Customer Reviews

The Deep Democracy of Open Forums: Practical Steps to Conflict Prevention and Resolution for the Family, Workplace, and World

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Arnold Mindell together with his wife and partner Amy are international treasures!

I am amazed that to date in this year 2010 there has been only one review of this remarkable book, The Deep Democracy of Open Forums, which was published 8 long years ago in 2002. I first became aware of it just last summer (2009), as well as of a long list of other equally remarkable books by Arny and Amy. I second the first reviewer's remarks!

In reading aloud the Kindle version preface to my wife one morning last summer to get an idea of its purpose and scope, we were so impressed and excited by it that we resolved to send copies to friends and family in anticipation of lively discussions. Alas, that is where we got stuck! The Amazon.com price in summer 2009 for the paperback version was prohibitive! So, I focused on other Mindell books before returning to Open Forums. However, I must have misread this number back then, because today it is altogether affordable.

In any case this book contains a model for creating true community and dealing with conflicts that block it. I realized that I had been looking for something like this for decades! It has given us here in Los Alamos a vision for an Open Forum, which is currently being planned for spring 2011. This notorious town is noted for its invention of The Bomb, which led historian Garry Wills to publish Bomb Power this year. Now, with Mindell's model, we have a means of transforming this horrid legacy into something creative. Our community would like this place to be known as the town "Where Discoveries are Made". If we manage to discipline ourselves well enough to apply Mindell's wisdom and practical suggestions, this transformation could become a reality to silence the echo of the old Manhattan Project.

The Deep Democracy of Open Forums is a book for any community large or small, which must deal with conflicts of any kind.

Eugene N Kovalenko, Ph.D.
Los Alamos, New Mexico

Although I have a number of friends who have studied with him, I have not had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Mindel or his equally gifted wife. I am now a retired psychotherapist but still do work in he field of leadership and groups facilitation(with my colleagues @ Matrix Leadership). However, one of the many reasons why I respect the body of his work so greatly is my own history of Sun Dancing for two decades with the Lakota people on the Rosebud Reservation, and the quest for knowledge from indigenous healers that come from the oral tradition. I could add far greater involvement in those kinds of arenas but that is not pertinent to this review. Belatedly, I owe him a profound thank you for having recognized and brought into the mainstream of psychology, the worldview of the shaman. As an acquaintance of the late (and great) anthropologist, Dr. Felicitas Goodman, I wish to thank him for his innovation in incorporating the right use of power and the realization that older modalities are in no way simple, primitive, or lacking in complexity. I am only touching on one aspect of the courage of his true intellectual inquiry. He and his wife have brought science in and through the areas of cultural diversity and the destructive and exclusivity of all the "isms" that separate us. I do apologize for the clumsiness of this review; it is late, but I wanted to honor him and his wife's work. In the Lakota tradition, I would do so by singing an honoring song. Maybe someday I will have the opportunity of doing so. Until then, try any of his books. They are always filled with compassion and appreciation, as well as being part of the great Hegelian dialective that leads toward the Whole. A mind not to be missed.