Holergy

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Description

Tom Atlee:

“Holergy is a term I coined to call attention to the often invisible power of each entity’s embedded uniqueness. That power becomes a resource to the extent we look beyond any single role they play or obvious categories they belong to. We might summarize this as “the part is greater than its role in the whole.” Each person and group is both a whole in their own right and part of many other wholes. So a teacher who knows that her students are not only students will tap their experiences, hobbies, and families for resources to use in teaching her class. An integral mediator will recognize that conflicted parties are not only adversaries but are also sources of insight and creativity for resolving their shared problem. An integral politician will recognize that citizens are not only voters, supporters, complainers, and recipients of government services, but potential sources of wisdom, creativity, and implementation in public affairs.

Significantly, both of these phenomena—synergy and holergy—include the phrase “greater than” as part of their definition. This means that the entities and factors in a situation can generate greater or lesser power and benefit, depending on how we view and engage with them. This is useful knowledge for anyone seeking to create change with limited resources. Well-utilized diversity in well-designed whole systems can provide free resources “out of nowhere.” The diversity of a community, well engaged, can generate collective healing, collective intelligence, and collective transformation accessible in no other way.” (http://integral-review.org/documents/Atlee,%20Integral%20Politics%20as%20Process%20Vol.%206%20No.%201.pdf)


More Information

  1. Integral Politics ; Integral Politics as Process, by Tom Atlee