Mental Complexity and ‘The Astonishing Naivety of Policymakers’

January 6, 2012 by
Filed under: Social Brain 

Those who have read ‘A Guide for the Perplexed’ by E.F Schumacher (better known for Small is Beautiful) will recall his excellent analysis of what he called ‘the loss of the vertical dimension’. He feared that a purely utilitarian view of the world would strip it of reverence, and remove the path-quality of life, in which primitive life forms evolve in complexity, not only across centuries, but in the space of a single human life. He wanted to keep alive is the idea that human beings not only change, but also grow and develop in some meaningful way.

Speaking at the Davos Economic Forum in 2006, Bill Clinton made a similar point. He alluded to the importance of mental complexity when he argued that the challenge of integrating all our best ideas to solve planetary problems was that we needed a ‘higher level of consciousness’ to make sense of how they inter-relate, and he referred to the work of Ken Wilber, a major theorist on the growth of mental complexity.

And yet the danger is that theories of adult development that speak of how mental complexity develops can look like the worst kind of elitism, suggesting there is a form of hierarchy that determines our worth, and worse- that the basis of this hierarchy is obscure, and subject only to expert judgment. In the first RSA event I chaired, I asked Adam Kahane about levels of consciousness, and he reponsded that he was wary of such ideas, because the people propounding them always tended to assume they were on the higher levels.

However, perhaps the only thing worse than an elite and obscure form of hierarchy is flatland, i.e. a complete denial of a vertical dimension, for this seems to amount to a loss of aspiration for progress in our emotional and mental lives, and the development of our character and our will.

Following on from yesterday’s post on our new report on the Big Society, I wanted to share extracts from a couple of sections that I found most difficult to write. We wanted to do what we could to carefully apply the perspective of adult development to a current live issue in the hope that it would stimulate interest among people who may not otherwise come across it. (starting on p 28 of report; slightly abridged, full references can be found there, while a few links have been added here).

Beyond ‘Flatland’

While the idea that we grow in mental complexity is familiar from childhood development, and informs education policy, in adulthood policymakers typically focus on the need to acquire skills, while organisations are more likely to focus on psychometric testing, resulting in personality measures like Myers-Briggs.

Despite a considerable literature on adult development and post-formal thinking (i.e. beyond the mental development of an eighteen year old) public policy appears to operate in what the American Philosopher Ken Wilber calls ‘flatland’: the view that all adults operate at the same level of mental complexity, and differ only in horizontal skills, intelligence, knowledge and proclivities.

We are not saying that the Big Society calls upon people to be nicer, or cleverer, or more informed, much as these things might help. Our point is that a growth in social productivity requires people to be able to disembed themselves from certain social and psychological influences that undermine autonomy, responsibility and solidarity, so that they can relate to those influences more flexibly and constructively.

This distinction between horizontal and vertical dimensions of human development is important, because our argument is quite specific. We are not saying that the Big Society calls upon people to be nicer, or cleverer, or more informed, much as these things might help. Our point is that a growth in social productivity requires people to be able to disembed themselves from certain social and psychological influences that undermine autonomy, responsibility and solidarity, so that they can relate to those influences more flexibly and constructively.

This kind of growth is ‘vertical’ in the sense that it changes how we know the world rather than ‘horizontal’ in the sense of changing what we know about the world. And such vertical growth is progressive in the sense that it transcends and includes our prior ways of knowing the world. Moreover, such models of mental complexity are theoretically highly developed, and amenable to empirical measurement.

In light of the explanatory power of this perspective, when policy makers try to change behaviour through incentive structures, environmental influences and choice architectures, they show, as Kegan puts it, “an astonishingly naïve sense of how important a factor is the level of mental complexity”.

The use of ‘astonishing’ is worth emphasising. In a context where ‘people’ are presented as the solution rather than the problem, mental complexity is perhaps the single most important variable to understand, and is required to inform how people are likely to respond to the behavioural demands of the Big Society agenda.

In light of the explanatory power of this perspective, when policy makers try to change behaviour through incentive structures, environmental influences and choice architectures, they show, as Kegan puts it, “an astonishingly naïve sense of how important a factor is the level of mental complexity”.

Kegan’s emphasis on the importance of mental complexity has parallels with the method of psychographic segmentation known as ‘Values Modes’ derived from Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, in which we move from subsistence to social to existential needs. Values are viewed as motivational constructs that underpin emotions, perceptions and behaviours, so they provide good proxy measures for mental complexity, which is useful because data on values is relatively easy to collect. This kind of progression in values has parallels with Kegan’s theory of development, and although the underlying mechanism of change is different, both models highlight that the range of values that gives rise to this segmentation is not ‘flat’.

