Age of Transition (cir. 2028 - ?), a.k.a. The Transition, officially coined in 2058 by the Chairman of the Federation for Cooperation, is a term used to bracket the historical era of human evolution in which humankind is transitioning from an age of Selfishness to an age of Cooperation. This era is defined in contrast to its preceding historical era, generally referred to as The Dark Night (cir. Industrial Revolution – 2028).

While The Age of Transition is believed to have started sometime between the year 2008 and the year 2108, its start date is often defined individually depending on the date on which the person had a Cooperative epiphany, often officially determined by the year he or she joined the Federation for Cooperation.

History

Origins

The Age of Transition has no one root, though its origins are primarily the psycho-spiritual stirrings of the population at large in reaction against the existing worldview (see Paul Hawken: Blessed Unrest), which was leading to increased rates of mental health disorders and physical illnesses.

In a 50-year span preceding the earliest start date for The Transition (cir. 2008), mental health statistics showed that in a MECA (Methods for the Epidemiology of Child and Adolescent Mental Disorders) study, 21 percent of individuals between the ages of 9 and 17 have a ‘diagnosable mental or addictive disorder with at least minimum impairment’ (Schor, 2004). Rates of anxiety, specifically, have been estimated to be as high as 13 percent by the year 2004 (Schor, 2004), and the ‘average (i.e., normal) young person between the ages of nine and seventeen scores as high on anxiety scales as children who were admitted to clinics for psychiatric disorders in 1957’ (Schor, 2004).

Psychologists blamed this mental health decline on the rise of either extrinsic motivation, i.e. being concerned with receiving external rewards (Christopher & Schlenker, 2004), or materialism, a specific form of extrinsic motivation, defined as ‘the importance a consumer attaches to worldly possessions’ (Belk, 1985), which was found to lead to ‘more anxiety, little vitality, few pleasant emotions, and low life satisfaction’ (Kasser, 2002).

Sociologists argued that the mental health decline was partly due to modern alienation, a consequence of the economic paradigm underlying society. The result of this alienation is that humans come to relate to each other not as human to human, but as commodity to commodity, and relationships are formed on the basis of their commodity or exchange value (Marx, 1978).

Put a different way by sociologist Emile Durkheim, modern societies suffered increasingly over the 19th and 20th (and then 21st) Centuries from the ‘disease of the infinite’, characterized by a lack of social control (‘anomie’) and a lack of social cohesion (‘egoism’). The latter found its expression in what has now been dubbed the ‘Selfish Mindset’ (see Paradigms).

Psychologically related physical health problems, such as alcoholism, reached staggering proportions by the 21st Century. And the prevalence of autoimmune diseases was skyrocketing, particularly amongst the female population. For example, ‘the proportion of women living with multiple sclerosis jumped by 50 percent between the 1980s and the 1990s’ (Cariati, 2002). While the prevalence of heart disease and cancer were declining in some of the more developed countries, the prevalence of autoimmune diseases rose steadily over time (Rose, 2004). The physical burden this placed in particular on the female population was one of the many causes of psychological strain that some suggest ushered in The Transformation.

Around the first decade of the 21st century, a consensus was emerging among academics that wellbeing was inextricably linked to mindset, i.e. it was the underlying mindset that determined society’s level of extrinsic motivation, alienation, etc. that were affecting physical and mental health. The issue of mindset was catapulted into public awareness by group work done in 2008 for the University of Dundee’s joint Masters of Design and Masters of Design Ethnography program. This group defined the prevailing mindset that was detrimental to wellbeing as the ‘Selfish Mindset’, and suggested that in order for society to be sustainable from a mental health perspective, this mindset would need to change over time towards a more ‘Cooperative Mindset’. The period of transition between these two mindsets is aptly referred to as The Age of Transition.

Paradigms

By the year 2108, 80% of the population has made the transition to a Cooperative Mindset, while 20% remains entrenched in their Selfish Mindset. Overwhelmingly, those that remained Selfish were predominantly the top 10% of the population in Socio-Economic Status (SES) or the bottom 10% (SES). Reasons for this trend were hypothesized, many suggesting that these two groups represented the individuals most highly invested in the perpetuation of the Selfish paradigm: the rich because they were succeeding best in the system, and the poor because they were paralyzed by fear of failing to attain a means of paying for necessities such as food and shelter.

