The Move Podcast S1E9: Amplifying Root Systems (with Curtis Ogden)
In Episode 9, The Move Podcast interviews Curtis Ogden from the Interaction Institute for Social Change. Co-hosts Ceasar and Ayushi trace modern social networks back to permaculture, reimagine the neighborhood as an organic organism, and champion network weaving to build healthier communities.
Transcript
Curtis: [00:00:00] I take a lot of my learning and inspiration around networks from the field of permaculture, really that notion in sustainable agriculture, that you’re not just being called to intervene in a system in a mechanical way, but to sort of honor what’s already in place, the root system that’s already there, and you can think of the social equivalence of that.
Ceasar: Hey Ayushi, how you doing?
Ayushi: Hey, good. How are you?
Ceasar: I’m great. You know, I’m great. We’re, you know here to actually talk about networks this time. Right? We’re bringing in our…
Ayushi: The hot word. (Laughter)
Ceasar: Yeah, I’m, you know. It’s it is a hard word
Ayushi: It is
Ceasar: and we had our own story around Network. Remember before we were The Move we were talking about ourselves as the Civic Design Network, and we kind of figured no one would ever listen to a podcast called the “Civic Design Network” so we kind of scrapped that word.
Ayushi: The URL bar was too long.
Ceasar: Yeah the URL was too long, you know, which is kind of interesting because can your network be too [00:01:00] long? You know, but the word can be too long…
Ayushi: A politiian would say no.
Ceasar: Yeah, could say no… But it’s funny, you know that whole evolution, and you know about this word, it means things in different contexts. I mean, what was it Tau said about networks?
Ayushi: Tau was really interested in rethinking the word network, right? I mean he thought, coming from the South African context, that the word network didn’t really embody the kind of relational nature of what happens at the community level.
Ceasar: Yeah. It’s kind of like he… And I think he was looking at it more in terms of you know, what’s happening this country, people are talking about networking, you know, as opposed to networks.
Ayushi: Social networks, and
Ceasar: Yeah, social networks and networkings it’s kind of like, you know I hear that I think of it like, you know, those words are like the gentrification of networks,
Ayushi: Right (laughs)
Ceasar: you know?
Ayushi: Right. I think of like telecoms, right? Networks and routers obviously big space, but I think really I’m so excited today to kind of go into the root of the word network and kind of decode the way that we see it today. Go back to what it really means. The sort of organic roots of it all.
Ceasar: [00:02:00] Yeah, and that’s where we are today. And you know, our guest today, Curtis Ogden, who’s at Interaction Institute for Social Change, you know, he really is about this word, and about this work of networks, and really understands it at its core
Ayushi: Right
Ceasar: As you say, “at its root level,”
Ayushi: Right
Ceasar: And we’ve just had such a great conversation with him.
Ayushi: We didn’t even have a chance to say hello and greet him
Ceasar: I know
Ayushi: he came through the door
Ceasar: I know we just jumped in, you know, the conversation with him
Ayushi: We were like, “Hey Mister Network, how do you feel about this stuff?”
Ceasar: So, you know, I think we should do the same thing with our audience just like they should experience what we experienced with him..
Ayushi: We’re just gonna…
Ceasar: Jump Right In.
Ayushi: Throw them in.
Curtis: We know networks are organic, right?
Ceasar: Yeah.
Curtis: ’Cause life is a network, or it’s a network of networks, and it feels like, in some sense, social networks and technology, online networks have kind of co-opted … I don’t mean that in some kind of nefarious way, but that’s how people often think about networks. But they are very organic, right?
Ceasar: They are. So there are a lot of reasons I wanted to have you come with us, part ’cause I’ve known you for a while, I read your [00:03:00] blog, you do a lot of stuff around networks, and one of the reasons we’ve talked about this whole idea of taking the notions of networks and putting them into something (inaudible) design for as you’re trying to build a new civic infrastructure, as you’re doing kind of civic design, is that notion is that there are all these organic things that actually are existing and working already.
Curtis: Exactly.
Ceasar: And sometimes you have to think about designing not in a way that’s about, well, we have to put that in place, when it’s more about, we have to figure out how we tap into and elevate that.
Curtis: Right. Right.
Ceasar: And amplify that. And you’ve been doing so much of that work. So we’ve been really trying to bring people on the show who are not just, like, thinking about the work, but actually just doing it, and also realizing this aint easy stuff.
Curtis: It sure is not. Yeah, that’s right. That’s right. Yeah.
Ceasar: So, anyway, maybe say a little bit about what you’re doing so I sure can catch up on who you [00:04:00] are.
