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Content - The Basics of Change in Human Systems |
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Over 60 years ago social psychologist Kurt Lewin laid down the foundations for understanding and influencing change in human systems4. The contemporary literature on change proliferates with myriad of models, methods and techniques to be used – many prescribing “how to” recipes for change in organisations and communities5. Yet, most of them are still based on Lewin’s theoretical framework. The strength of his framework lies in a capacity to help us focus on the right kind of variables that need to be conceptualised in order to understand and influence change – i.e. the “things” we need to look at: 1) the force-field; 2) change as a process with three phases and 3) the role of tension.
1. The Force-Field
A field is a human system: it can be an individual person (e.g. your best friend); a group (e.g. a school class, a football team, the staff of a project); an agency (e.g. a Caritas agency, a local NGO); or a larger social entity (the community of a given village/city, population in a region/State or a given identity group).
Inside the field – i.e. inside the system – Driving Forces (DFs) interact with Restraining Forces (RFs). These forces are essentially psychological phenomena: driving forces are the motivations, attitudes and behaviours that stimulate movement toward a desired goal; restraining forces resist change trying to maintain the status quo. DFs and RFs are likely to have different strengths and directions and the system’s status is a result of their interaction. In other words, DFs push for change and RFs resist it.
For example: say you have an addiction to tobacco and would like to give up smoking. Your DFs are all those forces that “push” you to give up smoking (e.g. your doctor has told you; you know it is better for your health; your partner does not like it; it is a considerable expense for the family budget). RFs are the forces that prevent you from changing (e.g. you can’t have a beer with friends without a cigarette; the cigarette is part of “your identity”; you like smoking; and why giving up smoking when your city is already so polluted?). If DFs are stronger than RFs you will give up, otherwise you will keep on smoking.
If restraining forces are equal to driving forces the system is in equilibrium (RFs=DFs). Actually, Kurt Lewin speaks of a quasi-stationary equilibrium. Why “quasi” and not just “stationary”? Because all systems undergo natural evolutionary changes, but these are different from planned and managed social changes. Natural evolutionary changes are the continuous learning processes that all the different parts of a system undergo to adapt to different environmental conditions. These evolutionary changes are not necessarily towards progress, they might also be pejorative6. From the system’s point of view, “natural evolution is not necessarily progressive or benign.”7
For instance: a community in conflict with a neighbouring village might progressively come to the use of force and kill others as a result of its adaptation to the environment – but this should not necessarily be considered as progress as it might lead to retaliation, loss of human lives and the destruction of property and other negative consequences. This example might look trivial, but how many times have we seen communities clashing and attempting to destroy each other with great reciprocal losses as a result? How often have we experienced problems “evolving” into destructive conflict – into war?
A quasi-stationary equilibrium is “comparable [to the state] of a river which flows with a given velocity in a given direction during a certain time interval. A social change is comparable to a change in the velocity or direction of that river”8.
What matters for us is to notice that for the system to change Driving Forces must become relatively stronger than Restraining Forces.
Questions we should ask (ourselves) when we engage with a system to build peace:
2. The three phases
Successful change in human systems has three aspects9 - or phases:
These three phases are sequential: for change to take place a system will first unfreeze from the current equilibrium, then move to a new equilibrium and then refreeze in it.
For example, let us try to imagine a project working on “tolerance building” in Kosovo after the 1998-99 war. The project works in ethnically cleansed communities: after the war the Serb population fled from many areas, with the exception of a few isolated enclaves within Kosovo. Years after the war, IDPs and refugees are planning to return to their homes and are supported to do so by international institutions and NGOs. But the Albanian communities have made it clear that “Serbs are not welcome” and they will do whatever they deem necessary to prevent them from returning. Clearly that could mean more violence. The international military force is ready to display whatever force is needed to protect repatriated civilians, even to the extent of having rural villages crossed with barbed wire and protected by heavy military presence for many years to come.
Let us try to see this situation from a change perspective, focusing only on the Albanian community - and simplifying, of course. The Albanian majority in communities where repatriation of Serbs is planned is “frozen” in its position: it does not want Serbs to come back and is ready for violence if that happens. This system is in a quasi-stationary equilibrium: resistance is equal or stronger than forces towards change. What does it take to help the system unfreeze? DFs have to become relatively stronger that RFs. What are DFs and RFs here? What prevents the system from changing?
From this perspective we can see that “providing more military protection” is not an answer, at least not the only answer. It only aims to prevent or contain violent actions, but it does not tackle the DFs and RFs.
Serb IDPs and refugees will be able to live in these communities only if this human system changes, that is, if Albanian communities unfreeze from their equilibrium and develop a motivation to change. Once that happens, this system can move to a new equilibrium where Albanians and Serbs accept that they must live together in the community and that the new situation will need to stabilise; it will need processes that prevent it from returning back to its original equilibrium.