(…) See report for relationship between mental complexity and values modes(…)

Fear of Hierarchy

The neglect of this kind of perspective may be because it is an uncomfortable notion for a liberal democracy. Developmental differences represents a form of hierarchy, and, at first blush, appears to raise similar political issues to IQ scores. This is a valid objection, but is attenuated by at least four factors.

First, In Kegan’s model in particular measures of development are complex constructs based on qualitative data, not psychometric measures producing single composite scores that can be readily compared.

Second, unlike traditional views of IQ, levels of mental complexity are not static and evolve in relation to challenges within one’s lifespan.

Third, more complex does not necessarily mean ‘better’. An adult’s mind is not necessarily better than a child’s, but it is typically more developed. The values of security and belonging are not less important than the values of self-efficacy and personal development, indeed they may be necessary conditions for them to arise.

Kegan uses the example of a driver who can only drive an automatic not being a worse driver than one who can drive both an automatic and a manual car. This difference is one of ‘fit’ rather than skill, and will only be felt in situations where there are no automatics available. The hierarchy in question is about one relatively basic way of knowing giving rise to and growing into another that is relatively complex, not about something better subsuming something worse in absolute terms.

Even with those three points in mind, the root metaphor of higher as better is difficult to shake. The fourth point is therefore important, and particularly relevant in the context of the Big Society. Simply stated, according to Kegan, more than half of the adult population (c. 58%) share a broadly similar level of mental complexity (‘the socialised mind’- see below). This large group therefore experience similar challenges in the mismatch between the cultural demands and their capacity to fully address them. Moreover, it makes it more credible to say that developing mental complexity in the general population is a viable public goal.”

Thanks for reading this far. Does this make sense? Is it still a bit scary?

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  4. Mental illness: the last taboo?

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Comments

  • Guest

    Hello Mr. Rowson, just finished reading your Big Society report and I find it quite interesting. As a Canadian citizen, I wasn’t aware of this social project you have underway in Great Britain. After reading a couple of articles, wikipedia page and the report about this topic some question occurred to me:

    -Where does this idea stand on the political spectrum? I see it’s been proposed by the conservative party so I assume it somewhat emanate from the right wing of the spectrum. Given that it aims for a smaller government and more responsibility in the hand of the citizens. On the other hand though, the developmental part of the ideology: the life long learning process seam to emanate from the government infrastructure in part. So would that sort of balance some left and some right and make it a central political ideology? I see there are different kind of learning possibilities involved; by attending school in multidisciplinary programs making student more aware of complexity so it’s partly knowledge base and also problem solving oriented but the main objective is to empower citizen to take action in their own hands by transmitting these 3 core attitude you speak about. So in a way this ideology is to reverse the too intrusive and sometimes intrusive government and replace it by a vibrant/different decentralize civil society through a different socialization process. I’m wondering though if shrinking too much the government is such a good idea though. What kind of power would be left in the hand of the government? Isn’t this approach replacing an extreme by an other (too much government vs too much civil society)? Would an equilibrium be the optimal solution or is that too naive of an intuition?

    -Also I was wondering, where does this ideology stand in compare to style of direct democracy that Sweden is currently building? I know they have democracy group of citizen periodically and regular referendum at a local level. Sweden is more of left wing society and to a certain level they are building in a way another system which might considered in the same family of decentralized government but at a different place on the political spectrum. So far they seam to enjoy some of the best condition of life a developed country as been able to achieve. Would it be a good thing to base some of the reform on their system? I think the lack of left/right positioning brings up a bit of confusion in my case as far as understanding goes.

    I recall reading in the first few page of your document that ideas were meant to be discussed and not tools to achieve them. I understand this avoid pigeonholing the ideology and/or dismiss it but knowing which different kind of implementation in a way ease the comprehension in my opinion. It’s a bit like the independence issue we have here in Québec, in theory it sounds like a good idea in some way but the lack of plan scare the citizen to make the jump in this new state.

    A more active kind of democracy and a better use of everyone’s very own level understanding seams like a good idea though. I understand that people need to understand that it’s not a snobish way of saying someone is better than the other but that people are different and meant to do different kind of things. And people will feel better if they get a job according to their own level of vertical development.

