The new state : $b Group organization the solution of popular governmentFollett, Mary Parker
Science
The new state : $b Group organization the solution of popular government
Follett, Mary Parker
Democracy; Political participation; Social psychology; State, The
I have spoken of the psychological tendency for group to seek group.
Moreover, it is not possible to isolate yourself in your local group
because few local needs can be met without joining with other
localities, which have these same needs, in order to secure city or
state action. We cannot get municipal regulation for the dance-hall in
our neighborhood without joining with other neighborhoods which want the
same thing and securing municipal regulation for all city dance-halls.
If we want better housing laws, grants for industrial education, we join
with other groups who want these things and become the state. And even
if some need seems purely local, the method of satisfying it ought not
to be for the South End to pull as hard as it can for a new ward
building, say, while the North End is also pulling as hard as it can for
a new ward building, and the winner of such tug-of-war to get the
appropriation. If the South End wants a new ward building it should
understand how much money is available for ward buildings, and if only
enough for one this year, consider where it is most needed. Probably,
whatever the evidence, it will be decided that it is most needed in the
South End, but a step will be taken towards a different kind of decision
in the future.
And we join not only to secure city and state but also federal action.
If we want a river or harbor appropriation, we go to Congress. And if
such demands are supplied at present on the log-rolling basis, we can
only hope that this will not always be so. When group organization has
vitalized our whole political life, there may then be some chance that
log-rolling will be repudiated.
And we do not stop even at Washington. Immigration is a national and
international problem, but the immigrant may live next door to you, and
thus the immigration question becomes one of nearest concern. This
intricate interweaving of our life allows no man to live to himself or
to his neighborhood.
Then when neighborhood joins with neighborhood all the lessons learned
in the simple group must be practised in the complex one. As the group
lesson includes not only my responsibility _to_ my group but my
responsibility _for_ my group, so I learn not only my duty to my
neighborhood but that I am responsible for my neighborhood. Also it is
seen that as the individuals of a group are interdependent, so the
various groups are interdependent, and the problem is to understand just
in what way they are interdependent and how they can be adjusted to one
another. The process of the joining of several groups into a larger
whole is exactly the same as the joining of individuals to form a
group—a reciprocal interaction and correlation.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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