For us, the question then becomes, how can we influence this system to change? More generally, the questions one should ask when engaging in peace building with a system:
3. Tension
For change to take place Driving Forces must be relatively stronger than Restraining Forces. When that happens the system can unfreeze and start changing. When DFs > RFs a tension is created. This is the fundamental ingredient for unfreezing:
The concept of tension can also be referred to as dissonance; it is an inherent characteristic of every conflict and the essential element for an individual's or social system’s development. Without tension there cannot be change and improvement. Tension is the essential element in a system’s capacity to grow and develop.
But tension doesn’t feel good. That is why systems may just try to avoid tension and maintain the status quo – even at the very expense of their own survival. A pattern of avoidance can become destructive for the system: for instance, when organisations promote executives based on their capacity to preserve the status quo and clamp down on forces promoting change, they fail to adapt to a changing environment. We also see communities who choose leaders that don’t see that their societies are changing and instead these leaders promote agendas inspired on conservation of traditional ways and values – “our way of living”. An inability to deal with tension might lead to a system’s breakdown: like when an organisation fails to meet its objectives; or when a community becomes profoundly divided and impoverished by destructive and protracted conflict. An incapacity to deal with tension can be closely associated with failure.
Many authors focusing on organisational learning assert that a useful construct for understanding a system’s ability to handle tension is its tolerance for ambiguity, or the unknown11. This is the ability of a system to deal with tension without simply rejecting it, but making it productive. This quality is also associated with creativity and the capacity to deal constructively with conflict. But, again, tension doesn’t feel good, it raises questions, elicits doubts; it gives a sense of instability and it might raise the fear of loss – no wonder avoidance can become a pattern.
Tension is such a fundamental ingredient for change that modern studies and applications on organisational change have placed it at the centre of the stage. Beckard and Harris - who, up to date, have designed one of the most influential models for planning and influencing change12 - have revised Lewin’s framework as follows:
One can see that that this is just another way of presenting Lewin’s three phases using a different terminology. Instead of “unfreezing” we have “current state”, “transition” for “movement” and “desired future state” for “refreezing”. This is still conceptualised as a sequential process but – here is the difference - Beckhard and Harris suggest that for planning and managing change we need to start from the third phase, from the “desired future state”. First, we need to develop a vision of what people – the organisation, the system – want for the future, where and how they want to be. Then we can move back to the present and assess the “current state”.
First we decide where we want to go, then we see where we are now. The gap between the current state and the desired future state generates the necessary tension for change to happen. This is the gap between how we are and how we want to be - it makes unfreezing possible creating motivation to change13.
What matters for us is to notice that modern organisational learning and change theories consider tension – or dissonance – so important as to re-think the framework for change and learning around it.
For us,
A summary of the key ideas introduced in this lecture:
1. The Force-Field
A field is a human system: it can be an individual person (e.g. your best friend); a group (e.g. a school class, a football team, the staff of a project); an agency (e.g. a Caritas agency, a local NGO); or a larger social entity (the community of a given village/city, population in a region/State or a given identity group).
Inside the field – i.e. inside the system – Driving Forces (DFs) interact with Restraining Forces (RFs). These forces are essentially psychological phenomena: driving forces are the motivations, attitudes and behaviours that stimulate movement toward a desired goal; restraining forces resist change trying to maintain the status quo. DFs and RFs are likely to have different strengths and directions and the system’s status is a result of their interaction. In other words, DFs push for change and RFs resist it.
For example: say you have an addiction to tobacco and would like to give up smoking. Your DFs are all those forces that “push” you to give up smoking (e.g. your doctor has told you; you know it is better for your health; your partner does not like it; it is a considerable expense for the family budget). RFs are the forces that prevent you from changing (e.g. you can’t have a beer with friends without a cigarette; the cigarette is part of “your identity”; you like smoking; and why giving up smoking when your city is already so polluted?). If DFs are stronger than RFs you will give up, otherwise you will keep on smoking.
If restraining forces are equal to driving forces the system is in equilibrium (RFs=DFs). Actually, Kurt Lewin speaks of a quasi-stationary equilibrium. Why “quasi” and not just “stationary”? Because all systems undergo natural evolutionary changes, but these are different from planned and managed social changes. Natural evolutionary changes are the continuous learning processes that all the different parts of a system undergo to adapt to different environmental conditions. These evolutionary changes are not necessarily towards progress, they might also be pejorative6. From the system’s point of view, “natural evolution is not necessarily progressive or benign.”7
For instance: a community in conflict with a neighbouring village might progressively come to the use of force and kill others as a result of its adaptation to the environment – but this should not necessarily be considered as progress as it might lead to retaliation, loss of human lives and the destruction of property and other negative consequences. This example might look trivial, but how many times have we seen communities clashing and attempting to destroy each other with great reciprocal losses as a result? How often have we experienced problems “evolving” into destructive conflict – into war?