    All in all I hope I understand the theory well enough. I was pretty mindblown at first with this new ideology. I’m looking forward to read some more.

    • Jonathanrowson

      Hi, thanks for your comment.

      I think the Big Society is a flexible enough idea to be proposed and interpreted from all political angles, as we suggest in the report.
      However, personally I would be glad if people stopped talking about the left-right political spectrum, which feels like 20th century language, and I find it does more harm than good in our efforts to make sense of the challenges we face in the 21st century.

      Jonathan

  • IanVol

    Jonathan,
    Thank you for your thoughtful post and the excellent report. We have an reductionist education system that prepers people for a mechanistic world that no longer really exists. We do have to improve understanding of complexity and non-linear changes that is taking place if we are going to adapt and enable people to understand that they are part of the solution and not to relay on a ‘hero’ to rescue them and  their lifestyle.

  • Anonymous

    I suspect Jonathan, Ben and I could easily have written a huge report, a whole book even, on the – sometimes contentious – issues relating to hierarchies/stages of development, ‘vertical’ vs ‘horizontal’ models of adult growth, the current prevalence of ‘Flatland’ models  etc.

    Despite the controversies, my suspicion is that it’s not really possible to understand today’s real challenges – deep or ‘adaptive’ challenges – that leaders and organisations face, in the absence of some understanding of the need for a shift to a later/’higher’/more complex stages of mental complexity/developmental diversity.

    In a sense there shouldn’t be anything that controversial about the issue of ‘hierarchy’. Do we all get worried about the shift from Traditional to Modern to Postmodern eras? No.

    Isn’t Kegan’s model just showing the corollary of those epochal shifts in individual human minds?

    Yet these days there is a tendency to presume that any hierarchy of development is probably just a hierarchy of domination (in disguise), rather than a natural hierarchy of actualisation/developmental growth.

    Just to complicate matters, even amongst researchers on adult development (like Prof Kegan), some of their models are stage models of development (eg Kegan, Lawrence Kohlberg, Jane Loevinger, Jean Piaget), but others are non-stage models of development (eg Basseches, Demick & Wagner, Noam).  Others still are stage models of change (eg Levinson), and others are non-stage models of change.

    It’s worth pointing out, too, that may developmentalists tend to see not a single line of development (such as Kegan’s 5 stages) but instead multiple relatively-independent lines of development (cognitive, interpersonal, interpersonal, moral et al – think Gardner’s ‘Multiple Intelligences’, perhaps) – which may all be at very different stages in a single individual. (Think absent-minded professor – with high cognitive development, and low socio-emotional).

    In fact Kegan himself states that his suggestion of a single central organising tendency, a holism or coherence, in development – rather than a melange of lines of development – is “out of favour”: “the field of developmental psychology is in far greater danger of losing the wisdom in the ‘common mental enterprise’ view than the ‘multiple mental adventures’ view”.

    And maybe it’s a ‘wave-particle kind of question’, where neither side can ever be finally right, he writes…

    Kegan himself does argue against any notion that ‘later stages are better’ – arguing that it is all about the appropriateness of one’s ‘fit’ into the surrounding organisation, or society.

    The mental demands of the 21st century call for professionals to have the abilities, the complexity, the tolerance and autonomy exhibited by his Stage 4/Self-authoring ‘way of knowing’. But most of us don’t yet have this Self-authoring way of knowing – as the OECD findings we mentioned in our report, made clear.

    So, a person centred in the Traditional ‘way of knowing’ risks finding themselves ‘In Over their Heads’ (which also happens to be the title of perhaps Prof Kegan’s greatest book!).

    Certainly many contemporary developmental scientists extol plasticity and diversity and seek to avoid anything that might smack of directionality, anything ‘normative’, that might suggest ‘gaps’ or ‘deficits’ – as they fear it could be marginalising. (Any yes, there have certainly been ghastly historic usages of crude models of development – but let’s not throw out the baby…).

    I find it interesting that different researchers who use *the very same* model can sometimes diametrically disagree about whether the model supports ideas of hierarchy, higher is better, an ‘Omega point’ or does not support them.

    This is the case with the 8-stage, 125-value (5000 values with synonyms), model developed by Brian Hall/Benjamin Tonna. Brian Hall views it as hierarchical, yet his Australian equivalent – Paul Chippendale, takes a non-hierarchical view (influenced by the work of Steven Jay Gould).