Over the 100 years between 2008 and 2108, this Selfish mindset led to a variety of trends that were accelerating unsustainably. (See Fig.2???).

(images of trends)

In recognition of the need for change, gradually people began to collaborate to address the concerns facing humankind. Eventually 80% of the world population adopted a Cooperative Mindset.

Characteristics of the Selfish Mindset

(image of the Selfish Head and/or logo)

The Selfish Mindset is often associated with a prevalence of materialism, estrangement (from the environment and from one’s fellow humans), isolation, exploitation, short-sightedness, narrow-mindedness, individualism, and meaninglessness; in short, a bleak picture for mental health (see Fig.4).

images of the trends :

In general, the Selfish Mindset is defined by the individual’s preoccupation with their own needs without consideration of the needs of the society. The Federation for Cooperation writes:

‘The Selfish Mindset, i.e. the mindset of a Selfish individual, manifests as one’s preoccupation with the satisfaction of their own extrinsic needs, often to the detriment of the society at large’ (The Transition Handbook, 2058).

This has been called The Selfish Paradigm – that the needs of the individual are more important than the needs of society.

Furthermore, the extrinsic motivation underlying the Selfish Mindset leads to a society in which production needs supersede human needs. At its extreme, this mentality led to unsustainable design solutions that put human kind in the greatest environmental peril in history.

Ironically, this Selfishness does not necessarily lead to satisfaction of one’s needs, and over the long-term, Selfishness is correlated with decreased life satisfaction. This is referred to as The Selfish Paradox (The Transition Handbook, 2058).

Characteristics of the Cooperative Mindset

(image of the Cooperative Head and/or logo)

The details of the Cooperative Mindset are articulated at great lengths in The Transition Handbook. The main characteristics of the Cooperative Mindset are the following:

• spiritualism: as the opposite of materialism
• harmony with nature: realizing oneself as part of nature rather than trying to dominate it; this leads to more sustainable use of the earth’s resources and a less damaging influence on the planet
• harmony with fellow human beings: realizing oneself as the same as other humans and living by The Golden Rule; this leads to less conflict, less exploitation, and better productivity toward meaningful ends
• socialization: as the opposite of individualism; people are more engaged with their surroundings instead of trapped in their own sensory bubble
• far-sightedness: being cognizant of one’s impact on generations to come and acting out of concern for the greater good of all parties
• open-mindedness: related to one’s capacity to listen to others’ views or needs; also manifests as a decreased obsession with one’s own regional or nationalistic needs

The Cooperative Mindset, in a nutshell, is defined as one’s identification with the group, the result of which is the inversion of the The Selfish Paradigm. The new paradigm, The Cooperative Paradigm, is one in which needs of society are prioritized above the needs of the individual. This paradigm is associated with the following trends:

(images of the trends going back down).

Individuals with a Cooperative Mindset are motivated by intrinsic needs. This means that human values supersede production values. This motivation leads individuals to act according to what they know to be ‘correct’. Psychologists believe that this values to actions verisimilitude leads to greater well being.

Cooperative Epiphany

According to the The Transition Handbook of the Federation of Cooperation, a Cooperative epiphany is a moment when one’s mindset shifts from a primarily Selfish one to a more Cooperative one:

‘As the demands of the Selfish society increasingly take their toll on the individual, he is likely to reach a breaking point at which point he awakens to the knowledge that his life is lacking in meaning and that his extrinsic motivation is detrimental to his mental wellbeing. At this point, he turns his focus outward toward his society in order to locate a new source of meaning. He realizes, finally, that the only way to find sustainable happiness is to put his efforts toward the creation of a society that is more harmonious with human values. This is what we call a “Cooperative epiphany”’ (The Transition Handbook, 2058).

Mindset Crisis

Often preceding a Cooperative epiphany, individuals may go through a period of deep reflection, assessing their values and needs and reevaluating how they are being met by their lifestyles. This is alternately called a Mindset Crisis and the Critical Mindset. At this stage, people may either reach a Cooperative epiphany or retreat into a their Selfish Mindsets with renewed determination to numb themselves to their psycho-spiritual needs. The Federation for Cooperation considers this Mindset Crisis of high importance to the cause of building a sustainable society:

‘It is not our responsibility to actively change people’s Selfish mindset, nor is it in our power. Each person must come to a realization for himself that his Selfish lifestyle is not making him happy or healthy. But if you take notice of a person’s Mindset Crisis, this is the perfect opportunity to offer emotional support to this person, welcoming them with kindness so that they do not retreat out of fear back to the comfort of their Selfish ways’ (The Transition Handbook, 2058).