Curtis: Sure, sure.
Ayushi: Yeah, what is a network to you? Why is this your job?
Curtis: Why is this my job?
Ayushi: I have so many questions for you.
Curtis: Yeah, that’s a great question. That’s a great question. Somebody asked me just yesterday, how did you get into networks? And I said, they kind of found me. I didn’t find them. I think that in part it’s this conviction that we’ve kind of subdivided the world into these compartments and have kind of projected as if those are actually what reality is, and so there’s a lot of dismantling of those barriers and borders that needs to be done. To me, the baseline of net work is about connection and often it’s about reclaiming and just validating connection. And, and I think about not just going in and building networks, but to understand that networks are always there. They may not be as robust, as diverse, as intricate as they may need to be for the health of that community, that neighborhood, that institution, but they exist. I take a [00:05:00] lot of my learning and inspiration around networks from the field of permaculture that I was introduced to about 25 years ago.
Ayushi: Wow.
Curtis: And really that notion in sustainable agriculture, that you’re not just being called to intervene in a system in a mechanical way, but to sort of honor what’s already in place, the root system that’s already there, and that we come in with these interventionist agricultural techniques to churn up the soil. Well, we already know that it destroys soil, it releases carbon into the atmosphere. You can think of the social equivalence of that going into community, disrupting root systems that we may not be able to see but that are there and what gets released. I may be stretching this metaphorically, but anger and angst-
Ayushi: Social (inaudible )
Curtis: Yeah, exactly.
Ceasar: But, do you know, you’re not, actually. It actually reminds me, ’cause I don’t know if you know the work of Mindy Fullilove.
Curtis: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Ceasar: She wrote this book, and she called it Root Shock-
Curtis: Yep.
Ceasar: … for that particular reason, about the impact on urban communities of urban renewal.
Curtis: Right.
Ceasar: Because it [00:06:00] disrupted-
Ayushi: Root Shock.
Curtis: Exactly.
Ceasar: … what was in place.
Curtis: Exactly. Right.
Ceasar: You know, it was the shock from permaculture of actually pulling plants up out by their roots-
Ayushi: Wow.
Ceasar: … in the wrong way and then not being able to replant them again-
Curtis: Exactly.
Ceasar: … and it destroys.
Curtis: Right.
Ayushi: Wow.
Curtis: Yeah, over time, if it loosens that, that’s where roots stock, you begin to loose nutrients from the soil, so that’s what we know is true of mainstream agriculture. And just think about sort of heavy-handed intervention into community through processes that are disruptive, and so what gets leached? People’s trust, people’s time, which is money-
Ayushi: Ooh, what gets leached-
Curtis: … which is trust, all those things. And so the call is really to go in and see with new eyes what’s already in place to know that many of these communities … Of course, those communities that we are often called into to work with are tremendously resilient already in the face of incredible [00:07:00] adversity, and so there’s a brilliance and a resourcefulness there in its connections, in what’s flowing. So can we first see that? That’s the first permaculture principle. Observe. Stand back. Observe before you leap in. So I think the original question was, why do I do this? There’s so much about living systems and living networks that I feel like we are being called to get back in touch with because I think a lot of what’s manifesting is a result of a world view that’s just off and damaging.
Ayushi: And your work is primarily to amplify these living systems.
Curtis: It is that. I mean, it takes a variety of different forms. In the South Bronx, Caesar knows about this work we’ve been doing for about three years with the City of New York. It’s a climate resilience planning initiative that’s being supported by HUD monies. We had gone into that community about three years [00:08:00] ago at the behest of the city because they wanted to initiate a process that would help to build as opposed to erode trust, and so it was really actually remarkable on this situation. You don’t often get called into work with municipal leaders who are just like … It wasn’t quite blank check, but it was very open. We’re going to craft a process that really invites the community in early to talk about what matters to them, and actually resulted in a list of implementation principles from the community that the process has really taken to heart around respecting community. At the end of the day, this is not just about creating seawalls and backup energy, but it’s about creating jobs and economic resilience. It’s basically honoring the definition of resilience in the community.
Ayushi: Right.
Ceasar: Right.