A quasi-stationary equilibrium is “comparable [to the state] of a river which flows with a given velocity in a given direction during a certain time interval. A social change is comparable to a change in the velocity or direction of that river”8.
What matters for us is to notice that for the system to change Driving Forces must become relatively stronger than Restraining Forces.
Questions we should ask (ourselves) when we engage with a system to build peace:
- What are the Driving and Restraining Forces at work in this system/situation?
- How is our peace building training likely to “play” with the forces at work in the system?
2. The three phases
Successful change in human systems has three aspects9 - or phases:
- Unfreezing. The system in a “quasi-stationary equilibrium” starts unfreezing from the solidity of its equilibrium and opens up to what is new. Motivation to change makes unfreezing possible. This phase has also been described as “developing awareness of the need for change”10 or creating the motivation to become different.
- Movement. The system moves to a new equilibrium: here actions are taken that change or move the system to a new level.
- Refreezing. This phase is composed of those processes that re-stabilise the system in its new equilibrium, contrasting the forces that push to let it return to the previous state or just continue to change. Refreezing stops movement and consolidates the new status.
These three phases are sequential: for change to take place a system will first unfreeze from the current equilibrium, then move to a new equilibrium and then refreeze in it.
Unfreezing Movement Refreezing
For example, let us try to imagine a project working on “tolerance building” in Kosovo after the 1998-99 war. The project works in ethnically cleansed communities: after the war the Serb population fled from many areas, with the exception of a few isolated enclaves within Kosovo. Years after the war, IDPs and refugees are planning to return to their homes and are supported to do so by international institutions and NGOs. But the Albanian communities have made it clear that “Serbs are not welcome” and they will do whatever they deem necessary to prevent them from returning. Clearly that could mean more violence. The international military force is ready to display whatever force is needed to protect repatriated civilians, even to the extent of having rural villages crossed with barbed wire and protected by heavy military presence for many years to come.
Let us try to see this situation from a change perspective, focusing only on the Albanian community - and simplifying, of course. The Albanian majority in communities where repatriation of Serbs is planned is “frozen” in its position: it does not want Serbs to come back and is ready for violence if that happens. This system is in a quasi-stationary equilibrium: resistance is equal or stronger than forces towards change. What does it take to help the system unfreeze? DFs have to become relatively stronger that RFs. What are DFs and RFs here? What prevents the system from changing?
From this perspective we can see that “providing more military protection” is not an answer, at least not the only answer. It only aims to prevent or contain violent actions, but it does not tackle the DFs and RFs.
Serb IDPs and refugees will be able to live in these communities only if this human system changes, that is, if Albanian communities unfreeze from their equilibrium and develop a motivation to change. Once that happens, this system can move to a new equilibrium where Albanians and Serbs accept that they must live together in the community and that the new situation will need to stabilise; it will need processes that prevent it from returning back to its original equilibrium.
For us, the question then becomes, how can we influence this system to change? More generally, the questions one should ask when engaging in peace building with a system:
- What do we need to do in order for our peace building efforts to support unfreezing, movement and refreezing?
- How do we support the development in people of the motivation to change?
- How do we influence the forces at work in the system we are working with?
- Who decides how to change?
3. Tension
For change to take place Driving Forces must be relatively stronger than Restraining Forces. When that happens the system can unfreeze and start changing. When DFs > RFs a tension is created. This is the fundamental ingredient for unfreezing:
Tension is the fuel that powers the beginning of the change process.
The concept of tension can also be referred to as dissonance; it is an inherent characteristic of every conflict and the essential element for an individual's or social system’s development. Without tension there cannot be change and improvement. Tension is the essential element in a system’s capacity to grow and develop.
But tension doesn’t feel good. That is why systems may just try to avoid tension and maintain the status quo – even at the very expense of their own survival. A pattern of avoidance can become destructive for the system: for instance, when organisations promote executives based on their capacity to preserve the status quo and clamp down on forces promoting change, they fail to adapt to a changing environment. We also see communities who choose leaders that don’t see that their societies are changing and instead these leaders promote agendas inspired on conservation of traditional ways and values – “our way of living”. An inability to deal with tension might lead to a system’s breakdown: like when an organisation fails to meet its objectives; or when a community becomes profoundly divided and impoverished by destructive and protracted conflict. An incapacity to deal with tension can be closely associated with failure.