It is through this generosity of spirit that the Cooperative movement gains membership.

Design for Fear

The unifying design principle of a Selfish Mindset is what the Federation for Cooperation calls Design for Fear, and it is a direct result of extrinsic motivation. Efficiency and profitability are the two aims behind this design principle.

Design for Love

In contrast to Design for Fear, Design for Love is the overriding design principle of a Cooperative society. Its spirit is best captured by famous Cooperative designer, A.Z. Smith:

‘When I set about to design something, I first ask myself what human values are at stake in the design. Once I define the potential influence my design might have on my fellow man, I determine which human values I am aiming to support with my design. Then I begin sketching. If I find that my design solution compromises any human value, I start again. My job is not complete until I have designed something that will improve the lives of the greatest possible number of people’ (Martin, 2108).

Design for Love takes into consideration both the long-term and global impact of any design on humans as it relates to human values. This principle was articulated in detail in the 2108 Symposium on Design for the Cooperative Age, which outlined a global plan for a sustainable future through design (see The Age of Cooperation).

Aesthetics, as it relates to happiness and well being, are of greater importance to Cooperative designers than Selfish Designers. Design for Love takes into consideration the psychological atmosphere created by the design. Whether it be adding a splash of color, personalizing one’s space to increase comfort, or making sure that one has a view of nature, Design for Love aims to address the psycho-spiritual needs of individuals.

Subdivisions

Conflicting Mindsets

As individuals identified themselves with the Cooperative movement, Transition Communities became increasingly common in the first part of the 21st Century. This led to new social organization as individuals with similar mindsets tended to group together.

Geographical Distribution

While individuals maintaining a Selfish Mindset (hereafter referred to as ‘Selfish people’) tended to congregate in cities and those with the new Cooperative Mindset (hereafter referred to as ‘Cooperative people’) often established sustainable communities in the countryside, these two groups occasionally overlapped in physical location in the early 21st Century. In other words, the Selfish Mindset is correlated with urban populations and the Cooperative Mindset is correlated with rural populations.

Over time, however, and with increased portions of the population seeking a Cooperative way of life, this trend of segregating by mindset was reconsidered. Cooperative people felt that secluding themselves from the Selfish people was detrimental to the cause of eventual world conversion to sustainable cooperation. By the mid-21st Century, Cooperative people and Selfish people commingled, living side by side in both urban and rural communities.

Town Planning and Housing

The two mindsets resulted in two different plans developing simultaneously: the Selfish people continued to build out of immediate needs and wants, whereas the Cooperative people built according to a long-term plan for sustainable living.

Particular consideration was given by the Cooperative people for issues regarding allocation of arable land resources (see Agriculture and Food Production):

‘Any plans for a new building must take into account the resources necessary to accommodate those individuals living in that building, and this need must not exceed the resources available on the building’s property. In sum, this means that the land on which a new building is built must be able to generate enough food to feed the people who will live in the building’ (The Transition Handbook, 2058).

In contrast, Selfish people built their homes to maximum efficiency so that the most number of people could be packed into a single building. Property managers sought to extract the greatest possible profit from their tenants. As a result, most buildings resembled tall boxes with small boxes inside them.

Buildings designed according to the Design for Love paradigm, Cooperative buildings, were often more aesthetically pleasing to inhabit, and thus engendered a certain inner contentedness. They were also designed for the purpose of facilitating cooperation between individuals. This meant that special consideration was made to ensure that individuals were able to socialize and interact with their neighbors. Frequently this meant that within a building, certain sections were designed to be shared amongst the tenants (such as a building café, pool, game room, etc.).

These Cooperative buildings were designed to be ‘green’, running on as little power as possible and, in most cases, growing crops on the roofs.

(images)

It is the policy of the Federation for Cooperation that individuals seeking residency in a Cooperative building cannot be turned away simply because they are not yet members of the Federation. Cooperative people welcome Selfish people into their buildings, partly because, as is often the case, these Selfish people rapidly reach a Cooperative epiphany when living closely amongst Cooperative people.

