12th November 2006 | Draft
A Singable Earth Charter, EU Constitution or Global Ethic?
- / -
Also published in abridged form in Statistics,
Visualizations and Patterns (Vol 5 of the Yearbook
of International Organizations, Munich, K G Saur Verlag, 6th edition,
2006/2007, as section 10.4.2) under the title: Why
any Earth Charter or EU Constitution should be Singable.
Guidelines for consideration
Policy implications: a "Concert of Democracies"?
Cognitive engagement with complexity
Individual identity within global frameworks
"Singing the Earth"
Sustaining collective memory of articulations of collective intent
Distinctions relevant to technical considerations
Organizational implementation
Conclusion
References
Guidelines for consideration
The following considerations could be borne in mind when reflecting on the
potential role of song in ensuring that a Constitution should have credibility
and value beyond that typically associated with legal documents:
- Needs to be short -- but able to embody a complex pattern of information
(in the light of advances in auditory display and sonification)
- Needs to be memorable -- especially in the sense of its function of "re-membering" a divided society
- Needs to offer reminders of significant relationships between matters
that may otherwise be treated as dangerously unrelated -- vital feedback
loops from a systemic control perspective
- Needs to be attractive in the context of a complex social system -- especially
according to the new understanding of "strange attractors" in the complexity
sciences
- Needs to strike a balance between the dysfunctional symbolic
extremes of:
- the Ode to Joy, adopted as the anthem
of Europe -- appealing primarily to the older generation, if only
because of its classical quality, exemplifying the democratic challenge
that admiration does not necessarily enable participation
- the overwhelming popular winner of the Eurovision
Song Contest in 2007
(Hard Rock Hallelujah) -- a heavy metal band in monstrous demonic
guise, appealing significantly to the younger generation [video]
- the 300-pages of the legal text of the proposed European
Constitution [more] -- unreadable, and therefore incomprehensible,
to most EU citizens (and perhaps deliberately so)
- Capable of being refreshed periodically, if not annually, in the light
of new insights, challenges and opportunities -- and if only in recognition
of the limitations of any previous version
- Inviting participation, if not entraining it -- as a contrast
to the apathy-reinforcement characteristic of modern political discourse
- Inherently imaginative -- reframing the past, offering new significance
to the present, and pointing to new ways of thinking about the future
- Challenging to cognition -- an element of puzzle and mystery to be "solved",
as with many computer and other games in which there is a gestalt to be recognized
(possibly even at several levels)
- Imminently practical in its elaboration -- as with the procedures for open
competition for major architectural or other design projects
- Susceptible to animated accompaniment -- with possibilities of exemplification
through multi-media techniques and gaming simulations
- Embodying systemic understandings valuable to governance at all levels
-- and consonant with experience at those levels
- Challenging to the conventional mindsets of lawyers, managers, politicians,
academics, designers, commmunicators and system builders -- responsible in
their various ways for the current democratic deficit and the failure to
address the issues of society effectively
- Implying the future possibility of techniques whereby principles of governance
could be elaborated from aesthetic patterns -- as a complement to the dominant
tendency to use costly marketing techniques, including promotional music,
to render legal texts acceptable
- Offering a new vehicle for the articulation and transportation of value-charged
insights -- especially a vehicle capable of holding the values of the future
- Encompassing meanings and values held to be significant by a greater proportion
of the population -- bridging the cultivated divisions between political
parties
- Offering means of embodying the paradoxes of contemporary society -- and
suggesting perspectives from which they may be transcended
- Responding to the collective schizophrenia which fails to bridge between
aesthetics and governance -- between "opera" and "work" -- as complemetary
disciplines, exemplified by the role performed by epics in some cultures
(eg the Mahabarata in
India, the Dragon
Dance in China)
- Suggesting harmonious patterns of complex relationships, so effectively
explored in the discipline of musical harmony -- and practiced by singers
worldwide
- Embodying an aesthetic feel for what "Europe" means -- and what
it means to be a "European" in a European cultural context, or
a citizen of the world
- Giving credibility to challenging responses to challenging complexes of
social problems (as exemplified by: the 12
songs of The
Globalization Saga: Balance or Destruction, 2004, as a CD accompaniment to a book by Professor
Franz Josef Radermacher, FAW - Institute
for Applied Knowledge Processing, Ulm, in association with the Global
Marshall Plan Initiative; the 13 songs in the CD accompanying the book of Alan AtKisson, Believing Cassandra: an optimist looks at a pessimist's world, 1999 -- the AtKisson Group is currently engaged in a strategic review process for the international Earth Charter Initiative)
| Das über das Medium Musik, auch komplizierte Sachverhalte einfach
transportiert werden können und Songs als Brückenschlag zur Seele
funktionieren und damit sensibilisieren die Augen für notwendige Entwicklungen
zu öffnen, das hat sich bei den bisherigen Präsentationen
der Musicalsongs bewiesen, sowohl in Bildungskontexten als auch in internationalen
Konferenzen. Franz Josef Radermacher, member of Club of Rome |
Policy implications: a "Concert of Democracies"?
Only song can reframe
the formally recognized "global
intelligence failure" and
"lack of imagination" associated with the uncritical support of the
handling of the Iraq situation -- by the most intelligent, the most powerful
and the most wealthy -- acting through the Coalition of the Willing. Such lack of intelligence
would be further compounded by efforts envisaged to force acceptance of a European
Constitution.
Is it meaningful to live in a Europe whose Constitution is
unsingable?
Is there not a similiar challenge for any Earth Charter?
And for any future Global Ethic?
As an an alternative to the divisive foreign policy of the Bush regime, inspired by the neocon Project for the New American Century, a new bipartisan report by the Woodrow
Wilson School of Public and International Affairs (Princeton University), titled Forging a World of Liberty Under Law, US National Security in the 21st Century (2006), notably proposes an appropriate charter for the establishment of a "concert of democracies". This follows from one of the first speeches during World War I of President Woodrow Wilson who called for "a concert of free countries." The new concert is conceived in the following terms:
While pushing for reform of the United Nations and other major global institutions, the United States should work with its friends and allies to develop a global “Concert of Democracies” – a new institution designed to strengthen security cooperation among the world’s liberal democracies. This Concert would institutionalize and ratify the “democratic peace.” If the United Nations cannot be reformed,
the Concert would provide an alternative forum for liberal democracies to authorize collective action,
including the use of force, by a supermajority vote. Its membership would be selective, but self-selected.