Curtis: Now, that does not mean that every step of the process is easy, so what we’ve done more recently is to build an engagement [00:09:00] infrastructure that honors some of what’s already in place on the ground. So there’s a neighborhood outreach team, some neighborhood residents that are paid to do work to engage the community, not just to get them to meetings but to use art and other kinds of media that are going to be meaningful to the community to continue to listen to what’s on their minds and amplify their voices. So that’s one example in a place-based situation. I’m working with a few networks that are multi-organizational networks that are focused on issues through justice, sustainability, public health. And so those instances, it’s really about trying to bring a more organic, emergent approach and structure to the work that tries to disabuse people of this idea that you can kind of come in and command and control and engage in pure problem-solving that has the problem go away and then just assume that your work is done. Somebody once said to me, the problem with problem-solving is [00:10:00] that once you’ve solved the problem, you think your work is done. We know that things are just more complex than that, so it’s about putting into place processes and structures that kind of, in a continuous way, can adapt and adjust and respond to things as they come up. So that’s the work with Food Solutions New England, that’s the work with the Cancer Free Economy Network and some other networks.
Ayushi: I love that, ’cause as I’m listening to you I’m realizing that when I think of the word “network”, I think of something that’s a thing, like a noun, as opposed to a verb. But a lot of the work that you’re describing to me is process building-
Curtis: Right, right.
Ayushi: … as opposed to family or people-building, which is kind of what I think of when I think of the word “network” in the social context.
Curtis: Exactly.
Ayushi: And that’s so powerful ’cause that way you’re creating this sort of self-sustaining process which is building trust, and in that process building resilience, and in that process building perhaps a network as well.
Curtis: Yes, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Something else I say to groups sometimes, to [00:11:00] some degree of recognition, and sometimes people have no idea what I’m talking about, but is to say that networks are not just so that … it’s not building a mechanism so that we can do that, they just are. They already are.
Ayushi: It’s not a means. Or it’s not an … Ah, actually …
Curtis: It could be a means and an end, but the point is that systems are-
Ceasar: In place.
Curtis: … networks.
Ayushi: Yeah.
Curtis: And so there’s no outside. As we’re playing with connection and flow, we’re playing with the system.
Ayushi: Yep.
Curtis: Right? We don’t stand outside. That’s a very mechanistic-
Ayushi: Connection and flow.
Curtis: Yeah, yeah.
Ayushi: How do you begin to understand human connection? Especially when you’re trying to build a process for and with a group of people that you may not be a part of. I don’t know if you’re from the South Bronx, but thinking about the place-based nature of that network building.
Curtis: Yeah, it’s a great question. Certainly it’s about partnering, really partnering with people [00:12:00] on the ground, so to speak, who know the story of connection. Both know about the incredible social capital that’s already in place, may know some of the social dynamics, the political dynamics, and so we’ve got to come in from a stance of curiosity and inquiry, as every community is different. It’s really just about stewarding their thinking about best ways to kind of structure and set up processes. We certainly have seen there are certain design principles that can help in most instances, but again, to treat every community the same is a mechanistic approach, as opposed to a living system approach.
Ayushi: Right.
Curtis: And a lot of it is really to make trust-building central. So many people want to come to the table and say, “When are we getting to action?” And understanding that there is real urgency. We can leap to action and just continue to perpetuate the same dynamics [00:13:00] over and over and over again. So slowing it down, inviting people into some authentic relationship-building, naming what is really the issue. I mean, I find that a lot of these network-building initiatives, you know, what the issue is on day one or how it’s collectively understood is often very different at day thousand, if you get that far. So you may walk into a system and people say, “Well, this fundamentally is about food production. We need greater food production in the region.” But guess what? Three years later, you understand actually it’s a democracy issue. It’s an economic democracy issue. They’re very different. And it takes a while for people to build the trust, the relationship so they can have those kinds of conversations that reveal really what’s going on.
Ceasar: I’m hearing almost two ways in which you work around this notion, though, of networks. One is particularly in places that you are going and working with people to kind of, [00:14:00] from your own sense, observing in a way that helps people to also identify the networks that they already have in place, and then also helping them to kind of pay attention to what’s working about that, what’s not, what needs repair in it, what maybe need demolishing it. You know, all those different kinds of things, and really kind of strengthening that. And then I also hear that there’s another way which you’re working with, which is with groups who want to move towards something together to have a network sensibility about how they go about doing that.
Curtis: That’s right.
Ceasar: Right?
Curtis: Yes.
Ceasar: So, I wonder if we could talk a little bit about just those two different approaches and those two different ways of kind of engaging work, ’cause like, well, actually, when you say [inaudible ], ’cause it seems like, I don’t think they both could be involved, so take this off the Bronx and you’re working there. There are multiple networks that I imagine that are in existence.
Curtis: Absolutely, yeah.