Government and Politics

At the 2058 Conference on Cooperation (insert image), participating members proposed the establishment of a global governing body in charge of seeing to utilitarian matters on a world level. In 2062, a Cooperative Government was established, though its domain is limited to the global members of the Federation for Cooperation. Selfish people continued to function in general accordance with the will of their own national and local governments irrespective of the suggestions made by the Cooperative Government.

Law

New Cooperative laws even on the local level are established only after they are approved globally by the Cooperative Government. In contrast, Selfish people do not defer to the global governing body regarding jurisprudence.

Cooperative people follow the law out of respect, whereas Selfish people follow the law out of fear of punishment. When a Selfish law is broken, this punishment is applied to individual right (e.g. incarceration). But when Cooperative law is broken, the lawbreaker is forced to pay back their community, usually by helping in the creation of some portion of the Cooperative infrastructure (e.g. installing new power grids in addition to one’s other responsibilities).

The Cooperative Mindset is not enough to eradicate crime altogether, but because the levels of fear in Cooperative people are lower than in Selfish people (see Fig.8), this often leads to decreased crime, particularly because Cooperative people are unlikely to carry weapons. Furthermore, crimes motivated by financial needs are prevalent among Selfish people, but because of the Cooperative people’s relationship to money (see Distribution of Wealth), most Cooperative people are disinclined to commit a crime for financial reasons (see Fig.9).

(image of comparative fear between S and C)

(image of comparative crime between S and C)

Foreign Relations

Relations between Selfish governments around the world have been increasingly incendiary as global resources become scarcer and weapons of mass destruction proliferate. A significant burden of each selfish government is its military expenditures.

In contrast, the Cooperative Government has no military presence. All decisions are reached with global consensus, so ‘foreign’ is, ironically, an increasingly foreign concept to the Cooperative individual.

Politics

The Age of Transition is marked by political turmoil, as the two mindsets vie for control (which the Cooperative people would seek to achieve a sustainable future for humanity). Selfish governments are threatened by the agenda of the Cooperative Government, despite the Cooperative Government’s passivity regarding the affairs of the Selfish.

Economy

Many Cooperative people dislike money as a form of exchange between people. But because Cooperative people have to compete for resources with Selfish people (who would likely take them all if Cooperative people could not pay for them), Cooperative people and Selfish people share the same basic economy, which still exists in its regionalized form, i.e. each country has its own economy of which all people partake. Economic issues were addressed at the 2108 Symposium on Design for the Cooperative Age, and plans were made to attempt a gradual switch to an economy based on something other than money, though this cannot be realized until all individuals have a Cooperative epiphany and join the Federation for Cooperation.

Distribution of Wealth

Selfish people relate to one another as if from commodity to commodity (rather than person to person). This is a product of what Marx called commodity Fetishism, or the abstraction of men as commodities:

‘There is a definite social relation between men, that assumes, in their eyes, the fantastic form of a relation between things’ (Marx, 1978).

This abstraction causes Selfish people to identify with their money, and further, it allows Selfish people to perpetuate great imbalance of wealth. Amongst Selfish individuals, agreements of wage are made according to the culturally defined value of labor (which heavily favors intellectual labor over physical labor). This is in comparison to a Cooperative arrangement, generally reached according to the benefit of one’s labor to the society.

As such, the quality of money to a Selfish person is concrete and ‘hoardable’, to be used to satisfy individual (and generally immediate) needs; but to a Cooperative person, money is liquid, easily transmutable and difficult to hold in one’s hand. Cooperative individuals frequently pool their wealth together to help individuals in greater need. So while money is not evenly distributed in a Cooperative community, wealth is often subsequently redistributed to benefit all in the community.

Business

Selfish businesses are based on the idea of ‘buying to sell’ (Marx) in order to increase profit, often devaluing human labor (and thus the worker) in the process. Marx writes:

‘The directing motive, the end and aim of capitalist production is to extract the greatest possible amount of surplus-value and consequently to exploit labor-power to the greatest possible extent’ (Marx, 1978).