The use of the "concert" metaphor in the report would seem
to constitute a shift beyond the policy sustaining the Coalition of the Willing
-- but one that, in musical terms, could be challenged as a possibly outdated
mode in which the "music" is necessarily "directed" by
the "conductor" to
ensure that all sing "in concert" from the same "hymn sheet":
Leading Americans across the political spectrum understood that we are
far better off if American power is exercised within an international framework of cooperation, where
others have a voice – although not a veto – and nations endeavor to work in concert towards common ends...This aspect of the Concert would constitute a major effort to
integrate non-Western democratic powers into a global democratic order. At the same time, the Concert
would be more substantial and exclusive than the already existing “community of democracies,” which
is a broad but shallow organization that seeks to strengthen democracy within states..
As a reviewer of what is also termed the "Slaughter
Report", Chibli
Mallat describes the Concert of Democracies initiative in the following terms:
...it is the result of three years of intensive bipartisan debate involving over 400 prominent people from academia, the policy-making community, and the media in the United States, including former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, former National Security Advisor Anthony Lake, Newsweek International editor Fareed Zakaria and former Secretary of State George Shultz. The Slaughter report operates as a post-modern multi-layered problem solver, addressing such problems as terrorism, China, AIDS and other pandemics, global warming, energy and infrastructures. It is ambitious, and seeks the defining status of the famous "X article" by George Kennan on the strategy of "containment" published in Foreign Affairs magazine in 1947. [more]
To what extent could the Concert of Democracies be said to be merely a form
of institutionalization of the strategic mindset underlying the Coalition of
the Willing? Is the effective focus on "concerted effort" or "concertation"
without calling upon the musical connotations? As such it emphasizes concentration,
typically of a temporary character for a particular task -- as with any periodic
plenary assembly. It is perhaps appropriate to note that the related term concerto is
applied chiefly to compositions in which unequal instrumental or vocal forces
are brought into opposition.
However, in exploiting the connotations of such a potentially fruitful musical
metaphor (if that is the intention), it would be most regrettable if the USA
were only to develop its implications within a particular classical understanding
of musical harmony -- and the social organization associated with it from past
centuries (cf Jacques Attali. Noise:
the political economy of music, 1977/1985). This would avoid any
exploration of the other powerful potentials of musical harmony reflective
of the modern complexity that the new strategy purports to address.
There are
indeed other lessons to be drawn from the metaphor (cf John Kao, Jamming:
the art and discipline of corporate creativity, 1997; Lukasz Michalec
and David A Banks, Information
Systems Development Methodologies and all that Jazz, 2004).
Specifically it would be especially regrettable if "concert" became
merely another reframing of the unfortunate mindset underlying the "Global
Compact" of the United Nations (cf "Globalization":
the UN’s "Safe Haven" for the World’s Marginalized --
the Global Compact with Multinational Corporations as the UN’s "Final
Solution", 2000). A critical description of European institutions
has been made in terms of the "orchestra" metaphor by Timothy Garton Ash (The
European Orchestra, Hoover Digest: Research and Opinion
on Public Policy,
2001, 3).
Should the set of shared values fundamental to a Concert of Democracies be
expressed as a conventional checklist -- or rather as a song that interweaves their
relationships into a comprehensible whole exemplifying their complementarity
as a system of checks and balances?
Cognitive engagement with complexity
There is a real challenge in comprehending and communicating the strategic
challenges of sustainable development in an increasingly complex global environment,
as explored by Franz Josef Radermacher (Balance
or Destruction,
2004). Is there not a strong case for finding ways to hold the pattern
of systemic feedback loops (so essential to sustainability) in mnemonic devices,
such as song, that can be more widely understood and related to the values
justifying any action?
In musical terms, might it be possible to embody
such systemic sustainable development insights into a compromise between the
archetypal insights of Richard Wagner's Ring
Cycle and the participative mnemonics of Harold Baum's The
Biochemists' Song Book (1982/2003). The latter presents information
on the complexities of interweaving metabolic pathways, set to well known songs,
as an enjoyable memory aid. It is to be contrasted with the excellent charts
on the total pattern of metabolic pathways which illustrate the larger challenge
to comprehension (see Biochemical
Pathways: Metabolic Pathways; Biochemical
Pathways: Cellular and Molecular Processes; Metabolic
Pathways of
the International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology). These are of
a degree of complexity commensurate with the systems exercises in global modelling
-- indicative of the constraints on sustainable development.
Metabolic pathways reflect the fundamental life sustaining processes at the
micro level. It is to be expected (from a general systems perspective) that
these would be isomorphic to some degree with those at a macro-systemic level,
especially with respect to the pattern of systemic pathways basic to sustainable
development. Also fundamental to sustainable development are the laws of thermodynamics.
These have also been turned into a song (First
and Second Law. Flanders and
Swann Online).
If wisdom is required to respond to the challenge of sustainable development,
how might that wisdom be best embodied in music and song? |
Individual identity within global frameworks
Constitutions and charters might be said to be about collective identity. The question is what they imply or ignore in relation to individual identity.
Whilst perhaps acknowledging the individual to some degree as an objective entity for which legal protection may in some way be required, charters are typically lax in honouring the individual subjectivity that motivates engagement with global charters, indifference to them -- or their rejection. Consider, for example, the complementary dimensions embodied in the experimental Universal Declaration of the Rights of Human Organization (1971).
The "war on terror" is increasing pressure for a form of documented identity of citizens to be embodied in biometric identity cards. It is appropriate to ask whether those who identify with the description of themselves by others in ID cards merit what amounts to a two-dimensional existence in legal "flatland" -- in contrast to other possibilities (cf Ron Atkin. Multidimensional Man: can man live in three dimensional space? 1981). Such extreme reductionism might be considered the antithesis of what people consider meaningful in their lives. How can any global framework be meaningful in practice under such circumstances?
Expressing a constititution of any kind in a collective song evokes the possibility that individuals might themselves be acknowledged through the song that best expresses their identity. Whereas an identity card typically requires a "signature" to become a legal document, there is then a question of whether a "signature tune" constitutes a richer expression of the identity of an individual. More important is the question of the manner in which the individual identifies with the tune and to what degree. The significance of such a possibility is evident in affinities that are celebrated in song -- "they are playing our tune". Curiously the individuals in many species of animal, notably birds, are recognizable to each other through their unique song.
Such possibilities suggest a way of thinking about global constitutions as constituting a framework evocative of individual and group songs -- through which the identity of each is enhanced and through which each identifies the other. The challenge at this time, given the huge quantity of music that is accessible and in process of being created, is that individuals identify with songs produced by others -- whether or not they sing or play them themselves. Only rarely, in celebration of a life or as part of a ritual, is a song composed for an individual. Unlike painters, it is rare for individuals to consciously produce a musical self-portrait (Richard Strauss, Robert Schumann, Kurt Bestor and Keith Jarrett are some exceptions) although the process is now a feature of musical education. Consequently it might therefore be said that a sense of identity is borrowed from others ("downloaded") and played in private self-confirmation as a form of "identity pace-maker". The facilitation of this process may be seen by the future as a form of "identity theft" by the collectivity at this time -- as with global constitutions.