Ceasar: So at some point in time you [00:15:00] have the same problem at the local level which is, how do we get these different networks, players, to see themselves connected-
Curtis: That’s right.
Ceasar: … as a network at the same time while you’re simultaneously getting them to understand the network that is theirs already? You have both happening, what you call macro. You know, you can call it that way, which begins to sound very confusing, very dynamic, with a lot going on. But at the same time, you walk in and you know some things are at play, so how do you deal with some of the things that you know that are at play where you’re also trying to observe, you’re also trying to build this capacity? So you know, okay, I know race is really at play in this race, I know that there’s a whole lot going on with misogyny that’s really breaking these networks and is creating problems here. How do you push, listen, you know?
Curtis: Yep.
Ceasar: Maybe you have some stories about [00:16:00] that or …
Curtis: Yeah.
Ceasar: (crosstalk) may feel comfortable sharing or not.
Curtis: Yeah, yeah. No, definitely. There definitely is a balance between meeting people where they are and then kind of pushing them along. I’m going to do sort of this hand gesture that people listening will not be able to see, but I was reminded once when I was at Divinity School that when you engage in pastoral care with community, it’s first about holding them, but then it’s also nudging them. Just kind of gently pushing them in a certain direction, sort of challenging in a helpful way around growth and development. So I think at the outset, to push people can be very presumptuous if you don’t understand what’s going on, and so I think it is really to come in, first and foremost, with a stance of humility and listening and inquiry, but then to know that while every community is different, we all live in the same country. When you do a systemic analysis, guess what it takes you down to? The roots of power, power [00:17:00] differential, racism, systemic othering. We know that that’s in play in all of these situations, so you hope it comes up on its own because that’s an indication that there’s trust in the room, or that people feel like this is a place where they can actually make those statements. But then there’s just very strategic inquiry that we can do, asking questions about power or just saying, plainly, we know that power is part of the equation, so what does that look like here? How does that play itself out? There are, of course, so many attending considerations in terms of how that’s done in such a way that it’s not ultimately damaging or damaging for, let’s say, a certain part of the community or the network, right? So not just like blowing things up and then walking away. So it’s delicate. But we definitely know in our role at the Interaction Institute, it is not to come in with a stance of neutrality in the sense that if power isn’t mentioned, it’s our obligation [00:18:00] to say that is a big piece of what we’re here to do. You know about our collaborative lens at ISC, so we know that in building collaborative capacity you have to name power, you have to work toward equity and inclusion, and to not have that is damaging.
Ceasar: It’s interesting ’cause to be able to do that, and I’m thinking about some of our audience out here who are folks inside these agencies and stuff who may be saying, “Oh, I really want to kind of be more engaged with our community that way.” Inside the bureaucracy, that’s a hard place to be if you have that role and you’re trying to connect. Do you have thoughts about what are the little steps people can take to feel like, well, at least I’m starting the step there, even though I can’t do the whole thing.
Curtis: Right. Well, I think that there is a place for third party facilitation and intervention, but not to become over, really, reliant on that. I think the idea is that [00:19:00] we need to start building more of these bridges so that people can have authentic conversation about what’s really going on. One of the things that we’ve-I was joking with one of my colleagues, Michael [Primo ]-that we’ve been called into do this work in community and do these community meetings in a very different way, and, of course, there are all these kind of bells and whistles that you can bring to a community meeting in the name of being innovative, and really what’s innovative about what we do is we try and just take a lot of those conventions away so people can just see each other and talk very organically so it’s just a conversation. Because if you go to a public hearing, there’s so many layers of separation. There’s not really a conversation. So it’s trying to make it as organic as possible. So I would say that those are some of the baby steps that can be taken as what it would mean to be more authentic and real in the way that we [00:20:00] engage with one another. I know that can feel threatening. It feels like, in some cases, maybe we’re giving up power that we feel like is in our interest to preserve so that we can do our jobs if we’re in a bureaucracy. And, of course, bureaucracy tends to want to push back on those kinds of organic ways of engaging, but we also see that bureaucracy can be incredibly damaging, right?
Ceasar: Right.
Curtis: When it sort of reduces the proximity between decision makers and where action is happening. So think about what proximity could look like in your work, cutting through abstractions so that we’re treating anybody as sort of a stereotype. How can we really see one another in real ways?
Ceasar: Actually, I love that idea. The innovation in some sense maybe to (inaudible)
Ayushi: Stripping away.
Ceasar: To strip away, right?
Ayushi: Yeah.
Ceasar: (crosstalk 00:21:14)
Curtis: I think I tweeted this at one point. We said sometimes the innovation is just the human touch.