In contrast to this, Cooperative business is based on the idea of ‘selling to buy’ (Marx), without the motive to exploit human labor. Whereas Selfish businesses often do a great deal of importing of goods to be resold at a higher cost, Cooperative businesses produce goods locally to be sold. As an example, grocery stores in 2108 take two forms: Selfish grocery stores import goods, and Cooperative grocery stores resemble marketplaces, as they are a place where people from various Cooperative communities bring their goods to exchange for goods that they cannot produce in their own communities.

But because 80% of the population has Cooperative needs, even Selfish businesses have begun to cater to these Cooperative needs (for their own Selfish reasons). In other words, the prevalence of Cooperative needs is an incentive for corporate change towards a more Cooperative business paradigm.

Job Satisfaction

The Selfish Mindset is correlated with low job satisfaction, since Selfish people are preoccupied with climbing further and further up the proverbial ladder to success, seeking ever greater extrinsic rewards for their labor. This rarely leads to sustainable job satisfaction.

Cooperative people derive satisfaction from their work according to how beneficial their labor is to the society. These people are generally happier because they more frequently get the opportunity to do what they are best at. From this, Cooperative people derive intrinsic value through their labor.

Resources

One of the greatest psychological catalysts for the development of the Cooperative Mindset in society was the increasingly pressing ecological conundrum faced by people in the early 21st Century. As energy sources dried up, food sources dwindled (due to disruption of the ecosystem and rising water levels), and drinking water became scarcer, many individuals found themselves in a phase of Mindset Crisis, a new existential crisis. People began to evaluate their lifestyles and ask, ‘Is it worth all this?’ As a result, many people’s first Cooperative step was taken toward addressing these serious environmental issues.

A characteristic of the Selfish Mindset is living in disharmony with nature, trying to dominate it as opposed to live as part of it. Unfortunately, this is the root of the environmental crisis facing humanity to this day. While Cooperative efforts (80% of the population) help assuage some of the damage done by Selfish consumption and waste, the 20% of the population that is Selfish continued over the 21st Century to accelerate their destructive legacy to such a degree that the 80% of society that is Cooperative has succeeded in reducing this destruction overall only minimally (see Fig.10).

(image of the environmental trends)

Differences over environmental policies have been the biggest source of political strife between the two factions, and it is the top priority of the Cooperative agenda to get Selfish people to become more environmentally conscious.

Agriculture and Food Production

As an extension of the Selfish estrangement from nature, these people spend a great deal of time and energy trying to exploit nature as much as possible. Hybridization and chemicals are frequently used on crops to produce a higher yield at the expense of the nutritional health of the resulting harvest. And Selfish people spend a lot of money to import food from elsewhere in order to satisfy their tastes. Almost as a rule, Selfish people do not support themselves by growing their own food.

In stark contrast, Cooperative people produce enough food to sustain themselves, eating local and in-season foods, though frequently trading with neighboring Cooperative communities for the sake of dietary variety. Each community undergoes a deliberation process regarding the plan for growing sustainable food sources. In 2008, if there was any vegetation in a Selfish community, it was frequently, unfortunately, of little dietary benefit to people. Cooperative people routinely plant only useful plants and crops that will contribute to the community’s food stock, often directly in the cities in addition to in surrounding farmland.

Energy

Oil resources have dried up considerably in the past hundred years. Selfish people are unwilling to forsake their beloved automobiles and petroleum-based products, so the conflict over oil has increased through the years. Some effort has been made by Selfish people to harness new sources of energy, in a desperate attempt to maintain the lifestyle to which they have become accustomed. Many products are solar powered (e.g. all streetlamps), and a great deal of power is generated by wind.

Humanity’s desperation (Selfish and Cooperative alike) for energy sources has led to some impressive technological advancements through the 21st Century. These include the perfection of the harnessing of energy from tidal waves, biogas, sea level temperature differences, as well as more fantastic innovations:

  - harnessing of energy from geysers, volcanoes and earthquakes
  - the application of sea level temperature difference technology to air temperature difference energy
  - the harnessing of global warming as a source of energy (which simultaneously counteracts the levels of global warming) 
  - the creation of salt water batteries (which also offsets some of the problems of rising sea levels)

The greatest difference as far as energy between Selfish and Cooperative people is the consumption: Selfish people continue to use more and more energy, even though it is frequently from alternative energy sources; Cooperative people make a concerted effort to reduce their energy consumption whenever possible.