How might an individual be encouraged to recognize the song that they are
effectively singing -- the integrative expression of their identity (cf Mary
Catherine Bateson , Composing
a Life, 1990, which she compares to jazz improvisation, although
the focus is primarily on life stories). How can the many features of music
be used to articulate and hold the dynamics of an evolving identity? Phil Rockstroh
(An Outcast's
Inappropriate Aria: singing at the dinner table of the Empire, Swans
Commentary, 2005) makes an even stronger, politically engaged, point:
Can you accept the unsettling truth of knowing that what we inflict upon the world we will eventually inflict upon ourselves, and visa versa? And ask over and over again this question: When so many external and internal forces work to thwart, degrade, and destroy our essential selves, hence the world -- what can help to restore us?
Poets tell us that only depth-delving songs, those sounds and images that reveal hidden truths, can partially restore what had been lost...Orpheus can pass into the underworld and back...but Eurydice remains lost to shadow... We only half live in the world...the rest is mystery... Lorca called it Deep Song: An autochthonic music that allows us to live beyond ourselves...to glimpse larger realities...and be freed from our self-constructed prison of believing the world of subjectivity and habit is the only world possible.
Deep Song is not mood music for those in a Prozac state of mind. It is a chord progression of the cosmic blues. It wails primordial storms and collapsing stars; it sings of uncharitable seas of dark matter and of the alien oceans of our tide-tossed hearts.
One approach to understanding the "lost language" of pattern-shifting in such a process reality can be obtained from insights into the 4,000 year-old chanted hymns of the Rg Veda of the Indian tradition (as discussed elsewhere). A very powerful exploration of this work by a philosopher, Antonio de Nicolas, using the non-Boolean logic of quantum mechanics, opens up valuable approaches to integration. The unique feature of the approach is that it is grounded in tone and the shifting relationships between tone. It is through the pattern of musical tones that the significance of the Rg Veda is to be found:
Therefore, from a linguistic and cultural perspective, we have to be aware that we are dealing with a language where tonal and arithmetical relations establish the epistemological invariances... Language grounded in music is grounded thereby on context dependency; any tone can have any possible relation to other tones, and the shift from one tone to another, which alone makes melody possible, is a shift in perspective which the singer himself embodies. Any perspective (tone) must be "sacrificed" for a new one to come into being; the song is a radical activity which requires innovation while maintaining continuity, and the "world" is the creation of the singer, who shares its dimensions with the song. (Antonio de Nicolas, Meditations through the Rg Veda, 1978, p. 57)
"Singing the Earth"
It is appropriate to note that articulating through song the integrative
significance of the Earth as a whole, and engaging meaningfully with it, has
been undertaken throughout the history of humanity. Such songs have typically
been the work of priests in ritual ceremonies. Whilst typically these have
been long forgotten (or suppressed) as pagan ceremonies, it is not to be forgotten
that such songs continue to be sung in neo-pagan ceremonies, of which the midsummer
celebrations in Nordic countries are particularly significant.
Also of contemporary significance
is the importance attached to such songs within indigenous societies around
the world. In particular, Australian Aborigenes continue to attach great significance
to their capacity to "sing the land" -- singing the land into existence.
The people and the land are understood as one -- by the very act of singing
the land, the land itself lives and breathes. Such understandings have been
extensively documented for UNEP in a project led by Darrell Posey (Cultural
and Spiritual Values of Biodiversity, 1999).
Such insights are of course faintly echoed in modern religions in cycles of
popular festivals in which the fertility of the land is celebrated: spring
festivals, mid-summer festivals,
early autumn (harvest
festivals, Thanksgiving,
etc) and winter
festivals.
Such celebration points to a poorly recognized relationship between the associated
mindset sustaining it and that called for at this time under the term "sustainable
development" and as the need for "appropriate lifestyles". Sustainable development
might be considered a simplistic secular euphemism for a lost cognitive engagement
with the Earth -- and the joy of being approrpriately alive, as recognized in
popular festivals worldwide. This raises the question as to the nature of the
cognitive engagement of the world's earliest "sustainable developers".
Curiously the few festivals specifically initiated
to celebrate sustainable development tend to be named "Earth
festivals".
Sustaining collective memory of articulations of collective intent
Of particular relevance in the case of religious ritual down the ages is the
recognition of the mnemonic function of music and chant -- mnemonic songs --
as a means to convey insight. Important items of information are deliberately
linked to rhythm and repetition in an effort to aid memory. Sutras and prayers
are meant to be chanted, thus engaging the musical/rhythmic regions of the
brain in synchrony with the written and uttered word. More of the brain is
activated by an exposure to a combination of data units + rhythm + melody +
intonation + pitch -- especially with the addition of dance. As notably explored
by suggestopedia for
purposes of accelerative
learning, this enables large units of structured data to be remembered
as a patterned whole. At a a more familiar level it is one of the reasons that
pop songs and rap are so easily remembered.
The question of the constraints on collective learning was a significant dimension
omitted from an optimistic commissioned study of the supposedly unlimited
possibilities of individual learning -- as reviewed elsewhere (Societal
Learning and the Erosion of Collective Memory: a critique of the Club
of Rome Report, 1980), notably exploring the nature of the pathology of collective memory. For western culture it is interesting to note (drawing upon its classical roots, as presented
in the figure below) the traditional symbolic understanding of the relationship
between law, as one expression of longer-term collective intent, and the collective
memory capacity required to sustain its credibilty and viabity.
| Primordial relationship of law to memory as indicated by
the relationship in Greek mythology between Zeus (as
the guardian of law and morality), who fathered the nine Muses with Mnemosyne,
and his son Apollo (as
the giver of laws) |
 |
The complementary relevance of the Muses to memory, especially of collective
intent, might then be articulated as follows (with possibilities in italics of relevance to the memorability of declarations of collective intent):
- Calliope (epic poetry and eloquence ): As oral
narrative verse, this emphasizes deep feeling and ethical
significance rather than the
form or subject matter. It expresses the nature or ideals
of an entire culture at a significant or crucial period of its history. Accompanied
by a stringed instrument, the epic song was both the most popular form
of entertainment in the ancient world and the repository of a people's
cultural tradition and history. It charges the experiential world with
significance. This is exemplified by such works as the Iliad,
the Mahabharata or
the Kalevala.