Many authors focusing on organisational learning assert that a useful construct for understanding a system’s ability to handle tension is its tolerance for ambiguity, or the unknown11. This is the ability of a system to deal with tension without simply rejecting it, but making it productive. This quality is also associated with creativity and the capacity to deal constructively with conflict. But, again, tension doesn’t feel good, it raises questions, elicits doubts; it gives a sense of instability and it might raise the fear of loss – no wonder avoidance can become a pattern.
Tension is such a fundamental ingredient for change that modern studies and applications on organisational change have placed it at the centre of the stage. Beckard and Harris - who, up to date, have designed one of the most influential models for planning and influencing change12 - have revised Lewin’s framework as follows:
Current state Transition state Desired future state
One can see that that this is just another way of presenting Lewin’s three phases using a different terminology. Instead of “unfreezing” we have “current state”, “transition” for “movement” and “desired future state” for “refreezing”. This is still conceptualised as a sequential process but – here is the difference - Beckhard and Harris suggest that for planning and managing change we need to start from the third phase, from the “desired future state”. First, we need to develop a vision of what people – the organisation, the system – want for the future, where and how they want to be. Then we can move back to the present and assess the “current state”.
First we decide where we want to go, then we see where we are now. The gap between the current state and the desired future state generates the necessary tension for change to happen. This is the gap between how we are and how we want to be - it makes unfreezing possible creating motivation to change13.
What matters for us is to notice that modern organisational learning and change theories consider tension – or dissonance – so important as to re-think the framework for change and learning around it.
For us,
- What role has tension in our peace building efforts?
- How do we act to generate tension with the group/s we work with? What do we do to generate tension?
- What makes it possible for the system to accept tension without simply rejecting it?
A summary of the key ideas introduced in this lecture:
- A force field is the sum of all psychological phenomena (or forces) that act in reciprocal interdependence in a system;
- These forces can be divided in Driving Forces (pushing for change) and Restraining Forces (resisting it);
- The interaction of forces within the system produces a quasi-stationary equilibrium;
- Successful change in human systems has three aspects: Unfreezing Movement Refreezing;
- For change to take place Driving Forces must be relatively stronger than restraining forces – this makes unfreezing possible;
- When Driving Forces are relatively stronger then Restraining Forces a certain level of tension is created – this is the fuel that powers change.
1Hornby, A. S. (ed.), Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000 (6th ed.).
2Schein, E. H., “From Brainwashing to Organizational Therapy: A Conceptual and Empirical Journey in Search of “Systemic” Health and a General Model of Change Dynamics”, in Reflections, Vol. 6 Nos. 8-10, URL=< http://www.solonline.org/repository/item?item_id=8942618>.
3Social sciences have moved a long way since the time when conflict was considered a dysfunction of human relations. John Burton was among the thinkers who helped qualifying conflict as a natural aspect of human interaction, an intrinsic element of relations. See Burton, J., Conflict: Resolution and PreventionConflict: Human Needs Theory (vol. 2 of the Conflict Series), London: Macmillan, 1990. (vol. 1 of the Conflict Series), London: Macmillan, 1990; also from the same author see:
4Lewin, K., “Group Decision and Social Change”, in Maccoby, E. E., Newcomb, T., and Watson, G. (eds.), Readings in Social Psychology, Austin: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1947. Excerpts from this article are available at URL=<http://www.crossroad.to/Quotes/brainwashing/kurt-lewin-change.htm>. See also Lewin, K., Resolving social conflicts; selected papers on group dynamics. Gertrude W. Lewin (Ed.). New York: Harper & Row, 1948; and Lewin, K. Field theory in social science; selected theoretical papers. D. Cartwright (Ed.). New York: Harper & Row, 1951
5For an exhaustive view on contemporary models and techniques for change in organisations and communities see Holman, P., Devane, T. and Cady, S., The Change Handbook: The Definitive Resource on Today’s Best Methods for Engaging Whole Systems, San Francisco: Berret-Koehler, 2007.
6Schein, E. H., “Models and Tools for Stability and Change in Human Systems”, in Reflections, Vol. 4, No. 2, 2002, URL=< http://www.energy8.eu/images/systemchange.pdf>.
7Schein, E. H., Ibid., p. 1.
8Lewin, K., Ibid.
9Lewin, K., Ibid.; see also Marcus, E. C., “Change Processes and Conflict”, in Deutsch, M., Coleman, P. T. (eds.), The Handbook of Conflict Resolution: Theory and Practice, San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 2000.
10Lippit, R., Watson, J., Westerley, B., The Dynamics of Planned Change, Orlando: Harcourt Brace, 1958.
11Marcus, E. C., Ibid.
12Beckhard, R. & Harris, R., Organization transitions: Managing Complex Organisational Change. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1987.
13“Visioning” exercises that are used frequently in workshops, stem essentially from this rationale: creating a tension between the current state and the desired future state.