Medicine

Selfish medicine and Cooperative medicine differ a great deal. Selfish people have to compete with each other for medical resources, and often times some people are unable to pay for treatment. Cooperative people believe that all people are deserving of medical treatment, and as such all treatment is provided for free by the community doctor. In rare cases when a person needs treatment only available from Selfish doctors, it is traditional for the community to pool their funds to help the ailing individual.

Notable diseases

The most noticeable difference between Selfish people and Cooperative people is the prevalence of mental health disorders: it is increasingly rare for a Selfish person not to have a diagnosable mental disorder, while such disorders are exceedingly rare among Cooperative people.

Statistics related to cause of death are distinct for Selfish and Cooperative people (see Fig.13):

(image of the causes of death)

Particularly tragic is the rate of suicide amongst Selfish people, which soared throughout the 21st Century, reaching epic proportions. Sociologists suggest that this is a result of modern ‘anomie’ and ‘egoism’ amongst the Selfish (see Fig.14).

(image of Durkheim suicide chart)

Education

The education system remains much the same as it was in 2008 amongst Selfish people. Selfish education is based on disciplinary power (Foucault):

‘Discipline is an art of rank, a technique for the transformation of arrangements. It individualizes bodies by a location that does not give them a fixed position, but distributes them and circulates them in a network of relations’ (Foucault, 1977).

The goal of Selfish education is to control the population, to normalize individuals. To do so, the education system is preoccupied with ranking students and punishing outliers.

An entirely different paradigm lies at the center of the Cooperative education system, which began to take effect after the 2058 Conference on Cooperation. The goal of this system is to encourage free thinking, creativity, and self-esteem; in short, to foster the child’s inherent talents. The system is designed to be holistic in order to develop well-rounded humans, allowing them to explore where their particular interests truly lie. Unlike the Selfish system, the Cooperative system is unbiased with regards to the value of any child’s talents. Intellectual development is not considered of more importance than the child’s physical or spiritual development; and as the child matures and chooses to concentrate on a particular area which is to become his/her future employment, the education system aims to provide support to that student in whatever he/she chooses to do (be it intellectual labor, physical labor, trade labor, etc.).

Cooperative schools do not receive financial support from their national government (i.e. the Selfish government), though they do receive funding from the Federation for Cooperation. Often, however, teachers do not receive a salary for teaching. At any given time, those parents with time to contribute to the classroom will alternate teaching responsibilities. Whereas in the Selfish system, parents and teachers occasionally meet to discuss issues regarding education, in the Cooperative system, the parents are the teachers.

Cooperative teachers frequently take students out into the community to learn from experience. Occasionally, these fieldtrips bring awareness of the Cooperative system to Selfish parents, who may wish to enroll their children in Cooperative schools. It is the policy of the Federation for Cooperation that no child will be turned away if they wish to seek a Cooperative education.

A heavy emphasis is placed in the Cooperative curriculum on environmental awareness and the principles of sustainability.

Adult education is also an important component of the Cooperative education system. Any individual who joins the Federation for Cooperation is welcome to take part in classes.

The Transition Handbook is a standard teaching text for all ages.

The Transition Handbook

This publication was the product of the 2058 Conference on Cooperation. The great leaders of the Cooperative movement from around the world met to discuss their aims and voice their concerns about the future. In 2060, the publication was made free for all, and within a decade, more people had read this book than had read the Bible.

Language

Subtle differences can be found between the language used by Selfish people and Cooperative people, though these differences are not significant enough to cause communication problems between the groups. Often the differences are in tone: Cooperative people tend to use more polite language and might find Selfish people’s language somewhat rude. This is exacerbated by the fact that Selfish people often speak at a higher volume than Cooperative people, who are generally more respectful of other people.

Considerable research has been done by linguists on the qualitative differences between the two parallel languages. Their conclusions can be summarized as follows

Characteristic	Selfish language	Cooperative language
Pace	Efficient; ‘text-speak’	Slower, more descriptive
Quality	‘Mathematical’	‘Poetic’
Vocabulary	Derived largely from commodities	Derived largely from emotions; ‘feeling words’
Depth	‘Shallow’	‘Deep’

An interesting pattern was also noted by linguists: Selfish language was frequently adapted for technology (e.g. Tamil script was changed in the end of the 20th Century to be typed into computers more easily), yet Cooperative language has evolved to better express human needs.