Ceasar: Yeah.
Curtis: [00:21:00] It’s just being human, right? It’s just being vulnerable. I probably shouldn’t say what the organizational initiative was, but there was a very powerful moment in a public meeting that we were facilitating where people were getting kind of worked up, kind of a typical dynamic of community residents not trusting the city and the city feeling frustrated because they didn’t understand that they were trying to do right by the community. But there was all this bureaucracy, and I knew that to be the case. Things got to such a boiling point that actually one of the city people kind of let that out and said, “We’re trying to do right by you.” But this is what we’re dealing with, and it was this kind of breakthrough moment where one community organizer stepped up in that moment of vulnerability and said, “That’s so helpful to hear. We want to help you with that. We want to help you with that.” Right?
Ceasar: Right.
Curtis: So those little moments of vulnerability and being real, and [00:22:00] they can be really scary, but they can be breakthrough too.
Ayushi: Yeah. I think that’s one thing on the government … I mean, just hearing you talk about this, I will say I have my hair bristling, and all of my previous experience with working inside government, just coming to a [inaudible], like, “Oh no, that job was so hard.” And the reason was because you’re not only dealing with the power dynamics and trust issues on the community front, but also those internal to the organization. Those feed off each other because the people that work for the city, especially with the city municipal (inaudible) agency, are often people that are also in the community and vice versa, right?
Curtis: Right, right.
Ayushi: So it’s not like there’s a clear duality between, “Oh, I’m not a resident, I just work here.”
Curtis: Right.
Ayushi: And so things are personal.
Curtis: Yes.
Ayushi: And what you were saying earlier about a lot of the reason why people refuse to take off that hat and [00:23:00] not speak on talking points and be authentic comes from this threat, this survival sort of instinct, which then makes me think, well, what would be the ways to reduce that feeling of threat? I’m wondering whether the holding you were talking about earlier comes into play there, and I wonder what holding government looks like. How do you hold an organization, not just the people, the community that you’re working with, but how do you actually hold the bureaucracy and be gentle? Because the red tape is kind of inevitable with an organization as large as most municipal agencies are, and yet they require a certain degree of … I don’t know, I like to think of it as organizational therapy. Like radical self-acceptance.
Curtis: Right.
Ayushi: But for the organization, as opposed to for the individual. ’Cause if you’re, like I was, an entry level associate equivalent for government, I don’t really have much actual formal power, so what do I [00:24:00] do?
Curtis: Yeah, you’re touching on something that I think is really important and hard. As in most situations, the story is, government does not understand the people. There’s kind of a coldness to that.
Ayushi: Right.
Curtis: And I’ve discovered with some of my colleagues who have been doing community organizing for a long, long time, that it is a two-way street, and in some instances we’ve found that we’ve really got to work with the community to see these city officials as human and sort of have a bit of empathy for the real systemic constraints with which they are operating. Which I think is another very helpful step that you can take. I actually do this with every network building initiative that I do now, as of a few years ago, which is as soon as we can, get constraints on the table. So we’re coming to do this collaborative work, but what are some of the real or at least perceived constraints that you’re operating with? Because if those aren’t named, then we project those as being [00:25:00] personal. Right?
Ayushi: Right.
Curtis: ’Cause (Ayushi) does not want to (inaudible) play. Because Caesar, at the end of the day, this is just a job for him. And yet well meaning public servants go back to their institutions, their bureaucracies, and wrestle and fight. So can we have at least some empathy and some compassion? Understand that continues to be a big power differential, of course, but if there’s not a little bit of give on both sides, it feels like you’re just at loggerheads. Something else I was just going to mention as you were talking, actually, that came to mind was just an observation that bureaucracy has kind of saddled itself with so much responsibility that I feel like, in many ways, bureaucracy and hierarchy has lost sight of what it is most functionally capable of doing. And so there’s this network principle of subsidiarity where you push decision-making as close to the point of action and implementation as you can. I often wonder [00:26:00] if there isn’t work to be done within agencies to think about what is the decision-making they need to do, minimally, in some sense, that then can push decision-making-
Ayushi: As close to the point of action.
Curtis: Exactly.
Ceasar: Yeah.
Ayushi: Oh, man.
Curtis: Because at the end of the day, I mean, as crazy as this may sound, what if the job was to help build democratic capacity and civic capacity?
Ayushi: Oh, man, preach to …
Curtis: Right.