However the importance of the latter to the successful uptake of information
technology was highlighted in an introductory speech by the Finnish Presidency
of the European Commission on the New
Dimensions of Learning in the Information Society (July 1999)
by referring first to the influential role of the Kalevala (as
discussed in an earlier paper (Enhancing
the Quality of Knowing through Integration of East-West Metaphors,
2000). Clearly epic poetry provides an important form of support for long-term,
deep cultural memory -- if only in the perpetuation of the memory of a
ruler. This may be closely related to expressions of long-term collective
intent -- again perhaps exemplified by a ruler desiring to perpetuate his
intent. For the Greeks,
the source of inspiration was conventionally ascribed to the Muse. [more] Should
the European Union not elicit epic poetry to communicate the "deep
feeling and ethical significance" of any proposed constitution? An
Iliad or Kalevala?
- Euterpe (music): Music of different types serves
to sustain collective memory of a short, medium or long-term nature. This
may be seen in the short-term marketing role of advertising jingles (or the
"psyching up" of traditional battle music), the medium-term role of popular
tunes defining a cultural period or collective identity (as with regimental
marches) over decades, and the longer-term role of folk and classical music
in sustaining cultural identity. Rhythm assists in remembering otherwise
unconnected data which may be especially important in oral tradition where
key rules and elements of folk wisdom are often expressed rhythmically. Research
has shown memory to be affected by many different factors, but notably including
music because of the manner in which it stimulates parts
of the brain (Sara B Kirkweg, The
Effects of Music on Memory, 2006; M H Thaut, D A Peterson & G
C McIntosh, Temporal
Entrainment of Cognitive Functions: musical mnemonics induce brain plasticity
and oscillatory synchrony in neural networks underlying memory,
2005). Beyond Beethoen's Ode to Joy, what is possible in this respect
to encode mnemonically the insights of an Earth Charter, a Global Ethic or
an EU Constitution?
- Clio (history): The role of history in sustaining
collective intent is exemplified by the much-cited phrase regarding failure
to learn from history: "Those who cannot remember the
past are condemned to repeat it" (George Santayana, Life of
Reason,
1905). Without a sense of history there can be no sustained collective learning.
History provides an understanding of why collective intent has been embodied
in declarations and constitutions in a particular way. Music may well be
powerfully inspired by historical events important to remembrance of cultural
identity (as with the use of the
Lambeg drum in Northern
Ireland). A journal, History
and Memory (Institute for the Study
of Historical Consciousness), explores the manifold ways in which the past
shapes the present and is shaped by present perceptions. How should the
lessons of history be configured and presented in support of declarations
of collective intent in response to the challenges of the future?
- Erato (lyrics and love poetry): The role of lyrics
in song is evident in protest and revolutionary songs as well as in those
in celebration, and remembrance, of the qualities of people and relationships.
Lyrics are a common feature of memory aids. How to elicit the lyrics in support of any collective understanding of future action? What are the lyrics supportive of sustainable development and paradigm change?
- Melopmeme (tragedy): Any tragedy, dramatically
presented, offers an extremely powerful means of drawing attention to dimensions
of life that may be readily (even preferably) forgotten. It links memories
of sufferings in the past to the potential of sufferings in the future. In
so doing it gives a dimensional sense of depth. Powerful collective examples
are provided by the many massacres and genocidal
initiatives (eg the Holocaust). On an individual level examples
include cases of premature death, broken relationships, betrayal, etc. Tragedy
may be intimately related to traumatic memories and therefore a focus of
psychotherapy. How to express the tragic consequences of inaction, or
inappropriate action, to help focus declarations of collective intent for
the future?
- Polyhymnia (sacred poetry): The importance to
collective memory of sacred poetry is exemplified by the Rg
Veda as a collection of
Vedic Sanskrit hymns. Typically such poetry seeks to provide a sense, or
memory, of both a higher dimensionality to life and a subtler, or higher,
form of law and order (cf Antonio De Nicolas, Meditations
through the Rg Veda: four-dimensional man, 1976/2003). What
are the subtler dimensions that need to be appropriately expressed as a guide
to future constitutions? How to move beyond simplistic references to particular
understandings of spiritual dimensions and to give recognition to other forms
of subtlety? What does sacralization then mean and how can poetry assist
in communicating the integrity it implies? (cf Poetry-making
and Policy-making, 1993; Sacralization
of Hyperlink Geometry, 1997)
- Terpsichore (dancing and
choral song): The patterns
of dance, especially traditional folk dances, provide a powerful means for
remembering and preserving cultural identity. In the form of sacred dances
they constitute a language in their own right which has long been used to
exemplify and celebrate collective intent. The kinesthetic sense allows people
to feel internally the movements of their muscles, joints and tendons.
Kinesthetic memory (or muscle memory) is essential for the memorization
of a musical score [more]
or the routines of a dance, namely remembering all the movements, gestures
and physical sensations needed. Such kinesthetic memory therefore supports
the semantic content that ritual and other dances may be intended to represent
-- whether in sacred temple dances or in some indigenous cultures (such
as amongst the Aborigenes of Australia). Given the effort to give expression
to Europe through choral song in the Ode to Joy, how should Europe be danced?
How should a Global Ethic be danced? What is to be learnt from sacred
dances of the past?
- Thalia (comedy): Through whatever vehicle, readily
remembered humour provides a powerful means of creatively bringing together
the seemingly disparate in ways that offer new insight essential to the
vitality of any culture and its ability to respond to incongruity -- notably
that resulting from inadequacies in the law (cf Humour
and Play-Fullness: essential integrative processes in governance, religion
and transdisciplinarity, 2005). Through humorously juxtaposing
and reframing inequities, it provides a catalyst for nonviolent receptivity
to change. Its playful quality may sustain and give credibility to processes
of change (cf Playfully
Changing the Prevailing Climate of Opinion: climate change as focal metaphor
of effective global governance, 2005). What
comedy and humour would creatively sustain insight into the potentials of
any collective intent otherwise expressed more seriously? (cf Victor S.M. de Guinzbourg. Wit and Wisdom
of the United Nations: proverbs and apothegms on diplomacy, 1961)
- Urania (astronomy): The configuration and movement
of heavenly bodies in relation to the Earth has traditionally provided one
of the most powerful mnemonic device for means of remembering and ordering
relationships over time, whether it be the daily rhythms of life, monthly
cycles, annual cycles relating to agriculture, or the longer-term rhythms
traditionally considered so vital to a sense of place in the cosmos (cf Engaging
Macrohistory through the Present Moment, 2004). Would the values
and clauses of key legislation be more widely (if not universally) comprehended
by associating them visually with stories linked to particular configurations
of stars and planets -- as was so effectively done for oral cultures of the
past? What might the stars on the flag of Europe signify?