Social Life

Individuals of different mindsets do frequently form friendships, though it is rare for Selfish and Cooperative people to intermarry, mostly because the differences of opinion are too great.

It bears repeating that Selfish individuals are motivated by extrinsic need satisfaction, whereas Cooperative people are motivated by intrinsic need satisfaction. This applies to the social sphere: Selfish people frequently form relationships for status reasons or to satisfy immediate needs; Cooperative people tend to form lasting relationships based on mutual respect. Inherently linked with the economic paradigms operating under each mindset, Selfish people relate to one another as commodities (see Economy), and Cooperative people relate to one another as peers.

Romantic relationships

Because Selfish romantic relationships are contingent upon the acquisition of extrinsic rewards, they often fail when these needs are not met. In this sense, Selfish people treat their romantic relationships as disposable and replaceable (just as they treat their commodities). A Selfish person’s primary responsibility is his/herself, and relationship ties are broken when this person’s needs are not met adequately. Throughout the 19th, 20th, and early 21st Centuries, the rates of divorce climbed. By the mid-21st Century, marriage was dying out among Selfish people, as many could not afford the cost of divorce (which was considered almost inevitable) (see Fig.11).

(image of marriage and divorce rates)

Cooperative romantic relationships are built upon the desire for mutual happiness. When these relationships result in marriage (see Commitment), this is considered a social contract (as opposed to a legal arrangement): the two people make a promise to work to make each other happy. As a result, these marriages have greater longevity, and because there is no legal repercussion for divorce (should it come to that), marriage among Cooperative people has made a resurgence through the 21st Century.

Extended family relationships

Family ties were weaker in the 20th and 21st Centuries than any other time in human history (that is, with the exception of the Cooperative family relationships which formed in the 21st Century). Selfish adolescents derive their identity not from their families or their communities but rather from their consumption patterns. This was described as a variant on totemism, believed to be the earliest form of religion derived from one’s association with one’s social group or clan as represented by a totem (Durkheim, 1995). This ‘new totemism’, however, involves the appropriation of commodities into a new constellation of social meanings:

‘…one must wonder whether [totemism] has not been replaced by species and varieties of manufactured objects, which like totemic categories have the power of making even the demarcation of their individual owners a procedure of social classification’ (Sahlins, 1976).

Some Selfish families are closely knit despite these people’s desire to live their own lives, though often they are defined as a nuclear family (and often a fragile one at that). It is exceptionally rare for Selfish families to consider the larger community part of their family; they are distinct and isolated from the community.

It is common for family relationship ties to be based on feelings of entitlement (e.g. ‘I have to love her because she is my mother’), and often these bonds are little more than convenient financial arrangements between members of the Selfish family. Frequently these families become fragmented and separated physically and/or emotionally.

Cooperative families tend to be rather different. Extended family frequently live together in close proximity, and often the community is considered by Cooperative people to be ‘part of the family.’ It is rare for Cooperative families to separate. Members of the family are bonded by love and live amongst each other with respect and gratitude. As such, family members derive their identity to a much greater extent from their family/community identity, and they are much more likely to behave on behalf of the best interest of the entire family.

Ritual

Amongst Selfish people, rituals remain much the same as they were for the centuries preceding the 21st Century, albeit with possibly less emphasis on the importance of ritual in daily life.

But the Cooperative movement made a concerted effort to reincorporate ritual into the community as a way of creating social cohesion. Over time, new rituals developed among Cooperative people.

Birth

A new ritual at the birth of a child of Cooperative parents is the donation of the umbilical cord to science for the purposes of stem cell cures. Unlike Richard Branson’s Virgin Health Bank, which allowed parents to save their child’s umbilical cord in order to potentially save this child’s life in the future, Cooperative individuals donate their umbilical cords to a central bank, allowing all people the same future health benefits.

Usually at age 5, a child goes through an initiation ceremony as part of being welcomed into the Cooperative society. This ritual entails the child creating a work of art to donate to the community. Most Cooperative communities have over time collected these works in the form of a town mural (see Fig.12), which is a symbol that bonds all members to the community.

