vehicles for social objects

The last few posts on social objects have been gradually bringing a bit of clarity on how these social objects fit into the work that Seva Mandir and, I suppose, other organisations like it are involved in. This post is concerned with what, presumably can also be thought of as a social object: the vehicle or container for the social objects and the change that they have the potential to unleash. Although in the past I have tended to talk about containers, they have something too static sounding about them - which is not at all a good symbol of the dynamic process or context within which dialogue and action around social objects takes place!

The container-vehicles appear to have many levels. I will focus on only a few at this stage, and of these few, mainly on one. The few include: the organisation, the programme, the implementation team. The one will be the programme. My questions is basically this: what are the implications for the development and deployment of social objects (our medium for catalysing change) of being situated within a programme.

This line of inquiry emerges from a naggling sense I have that 'programmes' tend to function or be understood and interfaced with within a machine-like framework. By this, I mean to say they are defined by a simple, listed set of linear - almost mechanical - processes - such as making a visit, filling in a monitoring format, making a payment, holding a meeting, giving a training, which have the potential to be disembodied from the deeper engagement that is required to catalyse real change. That is to say, that the engagements see the creation of the social object(s) as ends in their own right rather than as means to a higher end.

For example, a day-care centre for children must be run (as targets have to be fulfilled) and running it is itself a worthwhile achievement (after all, we will be able to achieve our targets, for which we have requested funds and are now accountable), regardless of whether it is being used to the fullest to catalyse social change. Why does this happen? And why do targets continue to rise, year after year even when the desired quality of work on the existing centres has not been achieved? The answers to these questions (which I will not go into right now) are numerous and reflect the complex context within which development work takes place. All the same, it happens, to the detriment, I believe, of the quality of the work. Indeed, there is a kind of shallow engagement that takes place and expansion merely makes it more difficult to go into the kind of depth that is required to really understand what is going on. This feeds into some kind of vicious cycle and so it goes on.

Now, it may be unfair to attribute this 'problem' as an inherrent feature of the nature of 'programmes'. Instead, it might be better to say that this is an observable characteristic of most programmes, their potential for being more evolutionary and dynamic may simply be getting systematically missed because of the way people think, regardless of the existence of programmes or not. This raises the important questions of what the potential of 'programmes' actually is; why programmes are presently functioning within a 'machine' model; how would a programme operating outside the 'machine' model function (what would be its essential characteristics); and what would it take in order to make this kind of a transition within an organisational context.

Somehow, the understanding that can emerge from an inquiry into these issues needs to become institutionalised within the organisation. I suppose that a collaborative action-research-based intervention into the programme itself could be a good way to achieve this.