Of particular interest, given the written text mode preferred for modern declarations
and constitutions, is the absence of prose from the above schema. Whilst the
above schema may be seen as a limitation of the oral tradition (Michael
E.Hobart and Zachary S. Schiffman, Orality
and the Problem of Memory, 1998),
it is vital to recall the extent to which functional illiteracy and preferences
for non-text media determine contemporary collective behaviour and the manner
in which memory is sustained. In a sense the oral culture remains of far more
importance than those preferring text modes would care to admit.
Distinctions relevant to technical considerations
In arguing for singable articulations of strategic significance, it is vital
to distinguish (as in the table below) the extremes to which reference may
be made.
| Styles of knowledge
communication (rough and tentative) |
| . |
"Left hemisphere" ("analytic") |
"Right hemisphere" ("integrative") |
"operational"
engaged |
(a) praxis,
demonstration,
work chants, battle songs
company songs |
(d) embodiment of conceptual relationships
in song; archetypal engagement; sacred music; healing music, deep song |
"descriptive"
detached |
(c) systems dynamics,
mapping |
(b) evocative song,
opera and
educational multi-media |
A far more detailed method of distinguishing preferred modes of knowledge
communication is required. The table serves usefully to distinguish the essentially
unsingable (c) from the songs characteristic of (b) -- on the understanding
that particular approaches may lie closer or further away from the intersection
of the implied axes distinguishing the coloured quadrants.
As an example, in a survey of different educational approaches to systems
thinking, Günther
Ossimitz (The
Development of Systems Thinking Skills Using System Dynamics Modeling Tools, 1997)
notes that the system view of ecologists is often more "qualitative"
than the system dynamics view of system. He gives as an example of the latter
Frederic Vester (Unsere Welt - ein vernetztes System, 1984/2002)
and his game Ökolopoly (available both as a board
game and as a computer
game). Radermacher's songs reflect this emphasis, as do AtKisson's.
The challenge is to explore the forms of integration between (a), (b)
and (c) -- namely the emergence of (d) as a cognitive "marriage" enabling a new form
of creative operacy (using Edward de Bono's term). What might be understood by "intelligent songs"? (cf Christopher Chase. Playing by Nature's Paradigm: systems science and the
Grateful Dead, 1997). What characterizes and distinguishes the composition of songs that enable so-called paradigm shifts? How are such distinctions to be realted to the extensive work on music cognition? [resources]
One early example is the work promoted by the Cathars through the troubadours and trouvères, highly sophisticated verse-technicians, whose music and poetry combined in the service of the courtly ideal of love:
Modern European literature originated in Occitania in the early 12th century. It was started by hundreds of Troubadours (poet-musicians), who sang the praises of new values and in a new way. Their themes were courtly love, and concepts such as "convivencia" and "paratge" for which there is no modern counterpart in modern English or French. "convivencia" meant something more than conviviality and "paratge" meant something more than honour, courtesy, chivalry or gentility (though our concepts of honour, courtesy, chivalry and gentility all owe something to the concept of "paratge". They praised high ideals, promoting a spirit of equality based on common virtue and deprecating discrimination based on blood or wealth. They were responsible for a great flowering of creativity (The Troubadours).
A more recent example might be the role of the indigenous American art form
of country music, especially blackfaced minstrel singers (with widely popular
songs such as Zip Coon),
in the meaning and making of a culture (cf Damon W. Root, Hidden
Country,
Reasononline, October 2002).
How might song, and understanding
of the theory of harmony, act as a vehicle for the pattern of systemic insights
in the UN's Agenda 21,
for example? The work of Lukasz Michalec and David A Banks (Information
Systems Development Methodologies and all that Jazz, 2004) provides
interesting pointers of relevance to the elaboration and permanence of constitutions
relevant to sustainable development:
What really singles out jazz from other types of music is improvisation and jamming and these offer potentially useful views of IS development. Both jazz and systems development deal with problems that are unstructured, ambiguous, dynamic, socio-technical, innovative and unique. Both find and develop structures and solutions that did not exist before. Both can rely, to differing degrees, on ‘improvisation’, from Latin word 'improvisus', which means: not seen ahead of time... Both require a measure of creativity, insight and understanding of their respective audiences. Kao (1997) captures the process of ‘jamming’ in jazz, which is described as ‘... to take a theme, a question, a notation, a whim, an idea, pass it around, break it up, put it together, turn it over, run it backwards, fly with it as far as possible, out of sight, never retreating... but yes, here it comes homing in, changed, new, the essence, like nothing ever before.’ This suggests a more creative than strictly scientific approach, and one that accepts errors as part of the process of growth and development. There is also an underlying issue of free-wheeling ‘fun’, a notion that may not sit too comfortably with individuals who prefer to follow a strict set of guidelines, even though evidence suggests that slavish adherence to systems development methodologies often ends with a less that successful outcome
This goes beyond such insightful, but superficial, descriptions as:
To borrow from the thoughts of W.
Edwards Deming, who developed the theory
of continuous improvement through a systems approach, systems thinking is
like conducting a piece of music for an orchestra. While the flute solo may
be pleasant, the percussion powerful, the strings in perfect harmony, it
is the work of the conductor who pulls all the parts together into one beautiful
song. Only then do the musicians—and the audience members—get
the full and intended effect. (Claudia Mansfield Sutton, The
Leader's Role in Reaching Universal Success for All, The
School Administrator, January
2006)
As exercises in sonification (cf International Community for Auditory Display. Sonification Report: status
of the field and research agenda. Prepared for the National Science Foundation, 1999), it would be an interesting challenge
to determine whether and how:
- creative
music could be composed and publicly evaluated to articulate the values,
organization and systemic feedback loops vital to the sustainability of any "concert
of democracies" -- beyond the limitations of the Ode to Joy.
- parsing software could be used to associate standard phrases about
values or other issues, in political or other discourse, with patterns of
notes and melodies such as to convert speech into memorable sound sequences
(somewhat analogous to advertising jingles). This could serve as a means
of packing and compressing discourse into more compact patterns. Can a legal
text -- a constitution -- be converted via appropriate algorithms into a
musical representation, encoding the issues and respectful of the structural
relationship between them? What then of the corpus of EU directives?
- given the technical possibilities of transposition
of key within music,
what alternative representations might be obtained in response to the musical
tastes of different audiences, whilst retaining a degree of invariance?
