International Social Science Journal (Chinese Edition)

No.2, 2020

The ecological civilisation and a theory of community

(Abstract)

David Korten

Narratives of humankind shape our future, and the mechanistic dualism of the dominant Western narrative is a flawed narrative. At the same time， the insights of ancient Chinese philosophers provide a potentially powerful basis for the humankind’s transition to a viable future grounded in a co-productive human relationship with nature. The Theory of the Firm and the ideology on which it rests must be replaced by a new theory - a Theory of the Community - grounded in ancient Chinese thought and suited to guiding the transformation of society’s defining institutions and practices of management to align with underlying vision and principle of the ecological civilisation. From the community of life theory premise, this article proposes three foundational organizing principles from three aspects: the defining value and unit of organization, governance structures and processes and resource flows. These principles serve the future of mankind in building an ecological civilisation society in the future. All have important implications for how we structure and manage the relationships by which we harvest and allocate limited ecological resources.