Ceasar: This is actually (crosstalk)
Ayushi: Preach (crosstalk)
Ceasar: … we’ve been talking a lot to folks about this notion about, in some sense, the work of government or bureaucracies of organizations that actually are in relationship to the public that they actually have the responsibility of building the public’s muscle for democracy. Right?
Curtis: Right.
Ceasar: Everything they do with the public should do that, is to strengthen that so that it’s not one person’s responsibility. It is their interaction with all of the things that continue reinforcing [00:27:00] their role for the context of democracy.
Ayushi: One thing that we would talk about along those lines as well when I was working at this city agency was the way that we’ve kind of envisioned what you just said about rethinking the muscle, or rethinking the governance process within the city itself. The way that we framed it was not so much designing public services for the public, but also designing the public delivery process for the public servants, for those delivering. Because our thesis was, if the delivering process, the serving process, was more empowering, more fun, more engaging, more delightful for the public servant, then the service would be better served.
Ceasar: Right, right.
Ayushi: To the community.
Ceasar: (crosstalk )
Ayushi: And right now it’s so difficult for the public servant to actually serve, whether it’s because of that distance between the action and the decision-making, the decision [00:28:00] maker, or whether it’s because of other forms of internal maybe informal politics within the community that impact the people that are working the jobs, it makes it really difficult for people who are well intentioned to actually go through and do their job.
Curtis: Absolutely.
Ayushi: And then you perpetuate this government is lazy trope and, “Oh, well they don’t really care about us,” or “Oh, they don’t really know what public engagement looks like.” Right?
Curtis: Right, right. Yeah, I think you’re right on.
Ayushi: I love the synthesis of that is decision-making as close to the point of action.
Curtis: Yeah, yeah. And that requires a fair amount of … what’s the word I’m looking for?
Ceasar: Transparency.
Curtis: Well, transparency, but I think also reflection in part of these bureaucracies. It feels like we’re on this treadmill, and so the busyness is one of our worst enemies because it doesn’t really allow people to step back and be reflective. But it’s also clear that over-saddled bureaucracies in organizations and institutions needs to let go of something so that they can do their job better, [00:29:00] and that’s where I think this idea of networked infrastructure can come into play.
Ayushi: What do you mean by that?
Curtis: Well, I just think that there is … I’ll give you this example. I’m just actively playing with this in different systems. A constant pain point I hear is that organizations, institutions are just overburdened, whether you’re talking about public schools, whether you’re talking about hospitals, you’re talking about other organizations. What I feel like is missing, in some cases, is the interstitial tissue between institutions and organizations that would help to relieve some of the burden. So community health workers are becoming a thing, and out where I am in Western Massachusetts, there’s been this move to hire community health workers, not just solely to provide services to patients or those who are seeking services, but to the institutions so that they can kind of be this-
Ayushi: The liaison between-
Curtis: … liaison-
Ayushi: … the communities.
Curtis: Exactly, and help people to [00:30:00] navigate the system and relieve some of that burden on the institutions. Networks, of course, operate in very informal ways. It seems like we can formalize some of that kind of functionality in the field of networks. It’s called Network Weaving. What are some of the weaving functions that we could formally support to relieve the burden, but also to create more resilient systems? It’s still forming, but …
Ceasar: No, it’s a really-
Ayushi: Yeah.
Ceasar: I know out in that area, some years ago I was working in Springfield in the north, and they had a really robust kind of community health worker program they called Neon North, an organizing network that were basically people who were health workers who they had a schedule they went through, making sure they hit every door, every month. And they had enough. They had, like, 12 of these folks in their neighborhood and [inaudible ]. But when they went, [00:31:00] it wasn’t just to check up on a relationship group with particular health issue, they were there to kind of observe what was going on, to help people connect to other things that they didn’t even know that they needed or wanted, right?
Curtis: Yeah, exactly.
Ceasar: It became that kind of social threat-
Curtis: Yeah, I like that.
Ceasar: … for the community. And these workers would come back and they would talk about what they would see, they would be able to say, “So-and-so needs this, I saw that.” They would help them make that connection. One of the problems with all of that was the way the systems are set up, there was actually nothing to actually pay for that. They had to find other ways to pay for that, even though they found out sometime later that actually that was actually saving money-
Curtis: Exactly.
Ceasar: … in the system. It was saving the system a lot of money ’cause it was preventing so much, it was creating greater efficiencies.
Curtis: Exactly.
Ceasar: But folks didn’t necessarily see that to begin with.