- complex systems diagrams could be mapped onto comprehensible
soundscapes using music and song (whether as a substitute or adjunct), notably in the case of metabolic pathway diagrams and complex global models [Note the generic nature of this challenge which is applicable to other patterns, such as lace, knitting and carpet designs]
- given the well-recognized role of games in sustaining patterns of learning
over centuries, there is a case for exploring the intersections and
complementarities between a singable constitution and one that involves a
degree of play, as in traditional singing games. Of greater
interest is the possibility that collective singing has some dimensions that
resemble multiplayer gaming, notably as now proposed for military
education (cf Curtis J. Bonk and Vanessa P. Dennen, Massive
Multiplayer Online Gaming: a research framework for military training and
education, 2005). Singable gaming may prove to be the key to education
for sustainable development.
Aside from new possibilities, such exercises would offer a means of access
to these patterns for the blind -- who may bring greater insight to ways of
making them even more comprehensible. Classical patterns typical of complex
carpet, lace and chainmail designs,
may give a new sense of how the different "voices" can be fruitfully
interwoven in a larger song as an appropriate vehicle for governance in the
future (cf Metaphors
as Transdisciplinary Vehicles of the Future, 1991) . Curiously the
presentation of any metabolic pathways chart, and especially its systemic significance
for life -- recalls the myth of the "magic
carpet". The isomorphic pattern for the governance of sustainable development
is the "magic" required for the 21st century.
A vital question in relation to the above is the mix of disciplines relevant to the challenge. The contribution of bodies such as the European Society for the Cognitive Sciences of Music (ESCOM) is particularly relevant, especially in the light of their recognition of the interdisciplinary nature of any such challenge (see introduction to Conference on Interdisciplinary Musicology, 2004).
Organizational implementation
There is clearly a need to clarify the many dimensions and options of such
a possibility, preferably in an appropriately documented conference. This might
be done through an electronic forum. Some of the issues relating to such a
preparatory event have been explored with respect to a conference on poetry-making
and policy-making (Poetry-making
and Policy-making: Proposal for an exploratory international conference,
1993).
A challenging question is why there is such a difference in content and form
between an anthem that is designed for widespread popular use in celebration
of the essential values of a country (or a region) and a constitution -- the
latter being designed to detail the rights, responsibilities
and processes of a country in terms of those values. An anthem is typically
inadequate to the extent that it needs a constitution to ground the sentiments
it expresses in legally binding text. A constitution is typically inadequate
to the extent that its content has to be made palatable and comprehensible
through communication tools that do not distort the checks and balances of
its structure -- or severely diminish its credibility as an integrative device.
The fact that the two are elaborated through quite distinct institutional agendas
is a mark of institutional schizophrenia with highly unhealthy
implications for the culture in question. Both are presented as symbolically
important to the culture, but the investment in the intelligent "design" of
each is totally different -- with the anthem readily evaluated as a cynical
token to gull the masses. Ironically the constitution may also be judged in
this way.
There has been very little effort to explore the representation
of complex systems through music and song. However, ironically, there have
been many studies using systems methodology to explore and represent the often
problematic dynamics of the music industry. An early inspiration was the work
of Jacques Attali (Noise:
the political economy of music, 1977/1985). Such studies include:
Patrik Wikstrom (The
Enemy of Music: Modeling the Behavior of a Cultural Industry in Crisis, International
Journal on Media Management, Vol. 7, 2005, 1&2, pp
65-74: Dominc Power (ed), Behind
The Music Profiting from Sound: a systems approach to the dynamics of the Nordic
music industry, 2003; The
Cultural Dynamics Map: exploring the arts ecosystem in the United States,
2005).
Such studies point to the need to position any initiative within a complex
socio-political context. Various approaches might be considered to elicite
and disseminate an appropriate song:
- an international jury-based competition, as with major architectural/design
and music competitions. This would be the simplest to organize and the easiest
to finance. Insights could be obtained from a range of regular jury-based
initiatives (eg the Nobel Prize, etc). A variant might borrow from responses
to calls for proposals, as practiced by the European Commission, in which
submitted proposals would be evaluated by a jury of experts prior to according
funds for execution of the selected work.
- elicited as one of the categories of submission to
awards, such as the World
Peace Film and Music Award on the occasion of the World
Peace Film and Music Festival, organized by the World
Movement for Global Democracy (Lucknow, 2006)
- given the role of the European
Union Choir, and its long-term relationship with the
European Commission, it
might be expected that its concerns would include the challenge of giving
a choral rendering of the proposed European Constitution in song form. A
similar argument might be made in the case of the European
Federation of Youth Choirs (Europa Cantat), the Union
of Jeunesses Musicales of Europe, and even the Chorale du Conseil de
l’Europe. The European
Anthem has been jointly adopted by the
Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and by EU heads of State
and government.
- as with choirs, there are a number of orchestras associated with the European
Community with, in principle, similar roles in promoting a European vision:
European Community Chamber Orchestra, European Community Jazz Orchestra,
European Community Youth Orchestra, European Community Baroque Orchestra,
European Union Youth Wind Orchestra. These too might be expected to address
the challenge of a meaningful orchestral rendering of the proposed EU Constitution
- some groups have as their specific objective the use of music
to promote social harmony, however that is understood, for example: Harping
for Harmony Foundation. The Earth
and Spirit Songbook is resource
for educators and song leaders includes educational songs
of ecology, world humanity and peace.
- the cultural role over the centuries of the Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru (Eisteddfod of Wales) in gathering together poets and musicians. An International Eisteddfod is held annually in Llangollen (since 1947). Choirs, singing groups, folk dancers and other groups attend from all over the world, sharing their national folk traditions in one of the world's great festivals of the arts. It has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
- a
variant of the annual Eurovision Song Contest in which a popular
vote is
organized electronically across Europe in response to a televised performance
of competitors pre-selected from each country. Institutionally it is possible
that this could be organized as an extension of the existing event, much
as the Paralympic
Games are organized following the Olympic
Games by the International
Paralympic Committee
- an open source musical equivalent to the Wikipedia process through
which the parts of a song are discussed and formulated for further discussion,
but without closure. Constraints may be imposed to prevent abuse. Relevant
to this approach is the Musipedia:
the open music encyclopedia [more].
Here the concept is of an evolving song in which work is constantly being
done as a collaborative effort on the parts and their relationship to each
other -- allowing the song to be sung at any time as a "work in progress".
This approach could suggest a new interpretation of "com-position".
It could also be related to the possibility of widespread downloading of
current versions or segments as MP3 files. This possibility is explored in
more detail in Annex 1 (Participative
Development Process for Singable Declarations: Applying the Wikipedia-Wikimedia-WikiMusic concept
to constitutions,
2006)
- a challenge to the legal community to use their skills to go beyond the
initiatives of the many groups of "singing lawyers", such as that of Morrison
and Foerster (MoFo), a copyright specialising law firm with over 1,000
attorneys and 18 offices worldwide.
Their website offers a song which musically tells the
story of the firm's practice areas and approaches to representing clients.
