Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Take Me To Your Leaders 23/12/05
Take Me To Your Leaders 23/12/05
By Ian Lowden, M.Sc., B.A.
ian.lowden@shaw.ca
If Aliens landed on Gabriola and came up with the old line of “take me to your leaders”, whatever would we do? I for one would have a great deal of difficulty deciding to whom I should take the aliens. I’m not sure who are community leaders are. I know we have elected officials but on Gabriola are elected officials really the community leaders? I also know there are several people who for various reasons like to think of themselves, and often promote themselves as, our community leaders but most people don’t seem to believe the self-professed are, in any meaningful way, really our leaders. For me the Zen maxim of “if you lead I will not follow and if you follow I will not lead” effectively rules out the concept of leaders and followers, but very much emphasizes that we can for a time travel together. To me Gabriola is a very Zen kind of place in many ways but particularly in our diversity and our seemingly lack of need for LEADERS per se.
Can a community really function without leaders? History has shown us that our country and our province seems to function in the absence of credible leaders-we have politicians instead. We have people who through wealth, position, or occupation claim they are our leaders but few people take them seriously, as they rarely have any real impact on our lives. How then does a community without clearly defined leaders function? We seem to function closer to the contradiction in terms of a ‘community of anarchists’. I say this not in jest or in sarcasm but in the belief that Gabriola is like a functional anarchy. Yes we have several levels of elected representatives and hence several levels of restrictions; which the majority of us seem to ignore.
Can we really be a community without regular and identified leaders? Let’s look at the process. When something needs doing on Gabriola we seldom seem to wait for our “elected representatives” or are our ‘self appointed leaders’. When something needs doing someone just starts doing it. If it seems like a good idea then others tend to join in with varying levels of commitment and with various amounts of time and effort. Witness the things on Gabriola that have become and that work and endure.
We have the Community Centre, the Agi Hall, the Museum, the Women’s Institute, which was also our community library for many years. We have The Rollo Centre, the Lions Living Centre, the Retirement Village, the Golf Course, the Gathering Place, PHC and the food bank and now The Commons. We also have the Dancing Man Festival, Gabriola Days, the Salmon Barbecue, the House and Garden Tour, The Art Tours, the Farmer’s Market, the Annual Craft Show, the Island Singers, live theatre and a plethora of other musical and cultural venues. We have two community newspapers, a couple of on-line forums as well as more casual forums, we have gabriolalife.ca to keep us informed of the many musical, educational and cultural events, and we even seem to have the makings of a radio station. We have a boat school, a stonemason’s course and an entire institute at the Haven. We have a top-notch Ambulance system as well as an exceptional Volunteer Fire Brigade; we even have a taxi. We have many, many other groups, activities and services such as an emergency planning body, a Groundwater Society and end of life support group. In fact, just about anytime a need exists some ordinary citizen gets together with some other citizens and create something to fill the need, usually without political leaders and often despite government roadblocks. To me this is ‘functional anarchism’.
Some might take offence to the label “functional anarchism”. Perhaps it is just the way a community should work. Perhaps it is just the way an Island needs to work. Or perhaps it is because of the type of people who are drawn to island living. There is quite a distinction, both in quality and quantity of volunteerism between this island and most of the communities I have lived in. Actually in some ways it reminds me of my experience many years ago on an Israeli Kibbutz. They fought like cats and dogs, arguments and dissent seemed to be an art form, but when something needed doing it didn’t usually take any particular leaders to get it done. There, like here, somebody just went ahead and done what needed doing
The test of leadership is not how many votes somebody gets but how many things that need doing get done. Nor should we, having voted, expect the elected to do everything for us Leadership is in perceiving the need and finding the right people to meet it and being willing to get down to it. We seem to have no shortage of that kind of leader on Gabriola. We sometimes don’t recognize how many people volunteer and how much gets done because the people doing it generally shy away from publicity unless it directly helps “getting done what needs doing”.