Curtis: [00:32:00] Right. Yeah, that is another great example. I think it’s just emphasizing the need for people to develop more of a networked way of seeing, because there’s a way in which that is still diminished in terms of the value that’s added. It makes me also think about another network that I’ve been working with which is an education network. It’s a network of schools. And critically important role they have that is very, very valued are coaches that work with schools, and yet it’s interesting how the coaches are often identified for their content knowledge. But it’s not just the content knowledge. When they tell their stories, it’s often about making connections between schools, finding other districts that are dealing with similar challenges which, again, is a way of preventing those schools from having to go through the same kind of challenges without some kind of support. I think there are probably examples in every field you can imagine, and so how can we validate [00:33:00] that, value it, support it?
Ayushi: Hearing you talk about codifying the informality of network processes and then you providing an actual anecdote, a real life happening of people not being paid, despite them saving dollars on efficiency, something else coming up earlier was we were talking about trust as well, and I was like, how do you …? It all ties it all together now in my head. How do you quantify trust? ’Cause a lot of the way that money currently gets passed around is because of metrics. Better metrics. I put money in as a foundation and the output is better something. We’ve struggled with that in other places like, I think, carbon emissions. It’s kind of hard to quantify something that’s temporally so far away and is not visibile, and I think about the same thing with trust. I don’t know that trust, it’s temporally far away, also hard to see. How do you quantify that? Is [00:34:00] it more birthday parties you’re invited to? How would you get that paid for? How would you get a community health program, health workers program get paid for? How would you train a series of educators that are looking for the network’s connections among education institutions?
Curtis: Well, I think it begins with storytelling. I think it’s to turn to some of these powerful examples of-
Ayushi: So qualitative metrics.
Curtis: Well, I think it has to begin there. First of all, I think that story is what’s most compelling for most people. So actually a part of what I’m doing is collecting as many of these stories as I can. Most recently, story of a network in Connecticut that’s brought together all of these family liaison professionals in different high needs districts who have felt very isolated in their jobs and very misunderstood, and they’ve created this amazing thing called Friday Café where they bring these coordinators together. They’ll get 50, 60 people coming together from around the state, and they’ll [00:35:00] move it around and they’ll have a little mini TED talk that one of the practitioners gives, and they’ve had these really cool themes like innovation, and we’re using art around engagement. People feel restored, they feel rejuvenated, they feel respected. That translates into greater engagement once they [crosstalk ]. Now, somebody out there’s got to surely be able to create something that can quantify them. But I think, intuitively, we know what it means to be depleted and discouraged, versus feeling supported and what that translates into: good work and contribution.
Ceasar: Well, this has been great. I know we’re close to our time.
Ayushi: No.
Ceasar: I know. I’m sad. But really, this has been great having you with us and talking to us. I can’t wait to get this out to folks and see what kind of conversation it (inaudible ) up. You’ve given us a lot of references in your talk. We might have to [00:36:00] get back to you about some of those when we actually have them down.
Ayushi: We can link to them.
Curtis: Yeah, definitely.
Ceasar: (crosstalk ) everything, stuff like that. But any last things you’d like to say to us?
Curtis: I mean … thank you. I think a couple of these mantras that I keep putting in front of different groups and keep in my own head to kind of nurture this different way of seeing, or just to remind ourselves that connection is fundamental. Connection is fundamental. Connection is a social determinant of health, of individual and social health. Can we really take that seriously? Can we really look for evidence of that? And just keep asking ourselves what connection and flow could do to create the kinds of community and society we want.
Ayushi: That’s beautiful. Thank you so much.
Curtis: Yeah.
Ceasar: Thank you
Ayushi: Wow, that was amazing.
Ceasar: Yeah, that was quite something and you know, we started out this [00:37:00] whole thing about networks
Ayushi: Mmhmm (affirmative)
Ceasar: trying to redefine them, as you said, and you know where he took us, you know, it’s really at the heart of where we are around connections.
Ayushi: Yeah.
Ceasar: It’s the interstitial.
Ayushi: Yes
Ceasar: materials of our life.
Ayushi: Yes
Ceasar: and our relationships to each other.
Ayushi: Yup
Ceasar: That are really the things that we have to nurture.
Ayushi: And it’s almost shocking how little time I think we spend thinking about that interstitial sort of tissue, you know between people, whether it be as individuals, as co-workers, as you know, differently structured in their power dynamics between you know government and Community, etc. And a lot of the conversation about, that he was talking about, you know, how do you quantify trust? How do you think about things that are unquantifiable and are so far in the future, and yet so important to the here and now? It leaves me wondering all the work that I need to do, you know, [00:38:00] in investing in this sort of tissue.