An older group is The Courthouse
Steps --
singing attorneys who poke fun at national and local events.
- the various initiatives in the USA to "sing the
constitution",
notably that of Sue Dickson (Song
of America’s Freedoms) including the Preamble
Song,
and the What is the Constitution? song; there also exists The
Constitution Song (distributed by the ACLU) and various sung versions
of the
Declaration of Independence (Barbara
Speicher, We
The People) that highlight the articles in the Bill
of Rights. Additionally, the National Association for Music Education
has a National Anthem
Project. In
South Africa, Jennifer Jones sang
the constitution song
One Law for One Nation in a live global telecast from the Houses
of Parliament in 1996
- the previous initiative forms part of a broader effort to produce "educational
songbooks". A range of such politically-relevant songs and related educational
materials is provided in the USA on the website of Songs
for Teaching: Using Music to Promote Learning (notably on Social
Studies and American Government and Presidents
of the USA), including In
the Constitution and The
Gettysburg Address.
- in addition to the initiatives associated with the previous possibilities,
in the USA there is widespread interest in a range of "Declaration
Songs" (possibly with video), whether with a political, social, religious
or romantic focus. These
include America
Awake (The Federal Reserve Bank Song) sung
by Declaration2 in support of a book The
Second Declaration of Independence
- an elaboration of the "complaints
choir" format initiated by the artists Telervo-Kalleinen and
Oliver Kochta-Kalleinen who elicits public complaints about life and then
set them to music and song. The most successfully rated is the Complaints
Choir of Helsinki [more more].
Many such choirs are linked through the website Complaints
Choirs Worldwide. These can be considered a new variant on the long
tradition of protest
songs highlighting perceived
problems in society -- such as injustice, racial
discrimination, war, globalization, inflation, and social
inequalities. Of particular interest is the approach taken by the Chorus
of Women founded in Canberra, initially to sing Lament (specially
composed by Glenda Cloughley and Judy Clingan) to express
the grief of the women in Australia at the inevitable suffering, destruction
and loss of life that had to result from the West's intervention in Iraq
in 2003. The song was first sung by 150 women in the foyer of Parliament
House, just hours before the Prime Minister announced Australia's participation
in the invasion. Lament has since been sung around the world [more],
notably in association with the witnessing process of the Women
in Black that originated with protest against apartheid. The group
has produced a CD [songs
and lyrics]; subsequent songs have notably focused on climate
change. Protest songs are typically, but not necessarily, associated with
folk music.
- in a related artistic tradition Mieskuoro
Huutajat (Men's Choir
The Shouters) was formed in 1987 in Oulu, Finland, by a group of young men.
The idea was to dress some 20 men in
black suits, white shirts and black rubber ties, and train them to shout
some of the most beloved songs in the Finnish song heritage including
basic patriotic songs. The repertoire
has been expanded to include worker's songs, national
anthems (of a number of countries) and quotes from Finnish laws and international
treaties. --including the European Union's Amsterdam
Treaty,
with shouted texts from that document [video].
The group now
tours widely (Norway,
Sweden, Estonia, Russia, Denmark, Iceland, England, Wales, Netherlands, Belgium,
Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, France, Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary,
Serbia-Montenegro, Portugal, Russia, USA, Canada and Japan).
- a dancehall collective called Fire
Base Crew, have set up a breakaway
republic, the Ghetto Republic of Uganja, in one of the slums in Uganda's
capital, Kampala.
The republic has a full cabinet of appointed members: Bobi Wine (who is
the leader of the crew) is the president, the vice president is an artist
called Buchaman, they also have a prime minister, a defence minister, a
minister for disaster preparedness, a minister of agriculture (whose crop
of choice, unsurprisingly, is cannabis) and many more.
As reported by
John McDonnell (Scene and heard: Ugandan dancehall, Guardian
Music Blog, 5 January 2009), the whole concept may appear trivial,
but these musicians have much more influence on local people than politicians
could ever wish for.
- political parties and other
political movements may adopt a song or anthem to represent their beliefs
and principles. Such political
party songs may be sung or performed at party conferences, notably in
the UK. There is also a long tradition of revolutionary
songs. These are political songs that advocate or
praise revolutions. They are used to boost morale, as well as for political
propaganda or agitation. Examples include La
Marseillaise and
The Internationale.
Many protest songs can be considered revolutionary. Such songs, designed
for rapid dissemination, raise the question why "post-revolutionary" and
"post-protest" songs are not developed in response to contemporary
challenges and the implementation of appropriate strategic responses.
- organizations and corporations may also adopt songs to represent their
beliefs and principles. As with poltical party songs, these are used to
boost morale. Attention was
long focused on the use of company songs in Japan (cf Norihiko Suzuki, Workers'
perceptions of a Japanese company's song, Asia Pacific Journal
of Management,
2, 1985, May). The bonds between firms and their workers were reinforced
by rituals that included singing the company song, which was supposed to
express shafu (company
spirit) [more]. IBM
has also been notable for early cultivation of a company song Ever
Onward. Greenpeace (Shell:
Worst Corporate Song. Ever, 2006 [more])
has reported on the use by energy companies of corporate songs to greenwash
their environmental agendas. As promotional and motivational devices, skill
in the design of corporate songs is a focus of specialists (cf Another
way to drive your employees slowly insane: have a corporate song,
adfreak.com. May 2006)
- military groups in many countries participate in collective sports events
through the International Military
Sports Council. Military choirs also meeet collectively and competitively,
typically to promote a nation’s patriotism, heroism and militarism.
Beyond their tradition of regimental songs, such groups could be challenged
to articulate songs
supportive of peacekeeping operations, notably engaging the hostile
parties through song.
- battle songs in military conflict to pscyhe up combatants and intimidate
the enemy have a long tradition. As a development of this, so-called fight
songs, or team songs, have emerged in both professional
and amateur sports around the world, notably those of educational instiutions
[sample list]. These
are a popular way for fans to encourage their team and to discourage their
competitors. They are however distinct from stadium
anthems,
used for similar purposes, in that they are usually written specifically
for the purposes of the team, whereas stadium anthems are not.
- the organization and constitution of a utopian country (Nutopia), sung
by John Lennon (Imagine,
1971) was the focus of one of the most highly rated songs. A science fiction
initiative of similar inspiration was undertaken by the poet Robert Graves
(Seven
Days in New Crete, 1949)
- the dissemination of songs by devices such as iPods has now been associated
in the USA with their use to disseminate basic constitutional texts [more]
- given the various initiatives to group "singing
politicians", it is possible
that these might adapt their repertoires in response to communicating legislative
proposals, especially where the interest of the yougher generation is a key
factor. Yelena Demchenko, initiated a project to allow
Russian politicians to reveal their
human qualities to the Russian population (Club
of singing politicians to appear in Russia, Pravda,
12 December 2004); it appears to have developed into a Singing Politicians
and Businessmen Club (Singing
Deputies and Businessmen Get Party Started,
St Petersburg Times, 4 July 2006) [more].
