THE SUSTAINABLE DYNAMICS MODEL
WOW's Sustainable Dynamics brings a whole new perspective and inspiration to collaboration and the sharing of resources for the cultivation of sustainable culture and communities. WOW has created the framework to be applied to its partnerships at the regional collaboration level as well as in helping out individual organizations partners.
Originally conceptualized in 2012, the Sustainable Dynamics has now evolved into a framework of Human Biodiversity and presented for a case study by the ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity in March 2014. Over the course of two years, WOW has come to integrate other areas (interdesciplinary) to its sustainability programs; thus the eight pillars of Human Biodiversity.
These are still continuously evolving to inspire communities towards holistic participation. As Dr. Dirk Glaesser of the UN WTO emphasized during the APEC 2013 Workshop on Low Carbon towards Green Growth, "the important first lesson in sustainability: a holistic participatory view is necessary".
SUSTAINABLE DYNAMICS FRAMEWORK AS APPLIED IN SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITY-BASED ECOTOURISM IN BALI, INDONESIA
Hai Dai, WOW Bali Co-founder, explains the Sustainable Dynamics Framework (3:18) and human-centered design (8:30) as applied in Wow Bali projects (e.g., Cultural Wealth Collaborations and Bali Not For Sale) to participants of the Agrotourism Workshop sponsored by the Asian Productivity OIrganization (APO) in August 2013.
What it means to be truly sustainable
WOW Bali advocates the SHIP principle in sustainable dynamics and applies it in every collaboration it enters into. SHIP stands for SYSTEMIC, HOLISTIC, INTERDISCIPLINARY, and PARTICIPATORY. While all these are not entirely new concepts, many organizations nowadays claim their processes to be sustainable, holistic, interdisciplinary, and/ or participatory. These have become (nay, reduced to mere) buzzwords for people working in sustainable development. To apply these concepts into actual partnerships and collaborations while staying true to their meaning and at the same time be able to evolve and move forward requires a high level of creative thinking and deep understanding of sustainability. This dynamic brings WOW Sustainable Dynamics to the forefront of sustainable development solutions.
Sustainable Dynamics brings a whole new perspective and inspiration to collaboration and the sharing of resources for the cultivation of sustainable culture and communities. In here, one has to define the forces and properties that make the a certain collaboration project sustainable, as these are the same elements that will make it work dynamically. This framework works not only in collaborations between two or more stakeholders, but it also applies to organizational level participation, where individuals interact with each other, e.g., management or employer-employee relationship in most companies or organizations.
To better understand the dynamics within a community and how it functions to maintain a certain level of sustainable existence, WOW looks at sustainable dynamics from a social systems viewpoint. Much like the human body as a system (composed of parts that have specific functions), society is composed of different parts that have different roles. WOW has identified five groups of stakeholders interacting with each other: COMMUNITY, BUSINESS, GOVERNMENT, NON-GOVERNMENT (NON-PROFIT NGOs), and the ACADEMIA.
FUSION DEVELOPMENTS
WOW’s creative collaborations are based on mutualism– a relationship existing between and among partners in which each individual benefits. For real collaboration to work, all partners have to have mutual trust in each other. This is a form of co-operation that WOW fosters; alluding to nature, this can be considered a form of symbiosis that’s founded upon sharing of resources and exchange of ideas. This process differs from the conventional paradigm, where resources, products and information are protected by intellectual property. In mutualism, collaborators have to recognize each other’s resources and expertise or capacities, allowing both efforts to merge together for a goal that is greater than when each is working separately.
Creative economics is also one of the important element of collaborations where partners focus not on the money to be gained out of it, but on the process of co-creating eco-based sustainable products and services as well as finding creative ways of productizing and marketing. This is premised upon the assumption that all collaborators have attained a certain level of financial sustainability. Creative economics provides alternative to the monetary-based model that dominates most businesses at present
Active learning cultivates the individual’s creative potential and is considered to be our highest celebration. This allows exchange of knowledge between partners in an open environment of learning that fosters respect, thereby creating deeper understanding. Each is given the freedom to define his/ her own learning process thru multiple intelligences. Creative autonomy is the force and property in learning celebrations, allowing one to acquire knowledge in a process affective enough to drive them towards self-directed actions that allow them to be in harmony with nature. WOW’s programs on Active Learning are facilitated by digital means of sharing information for easier new media exchange and access.
KEY DYNAMICS
The Sustainable Dynamics model is based on human-centered design; it is focused on people. This framework is so designed such that the different stakeholders can holistically participate or mutualize and co-create sustainable solutions. To facilitate sustainable collaborations, WOW looks for so-called cultural creatives. These people may belong to any of the five major stakeholder groups identified above. Based on the stakeholder’s interests, coupled with their resources and the state of their dynamic wellness, they can integrate into the sustainable dynamic framework for collaboration. Identified below are particular examples of cultural creatives: permaculturists, artists, social entrepreneurs, wellness/light workers, teachers/ academics, LOHAS (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability) demographic, philantrophists, government managers (top management).
All these Sustainable Dynamics collaborations are aimed at creating abundance and wellbeing. It is also through these collaborations that WOW is able to regenerate and celebrate abundance and wellbeing. But while WOW looks at abundance as the condition that awaits everyone at the end of this journey towards sustainability, WOW has taken a different route: to start the journey right at the same condition that it wants to attain: abundance! No other place in the world offers this level of prosperity than Bali.
LEARN MORE ABOUT SUSTAINABLE DYNAMICS
Understanding the framework of WOW Sustainable Dynamics requires looking into the different aspects as well as elements.
Click play to deepen your knowledge of the framework and see if the concepts resonate with you.
Explained from a Human Biodiversity viewpoint, see how the Sustainable Dynamics viewpoint figure into the most pressing issue of biodiversity loss our planet is facing.
Click play to share in this exchange for case study by the ASEAN Center for Biodivesity.