Ceasar: Well, it’s funny because I, you know, I also think it’s and I’m going to ask you, you know, Ayushi,
Ayushi: Yeah
Ceasar: to also be easy on yourself. Because I think part of what he’s also saying is, “yes there’s work we all have to do, but it’s also work we are doing we have to recognize.”
Ayushi: Mmm (affirmative)
Ceasar: And that’s part of what we’re not doing. That if we just recognize that part of what’s at work here, is that
Ayushi: Yeah
Ceasar: and just turn our attention to a little bit more, turn our gaze to little bit more,
Ayushi: Yeah
Ceasar: it’ll get better.
Ayushi: Right
Ceasar: We’ll get better at it.
Ayushi: Right
Ceasar: When we’re out of that connection, that interstitial material, we know it because things are so bad.
Ayushi: Yeah
Ceasar: Things are so distrupted, things are… You know we feel it in our bodies all the time.
Ayushi: Yep.
Ceasar: And we don’t feel that all the time. Right?
Ayushi: Yeah
Ceasar: We may have issues with dealing with, things that are troubling, but if we’re able to just like pay attention to that little bit more, and you know it sounds a little abstract, but you know in the work of [00:39:00] bringing communities together and working with people, it’s just you know that paying attention to those little things.
Ayushi: Yeah
Ceasar: Just those little connections. That’s why it’s funny to me, how in a meeting for example in kind of a traditional planning board meeting, the board is sitting up front and people sitting in the audience
Ayushi: Mmm (affirmative)
Ceasar: and that just serves to disconnect.
Ayushi: Mmhmm (affirmative)
Ceasar: And if you’re paying attention to that interstitial, how important it would be if they were, even if they were started out by sitting amongst people
Ayushi: Right
Ceasar: and then moved up there, that connection could travel with them. But if you travel, start without that connection,
Ayushi: Mmhmm (affirmative)
Ceasar: it’s hard to make it.
Ayushi: You kind of lost half the battle already.
Ceasar: Yeah
Ayushi: Right, and you know some of this talk about the importance of social connection as you’re pointing out, not just in the workplace, but as a determinance of Public Health, right? As a determinance of human mortality in a variety of studies across the world. [00:40:00] You know, I’m thinking about a book that just came out with Eric Klinenberg, and he talks so much about this sort of social infrastructure that is missing in the urban environment because there’s so much attention being placed on the sort of spatial nature of buildings,
Ceasar: Yes,
Ayushi: and the sort of physical nature of the city, but not so much on this tissue. Not so much on the social relationships that might be damaged as you move one community to a completely different location.
Ceasar: Yeah, that’s a lot of what Mindy Fullilove talked about in her book
Ayushi: Exactly
Ceasar: Root Shock, about what happens when you move people up. And it’s interesting, you know, she talked about that from the standpoint of
Ayushi: urban renewal
Ceasar: someone who… Of urban renewal but someone who looked at it from a psychological standpoint.
Ayushi: Right
Ceasar: Not just thinking about jobs lost and mobility lost, her notion of what people have to struggle with is the same thing a plant has a struggle with
Ayushi: Right
Ceasar: when you pick it up out of its soil.
Ayushi: Yep
Ceasar: and move it somewhere else, and the shock that’s [00:41:00] in the system.
Ayushi: Yep
Ceasar: and the care that’s needed to actually make sure it flourishes in a new environment. And that notion, you know, what is the care that we need to be taking
Ayushi: Yeah
Ceasar: in our social systems as we are remaking our cities?
Ayushi: Yes.
Ceasar: Right?
Ayushi: Yes.
Ceasar: As people are changing and shifting where they are,
Ayushi: Right
Ceasar: is as important if not more important.
Ayushi: Yep. What is our sun and water for the urban organism? (laughs)
Ceasar: What is our sun and water for the urban organism? That’s it. This has been wonderful. I’m really so glad we had this conversation with Curtis, and next week…
Ayushi: Is our final episode!
Ceasar: I know!
Ayushi: I’m doing a little drum roll, I don’t know if people can hear it. (laughs)
Ceasar: I know, so next week join us we’re going to do a recap of what’s been happening here and our broad work around these design principles. And hopefully it will help you make sense of all this together. And it certainly will help us in thinking and talking through it with you. So join us again at themove.mit.edu. [00:42:00] I’m Ceasar McDowell
Ayushi: I’m Ayushi Roy. Thank you so much for listening.
Ceasar: Till next week. Bye-bye.
Originally published at https://themove.mit.edu on October 23, 2018.