(image of mural)

It has also become traditional for Cooperative people to celebrate their birthday by giving thanks to the community (rather than by receiving presents, as Selfish people do). Often this means that people will spend their birthdays doing a good deed for the community, be it building something, creating art, or helping their neighbors.

In the latter half of the 21st Century, a tradition of Favor Flags has developed: on their birthdays, people go around the community and select a Favor Flag from the box outside a home (selecting ones according to their abilities, e.g. children’s favors, skill-based favors, general favors), on which the family has requested help for a specific task. As a way of giving thanks on their birthdays, people perform the selected favor for someone in their community. It is not unheard of for a Cooperative person to do a favor for a Selfish person, though it is less common for Selfish people to partake of the Favor Flags tradition.

(image of Favor Flags)

Death

It is increasingly common for the deceased’s body to be donated to the community, either for scientific purposes or in the form of organ donation. In cases when the corpse is buried, this is often done in a biodegradable container in farmland (to increase the fertility of the soil), and if the grave is marked at all, it is done minimally, in great contrast to the status symbols that Selfish people use to mark their graves.

When a Cooperative person dies, it is traditional for the deceased’s family to collect his/her belongings and bring them to the town center to offer to anyone who might make some use of them. The community comes together to share the offering, and in return, they help the grieving family by bringing them food or by doing household chores.

While Selfish people often grieve for the loss they personally experience when someone dies, it is more common for Cooperative death rituals to be a time of celebration. At every funereal gathering, a person gives a eulogy, celebrating the contribution that the deceased made the community while alive.

As each person in the Cooperative community has at one point contributed artwork to the community mural (either at their childhood initiation or when they joined the Federation for Cooperation), at the time of their death, their artwork is marked with the date of their death and a list of their contributions to society.

(images of death marking on wall)

And once a year, a candle is lit on the wall for each Cooperative person who has died.

(image of candles lit)

Commitment

Marriage is the ritual that has changed least from the Selfish Mindset to the Cooperative Mindset, though the meaning and the prevalence of marriage vary greatly between the two groups (see Fig.11, above).

As marriage is considered by Cooperative people to be a social contract between the two individuals and the community (rather than a private legal arrangement), it is traditional for the couple to give their thanks to the community at the time of their marriage. Similar to the artistic contributions made at initiation (childhood or adult conversion), the married couple contributes artwork to the community mural, symbolizing their commitment to the society and to each other.

(images of marriage marking on wall)

While the exchange of rings is still the norm for these marriages, Cooperative weddings are without exception eco-friendly, contrasting with the extravagance and waste of the average Selfish wedding. Food is provided at the event by the families of the couple, and all members of the community are welcome to attend the wedding and celebration.

Just as Cooperative people give thanks on their birthday, it is common for married couples to do a good deed for the community on the anniversary of their wedding.

The Age of Cooperation

Representatives from around the world gathered at the spectacular 2108 Symposium on Design for the Cooperative Age (SDCA ’08) to lay out a plan for the future of the planet and humankind. Designers and Design Ethnographers played a crucial role in discussions, emphasizing the three factors that would lead to a healthy and sustainable world:

 - humans-first design (a.k.a. human-centered design)
 - ‘designing because we should’ (as opposed to ‘designing because we can’)
 - designing for love

While 20% of the population is Selfish, these numbers are shrinking, and the SDCA ’08 conferred about the need for design change throughout the societal infrastructure. It is the belief of the Cooperative people that once a viable and successful Cooperative infrastructure is established, the remaining Selfish people will be more willing to step outside the comfort of their Selfish mindset and participate Cooperatively in the world.

The immediately pressing infrastructural issues relate to the environment and resources. The SDCA ’08 concluded that the top priority on the agenda was making it possible for the world to become free of its addiction to oil. While a consensus as to how to solve this problem was not reached at the Symposium, several designers are working on fleshing out their ideas with the help of ethnographers’ insights into the psychological hurdles and the human values issues at stake in withdrawing from oil dependency as a society.

In the SDCA ‘08’s published proceedings, an optimistic prediction is made of the future:

‘We are at the brink of a new age, The Age of Cooperation, in which humankind awakens to our inner potential for greatness on earth. Quality design is the key to open the door to this new utopia’ (Smith, A.Z. et al, 2108).

External links

• University of Dundee Masters of Design
• University of Dundee Masters of Design Ethnography
• Virgin Health Bank