Vandergriff: 4th generation leadership (3)

by | Mar 31, 2007 | Influence and networks

Major Donald E. Vandergriff (US army retired) – see previous posts (1, 2) – describes a model for educating adaptive leaders, with the aim of producing a student that can demonstrate an ability to:

  • Rapidly distinguish between information that is useful in making decisions and that which is not pertinent
  • Avoid the natural temptation to delay their decisions until more information makes the situation clearer, at the risk of losing initiative
  • Avoid the pitfall of thinking that once the mission is underway, more information will clarify the tactical picture
  • Feel the battlefield tempo, discern patterns among the chaos, and make critically important decisions in seconds

The leader will also have developed: “strength of character; experience and intuition through repetitive skills training; an understanding of the value of self-study; and proper understanding of a command climate that promotes adaptability, accepts change and encourages innovation.”

So how does Vandergriff think its done? (more…)

On the Draft Manual for 4GW (1): Clans

by | Mar 31, 2007 | Conflict and security, Cooperation and coherence, Influence and networks

For the authors of the draft field manual on Fourth Generation War (William Lind et al), 4GW is fuelled by the rising importance of non-state entities and the declining powers of the state. And states cannot win these wars unless they learn to behave like the clans that oppose them.

4GW is not novel, but a return to pre-Westphalian ways. The period where the State held a Hobbseian monopoly of power is not normal, but an interlude, even an aberration:

“Once again, clans, tribes, ethnic groups, cultures, religions and gangs are fighting wars, in more and more parts of the world. They fight using many different means, not just engagements and battles. Once again, conflicts are often many?sided, not just two?sided. [Those] who find themselves caught up in such conflicts quickly discover they are difficult to understand and harder still to prevail in.”

It is not just in warfare that clans are important. How could it be? Today’s world is driven by non-territorial clusters of power – non-governmental organizations (take your pick from Oxfam, Shell or Al Qaeda) or non-governmental non-organizations (neo-conservatism, the Chinese diaspora, the global warmingerati etc.). (more…)

Where next for NGOs?

by | Mar 31, 2007 | Climate and resource scarcity, Economics and development, Influence and networks

What’s a single issue NGO to do in a multi-issue world? It’s no easy balancing act.

On one hand, funding departments argue that members want to see them campaigning on the issues they’re known for. Too much scope creep, they say, could lead to falling subscriptions, legacies and income. (Sometimes, members are in fact surpisingly open-minded and ready to understand interconnections between issues, and it’s actually conservatively minded staff members, rather than grassroots members, who want to keep things ‘as they’ve always been’.)

On the other hand, the brighter NGO policy departments understand very well that as issues like environment, conflict, development and human rights become increasingly intertwined, it makes less and less sense to focus resolutely on just one piece of the puzzle. Will the Oxfam / Greenpeace / Amnesty generation of NGOs be able to make the shift? Or are we heading towards a new – and perhaps less ‘vertically integrated’ – model of NGO campaigning?

(more…)