Transforming Systems Through Radical Engagement
When it comes to transforming systems, Adam Kahane has had a front row view. As a key scenario facilitator in the Mont Fleur negotiations that ended apartheid in South Africa, and “The Future of Colombia” peace negotiations that brought together rebels (National Liberation Army), resistance leaders (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia/FARC), and various paramilitary factions to transform the country, Kahane learned just how crucial it is to have new stories to create a new reality.
In this interview for our Creating Foresight Fueled Action series, Adam and Frank explore how deep change can be facilitated through small but powerful actions. Pulling from both his years of experience as well as his new book Everyday Habits for Transforming Systems: The Catalytic Power of Radical Engagement, Adam shares how systems are not immutable, but are filled with “cracks” that allow for generative transformation through Radical Engagement.
“The core message of this book is that the foundational way of being, relating, and acting required to transform systems generatively is radical engagement.”
Topics covered include:
- Intentional and conscious connecting and collaborating with people from different parts of the system working at the “cracks” to bring about transformation.
- Reciprocally and relationally taking part with hope and curiosity, leaning forward and digging deep.
- Being and acting through interaction and connection that reduces fragmentation, oppression, and inequality.
- Small actions that create big impacts.
- The 7 habits for transforming systems.
Adam Kahane is a Director of Reos Partners (reospartners.com), an international social enterprise that helps people move forward together on their most important and intractable issues. His home page is adamkahane.com.
Adam is a leading organizer, designer and facilitator of processes through which business, government, and civil society leaders can work together to address such challenges. He has worked in more than fifty countries, in every part of the world, with executives and politicians, generals and guerrillas, civil servants and trade unionists, community activists and United Nations officials, clergy and artists.
During the early 1990s, Adam was head of Social, Political, Economic and Technological Scenarios for Royal Dutch Shell in London. He has held strategy and research positions with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (San Francisco), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (Paris), the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (Vienna), the Institute for Energy Economics (Tokyo), and the Universities of Oxford, Toronto, British Columbia, California, and the Western Cape.
Adam has a B.Sc. in Physics (First Class Honours) from McGill University (Montreal), an M.A. in Energy and Resource Economics from the University of California (Berkeley), and an M.A. in Applied Behavioural Science from Bastyr University (Seattle). He has also studied negotiation at Harvard Law School and cello performance at Institut Marguerite-Bourgeoys. His latest book is Adam Kahane is Everyday Habits for Transforming Systems: The Catalytic Power of Radical Engagement.