So if the Aliens land and want our leaders I guess we might just as well introduce them to everybody.
By Ian Lowden, M.Sc., B.A.
ian.lowden@shaw.ca
If Aliens landed on Gabriola and came up with the old line of “take me to your leaders”, whatever would we do? I for one would have a great deal of difficulty deciding to whom I should take the aliens. I’m not sure who are community leaders are. I know we have elected officials but on Gabriola are elected officials really the community leaders? I also know there are several people who for various reasons like to think of themselves, and often promote themselves as, our community leaders but most people don’t seem to believe the self-professed are, in any meaningful way, really our leaders. For me the Zen maxim of “if you lead I will not follow and if you follow I will not lead” effectively rules out the concept of leaders and followers, but very much emphasizes that we can for a time travel together. To me Gabriola is a very Zen kind of place in many ways but particularly in our diversity and our seemingly lack of need for LEADERS per se.
Can a community really function without leaders? History has shown us that our country and our province seems to function in the absence of credible leaders-we have politicians instead. We have people who through wealth, position, or occupation claim they are our leaders but few people take them seriously, as they rarely have any real impact on our lives. How then does a community without clearly defined leaders function? We seem to function closer to the contradiction in terms of a ‘community of anarchists’. I say this not in jest or in sarcasm but in the belief that Gabriola is like a functional anarchy. Yes we have several levels of elected representatives and hence several levels of restrictions; which the majority of us seem to ignore.
Can we really be a community without regular and identified leaders? Let’s look at the process. When something needs doing on Gabriola we seldom seem to wait for our “elected representatives” or are our ‘self appointed leaders’. When something needs doing someone just starts doing it. If it seems like a good idea then others tend to join in with varying levels of commitment and with various amounts of time and effort. Witness the things on Gabriola that have become and that work and endure.
We have the Community Centre, the Agi Hall, the Museum, the Women’s Institute, which was also our community library for many years. We have The Rollo Centre, the Lions Living Centre, the Retirement Village, the Golf Course, the Gathering Place, PHC and the food bank and now The Commons. We also have the Dancing Man Festival, Gabriola Days, the Salmon Barbecue, the House and Garden Tour, The Art Tours, the Farmer’s Market, the Annual Craft Show, the Island Singers, live theatre and a plethora of other musical and cultural venues. We have two community newspapers, a couple of on-line forums as well as more casual forums, we have gabriolalife.ca to keep us informed of the many musical, educational and cultural events, and we even seem to have the makings of a radio station. We have a boat school, a stonemason’s course and an entire institute at the Haven. We have a top-notch Ambulance system as well as an exceptional Volunteer Fire Brigade; we even have a taxi. We have many, many other groups, activities and services such as an emergency planning body, a Groundwater Society and end of life support group. In fact, just about anytime a need exists some ordinary citizen gets together with some other citizens and create something to fill the need, usually without political leaders and often despite government roadblocks. To me this is ‘functional anarchism’.
Some might take offence to the label “functional anarchism”. Perhaps it is just the way a community should work. Perhaps it is just the way an Island needs to work. Or perhaps it is because of the type of people who are drawn to island living. There is quite a distinction, both in quality and quantity of volunteerism between this island and most of the communities I have lived in. Actually in some ways it reminds me of my experience many years ago on an Israeli Kibbutz. They fought like cats and dogs, arguments and dissent seemed to be an art form, but when something needed doing it didn’t usually take any particular leaders to get it done. There, like here, somebody just went ahead and done what needed doing
The test of leadership is not how many votes somebody gets but how many things that need doing get done. Nor should we, having voted, expect the elected to do everything for us Leadership is in perceiving the need and finding the right people to meet it and being willing to get down to it. We seem to have no shortage of that kind of leader on Gabriola. We sometimes don’t recognize how many people volunteer and how much gets done because the people doing it generally shy away from publicity unless it directly helps “getting done what needs doing”.
So if the Aliens land and want our leaders I guess we might just as well introduce them to everybody.