    You can see an analysis of Matthew Taylor’s ‘Twenty-first Century Enlightenment’ pamphlet, and of the RSA’s vision, through the lens of this developmental model here: http://www.minessence.net/rsa/ValuesInDocs.aspx

    Who’s right on hierarchy? Maybe no-one. A friend – Mike Munro Turner FRSA – suggested to me that it might be a bit like the wave-particle paradox in physics. It is neither one, nor the other.

    And isn’t much of the worry about hierarchy because of the idea that a new hierarchical stage won’t healthily ‘transcend and include’ previous stages, but will instead divisively ‘transcend and negate’ them? We should choose to avoid the ‘negation’ pitfall, perhaps.

    I suppose a hope of mine is merely that people – including me! – will learn about all the competing and contrasting perspectives on adult development, and perhaps draw on what’s best from each.

    Perhaps such an integrative solution is similar to the ‘clumsy solutions’ RSA Chief Executive Matthew Taylor advocates – which aren’t constrained by one way of organising but draw from across all the differing rationalities (ie from individual, egalitarian, hierarchist and fatalist) that are described in Cultural Theory.

    Re Adam Kahane’s fear that people who like developmental/hierarchical models tend to put themselves at the top – some people will certainly seek to do this. People with the ‘Achiever’ ethos (that is so rewarded in the corporate context) often seek to do this. But most developmental models have assessment tools, which cannot so easily be tricked.

    You can’t just put yourself ‘at the top’ of them, other than rhetorically.

    Apart from ‘I’m at the top!’, another common response to these models of developmental diversity is to reject them – this comes most commonly from the left/egalitarian/’PC’ way of thinking, which fears ‘labelling’ people, categorising, judging, marginalising etc.

    [By the way, if you personally want to try out a quick ‘vertical’/developmental assessment, here’s a free ‘Values Modes’ one based on Maslow’s ‘Hierarchy of Needs’: http://www.cultdyn.co.uk/Process/indexAdagio.php ; and here is a ‘horizontal’ personality type assessment of the Big 5 (Openness, Conscientiousness, Extroversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism). Big 5 is widely believed to be the most valid personality type model, in contrast to Myers-Briggs etc. It is non-developmental (in the same way being left-handed isn’t maturational/developmental) – though, interestingly, the ‘Openness’ scale does seem to correlate with Loevinger’s ego maturational stages.)

    Interestingly, Prof Bill Torbert found that when people have completed a developmental assessment and are offered a personal feedback meeting to discuss their results, many jump at this opportunity to learn about themselves, and others just ignore the chance. A person’s developmental stage usually predicts which of these responses they will make!

    I haven’t mentioned another reason why researchers may well be wary of talking about hierarchical stage models: research that risks uncovering differences between groups is controversial. We know that academics sometimes lose their jobs if they discuss sensitive findings in public.

    I think I’d better draw my rambling thoughts to a close – suffice to say that we certainly could have said an awful lot more, on these points! ;-)

    Matthew Mezey (co-author of ‘Beyond the Big Society – Psychological Foundations of Active Citizenship’)
    (RSA Senior Networks Manager – Online & International)

    Twitter: https://twitter.com/MatthewMezey

    * And do take a look at this new web dashboard of RSA online activity: http://bit.ly/sa4rni

  • mike jay

    The illusion here…while not obvious, is that any amount of human mental complexity can keep up with exponential complexity…so while the “debate” continues, it’s quite silly in many ways…demonstrating the limits of our ego, ability and sense of naviete. – “Much ado about nothing” as the noise drowns out the signal, as the wrong questions continually get answered….mike

  • Kristian Stalne

    Hi Jonathan,

    I was glad to be noticed about your piece from our adult development listserv by Matthew Kalman.

    Very intresting piece! Thank’s for sharing!

    In my view Robert Kegan’s subject-object theory and discussions on mental
    complexity and the demands that are placed on us from the society, the
    curriculum of society, are highly relevant so I think it’s a great initiative! I am really fond of Kegan’s work and it’s a great introduction
    into adult development. The issue of people ”being” at different stages is of
    course a source of conflict.