In the USA there has been a group of Singing
Senators [more] and a congressional rock and country band called the Second
Amendments
- given the degree of popular engagement evoked by interactive computer games,
and their importance to new approaches to comprehension (cf Playfully
Changing the Prevailing Climate of Opinion: Climate change as focal metaphor
of effective global governance, 2005; Humour
and Play-Fullness: Essential integrative processes in governance, religion
and transdisciplinarity, 2005), a variant
of the Serious Games Inititative,
with its annual summit, could be set up for the exploration of "serious
songs".
The games initiative is a project of the Woodrow
Wilson Center for International Scholars (Washington, D.C.) with the
goal of helping usher in a new series of policy education, exploration, and
management tools utilizing state of the art computer game designs, technologies,
and development skills. It also helps to organize and accelerate the adoption
of computer games for a variety of challenges facing the world today (see
Ben Sawyer, Serious games: improving policy through
game-based learning and simulation --
Executive
Summary, 2002 ;
Foresight
and Governance Project Explores "Serious Games").
In exploring such options consideration could be given to the weight to be
attached to the following -- and how they might be combined:
- solo singer versus group processes responding to the polyphonic
challenge of multiple voices, exemplifying the relationships between competing agendas
inherent in sustainable development and the possibilities of their harmonious
integration
- artistic/free expression, as is typical of international ice-skating competitions.
This would emphasize evocative song, for which there are now many examples.
Here the challenge is to embody deeper levels of meaning as with an understanding
of "deep song"
- technical skill, again as is typical of international ice-skating competitions.
Here the challenge is to embody complex systemic insights relevant to sustainable
development into the structure of the song using the full panoply of resources
of the theory of harmony. A further component would be creating a bridge
to legally significant texts.
- ritual celebration, as characterized by traditional ceremonies for
"singing the Earth" -- and competitively evident to some degree on the largest
scale in opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympic Games
Conclusion
Why should national legislation not be singable? Why should global strategies,
like Agenda 21,
not be singable? What is achieved by structuring policy
so that its complex interdependencies are memorable only to the few and meaningless
to those who depend on its viability? Should new resolutions of the
United Nations, or new directives of the European Union, by their musical form
-- as new leitmotivs? Downloadable as MP3 files?
It would
however be wise to remember who attracted the most popular support in the 2006 Eurovision
Song Concert --
and to endeavour to understand why. Failure to do so might simply provide a
musical metaphor for the "clash of civilizations" -- an archetypal "clash
of music" or a "clash of song", recalling the competing "war
songs" of
clashing cultures. Clarity in this respect is vital given the "democratic
deficit" and the fact that relatively few attend "concerts" of
classical form in democratic societies.
It is important to distinguish the use of songs "about"
institutional change -- whether in protest, in praise of enabling
agreements, or in celebration of the values they express
-- from their use to "bring about" such a change
of pattern, or inhibit it.
Can music "give form" to new patterns of social relationship --
as with the early spiritual aspiration of "sacred music" and the
belief in its inherent
power to "bring into being" the reality it represents? Does music offer ways
of integrating different timescales and cycles vital to the credibility of
sustainable development and recycling?
Music has played a major role in mobilizing troops for battle and intimidating
the enemy. It continues to be used for that purpose in modern armies. Is there
a case for exploring the use of music and song in support of peacekeeeping
and non-violent peace operations?
In addition to any minimal efforts at televised satellite debate between
representatives of the annual World Economic
Forum ("Davos") and of the annual
World Social Forum ("Porto
Alegre"), what might emerge from songs composed and
sung by each in response to the policy concerns of the other? Especially interesting would be the musical
challenge of interweaving the thematic and harmonic content of both -- notably
by integrating a "voice" representative of
the many people puzzled and unconvinced by both.
Might it be possible to both
honour and reframe the archetypal encounter between the Davos and Porto Alegre
"choruses" in the light of the understanding of the cultural significance
of the Maori
haka (so widely evident
at the start of rugby games with the All
Blacks of New Zealand) -- a musical encounter between
the "All Blacks of Davos" and the "All Greens of Porto Alegre"? Could
this be developed into politically significant encounters between opposing
political parties based on their political songs -- enabling the articulation
and expression of new forms of national harmony?
Of particular interest is the extent to which music and
song should reinforce legal patterns formulated in the past as opposed to responding
to the inspiration and collective intent of the moment -- in the light of new
recognition of the nature of an emergent future. To what extent should the
music and lyrics "look
back"
rather than "look forward", and to what extent can they provide a
vital bridge between the two? Can the intent of declarations of the past now
be better excpressed? Can the possibilities of institutional
reform (as with
the United Natuions and the European Union) be articulated through music and
song for wider comprehension?
The challenge
is to encourage the use of song and music to render credible new patterns of
relationship worldwide -- imagining a harmonic expression of a "NewWorld Order". Can
the complex harmonies of music "bring into being" new patterns
of cooperative relationship responsive to the challenge of the times? What
resources have been devoted to this possibility?
What is the song through which the many global stakeholders are
to be collectively empowered by polyphonic singing of their respective parts?
As Mozart explains in Amadeus regarding his opera Marriage of
Figaro:
In a play if more than one person speaks at the same time it is noise.
One can’t understand a word. But with Opera, with music… with
music, you can have 20 individuals talking at the same time and it’s
not noise -- it’s
a perfect harmony!
How is such music to be composed -- or improvised -- and how is any keynote
to be sung?
Although many songs have been written about the United Nations or on related themes, there is no official anthem or hymn for the Organization. One such song, or hymn, was written and performed at the United Nations on 24 October 1971, on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the United Nations (United Nations: Hymn to the United Nations words by W.H. Auden; music by Pablo Casals, 1971)
***
An Earth Song was produced by Michael Jackson in 1995 [lyrics]. In the music video it outlines how the Earth is being destroyed by humans, and it alludes to environmental and poverty issues in the world. The single sold over three million copies worldwide. There is also a heavy metal song named Gaia produced by Devin Townsend.
***
The Galaxy Song by Eric Idle is an upbeat and somewhat nihilstic song from the movie Monty Python's The Meaning of Life, later released on the album Monty Python Sings. The lyrics include a number of scientific theories about the creation of the Universe, as well as a small number of astronomical facts, many of which are surprisingly accurate (Paul Kohlmiller, A study of the Galaxy Song by Eric Idle, 2003) [song]. |
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