    If one want to make a case for the existence of developmental stages and hierarchies I think that the work on the Model of hierarchical complexity, MHC, of Michael Commons et al is central and that a further discussion on the topic of adult development and education in general and hierarchies in particular would benefit from it.
    The work of Michael and all other researchers on the MHC can certainly deepen
    the discussion and understanding of mental complexity, horizontal vs vertical
    development, tasks from society and the corresponding response from the
    individual. If one wants to promote a transfer of power and responsibility from
    the politicians to the public I think that it with Michaels MHC it is easier to
    define appropriate tasks at the various orders, e.g. concrete tasks, abstract
    tasks, formal tasks, systematic tasks and so forth, and easier to identify
    people that are able to perform the respective tasks. I think that MHC is more
    gentler towards the subjects in that it doesn’t classify people and pigeon-hole
    them (Wilber’s expression), rather that it classifies tasks with the natural
    consequence that people will perform at varying success. Or why not looking at
    Sara Ross’ TIP (The Integral Process for Working on Complex Issues), which is a
    great example of applying and complexity in small scale societal issues.

    So in my opinion Michael’s model and the theoretical as well as applied work
    that have been carried out by other researchers has a great deal to offer to
    the discussion as it hopefully continues and deepens, which it probably will
    after this exciting piece!

    Best regards
    Kristian Stalne
    Lund university
    Sweden

    Very intresting piece! Thank’s for sharing!

    In my view Robert Kegan’s subject-object theory and discussions on mental
    complexity and the demands that are placed on us from the society, the
    curriculum of society, are highly relevant so I think it’s a great initiative! I am really fond of Kegan’s work and it’s a great introduction
    into adult development. The issue of people ”being” at different stages is of
    course a source of conflict.

    If one want to make a case for the existence of developmental stages and hierarchies I think that the work on the Model of hierarchical complexity, MHC, of Michael Commons et al is central and that a further discussion on the topic of adult development and education in general and hierarchies in particular would benefit from it.

    The work of Michael and all other researchers on the MHC can certainly deepen
    the discussion and understanding of mental complexity, horizontal vs vertical
    development, tasks from society and the corresponding response from the
    individual. If one wants to promote a transfer of power and responsibility from
    the politicians to the public I think that it with Michaels MHC it is easier to
    define appropriate tasks at the various orders, e.g. concrete tasks, abstract
    tasks, formal tasks, systematic tasks and so forth, and easier to identify
    people that are able to perform the respective tasks. I think that MHC is more
    gentler towards the subjects in that it doesn’t classify people and pigeon-hole
    them (Wilber’s expression), rather that it classifies tasks with the natural
    consequence that people will perform at varying success. Or why not looking at
    Sara Ross’ TIP (The Integral Process for Working on Complex Issues), which is a
    great example of applying and complexity in small scale societal issues.

    So in my opinion Michael’s model and the theoretical as well as applied work
    that have been carried out by other researchers has a great deal to offer to
    the discussion as it hopefully continues and deepens, which it probably will
    after this exciting piece!

    Best regards
    Kristian Stalne
    Lund university
    Sweden

  • Gerard Bruitzman

    Schumacher’s book, A Guide for the Perplexed, is the fruit of a lifetime of deep engagement with the deep questions of life.

    The current wikipedia article on Schumacher notes that he shifted in his views from atheism and modernity in his youth towards Buddhism, Catholicism, Thomism and Christian mysticism in his maturity. Schumacher evidently found more beauty, truth, and goodness in traditional religion based on contemplative awareness and practice than in the flatlands of reductionist science, industrial society and modernity.

    This observation of Schumacher’s personal development puts an often used sequence of development found in integral circles in question. How often do we see a model of development that asumes that development shifts (progresses?) from traditional to modern to postmodern? In Schumacher’s case, his development proceeded from modern to traditional, from modern horizontal quantitative flatlands to traditional vertical qualitative appreciation of beauty, truth and goodness.

    Developmental studies by Cook-Greuter, et al., acknowledge the progression of cognitive complexity from 1st- to 2nd- to 3rd- to 4th- to 5th- to nth-person perspectivity in individuals. In Schumacher’s case, he found presentations of wisdom and compassion that become available in 4th- to 5th- to nth-person perspectivity in the Christian Neo-Thomists, like G.K.Chesterton, and the Christian mystics, like St.Teresa of Avila and Thomas Merton.

    What we learn here is that there is more wisdom and compassion in traditionalists, like Schumacher, than what the simple-minded sequence of development from 2nd-person traditional to 3rd-person modern to 4th-person postmodern allows. We find 3rd-person rationality, 4th-person contextuality, 5th-person integralism, and nth-person contemplative wisdom and compassion in traditionalists such as Huston Smith, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, A.K.Coomaraswamy, William Shakespeare, et al.