Seeds of Change - Heiner Benking's Blog - quergeist.info

'art in service': interrogating social practice - BERLIN special invitation

Fri, 3 Feb 2012 14:04:18 GMT

As a side event after the RADIUS OF ART symposium we have just finalized this Public Event on Friday next week in coop with the Open-Forum of PNW at the HomeBaseLAB in Berlin.

'art in service': interrogating social practice - INVITATION see also the (Anna-Lindh-Network) announcement.
with Todd Lester, our special guest on FRIDAY 10th in the evening in BERLIN. Todd is Executive Director for Global Arts Corps. - Facebook

Global Arts Corps' mission is to offer innovative strategies for communities in conflict to process the past in order to thrive in the future. The Corps brings together world-class artists from opposite sides of civil, religious, and racial conflict, who, together, create theatrical productions that tour the world's conflict zones to advance the cause of reconciliation.

See also THEATER WITHOUT BORDERS: and check-out Todds background:
TODD LESTER founded freeDimensional (fD) and Creative Resistance Fund (CRFund) which work with residencies in over 80 countries to host culture workers in dire situations. Currently, he serves on the boards of residencies in India, Germany, and Mexico and recently wrote desk studies for FREEMUSE/SIDA and Res Artis/Fonds BKVB on the residency sectors in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkey, West Africa, North Africa, Middle East, Central America and South America. This Winter, he is convening a workshop for the Heinrich Boell Stiftung on 'Conditions that put Artists in Danger' for its February 2012 Radius of Art conference and for TPAM Yokohama giving a keynote talk on residency and new forms of sharing in the wake of the 2011 earthquake in March.
He recently assumed the role of Executive Director for Global Arts Corps. Before that, he consulted for the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, Fonds BKVB, Lambent Foundation, Arts Collaboratory, and the Astraea Lesbian Justice Foundation. Todd holds a Masters of Public Administration from Rutgers University and is a graduate of the Refugee Studies Centre's Summer School in Forced Migration at Oxford University. Todd received the Peace Corps Fund Award for his work starting freeDimensional; was named 'Architect of the Future' by the Waldzell Institute in 2008; and serves as a Senior Fellow at the World Policy Institute where he is the focal point on issues of art and policy.

What to expect!?
We announced an open-format event - which means we are not sure what will happen ! Be prepared to be surprised you lear at every Open Space session.
We have a facilitator, Farah Lenser who has done some events before: http://farah-lenser.de/moderationen.html

Maybe see PLAN C of ietm (PDF) and check this link of PAN C in this blog
We do sometimes Anna-Lindh-Salons in Berlin and esewhere so maybe the setting is right for a salon style event, we will see: http://anna-lindh-salon.de/

To get deeper into the matter of Dialog and Participation, Deliberation, Encounters and event Multi-track Diplomacy I invite you to go to Backgroundpapers and visit the website: 21stCentury Agoga
more >

Pingo ergo sum - The Painting drops out of the Head

Wed, 1 Feb 2012 10:49:36 GMT

Please read and support.
www.pingo-ergo-sum.com
I just learned about Angela doing a very special project bridging arts and communication with very special needs and gifts.
Angela is a good friend and a very special artist working now on mental mobility and artistic expressions. Please see if you like the project, maybe even can can support it via StartNext !
Here you find a keynote of Angela in Turin: (Slides and video clips) and this is her new website:

Pingo ergo sum - The Picture out of my head NEW WEBSITE The paintings drop out of the head
Please check also the new StartNext project
see more at my Facebook account:

The Place of the Political in a Digital Mediaworld - 50 years DLF

Fri, 6 Jan 2012 21:25:16 GMT

50 years celebrations of public media: DEUTSCHLANDFUNK - The Place of the Political in a Digital Mediaworld

German Radio celebrates 50th anniverary, teaming up with the bpb soon celebrating its 60th. So a "seasoned" exercise with lots of "expertiose" around and with a very timely theme !! - The Place of the Political in a Digital Mediaworld

But, too bad, heavy storm over Germany and no way to get this morning early 6+ hours to Cologne. Instead I hope to get most out of the Podcasts and Radio deliveries, check the tweets, and instead of F2F link to some people later. So please excuse my "2nd hand reporting" this time - but I feel that not only the title is soo exciting, but the topic as this was dear to me already long ago, so here a little "expertise" to check from where I am speaking:

* 1994
WORLD BANK '94, John O'Connor: What is going on in ICT? about the New Media with WORLD BANKS John O'Connor looking into the INFORMATION COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY trends in 1993 ! Check out the mentioned "embryonic design" of the WORLD PRESS CENTER and my Knowledge Panorama Design: Panoramic Thinking and (Pointers to Possibilities
* 1996
New Spaces / NEW SPACE FOR CULTURE AND SOCIETY (NEW IDEAS IN SCIENCE AND ART Culture of Europe - Need for meta-paradigm/ (panoramic knowing and concertations)
100 years FID (International Federation for Information and Documentation): KNOWLEDGE ORGANIZATION: TOWARD THE 21st CENTURY - Concept and Context mapping: Towards Common Frames of Reference
* 1998
WORLD TELEVISION FORUM 1997 - Programming for People - From Cultural Rights to Cultural Responsibilities - Surviving Cyberculture's impact - what can be done!? Kofi Annan invited the media and civil society to the UN in NYC ....
* 2000
DIALOGUE AMONG CIVILIZATIONS, Volume II, Role of Culture in Dialogue among Civilizations, "Dialogue Toward Unity in Diversity" UNITY IN DIVERSITY, GLOBAL SCHOLARLY PUBLICATIONS with UN Kofi Annan again * virtual MMI Maastricht McLuhan Institute see also * United Nations (UN-AMR) 2008
* 2002
ISKO Granada: What do we need ? Where do we want to go ? - A Linguistic Turn ? , An Iconic Turn ? or a Pragmatic Spin ? - The construction and ethics of shared frames of references, in: Ethics in Knowledge Representation and Organization, in: Knowledge Representation and Organization for the 21stCentury: Integration of Knowledge across Boundaries" The Seventh International ISKO Conference, Granada, Spain, 10-13 July 2002,

* 2002 - 2012
see further down: Internet and Society - Open Government / 2.0 Plus Stammtisch 3.0 - Expertise Conferencing - Dropping Knowledge - ...

I could be weeping... Seeing it from today I feel: Nobody was in Charge (and typically is for larger topics), too few followed up and developed further what was there before the Internet so a lot was lost from ((not BC) but before BI (Before the Internet) so much was done in the mid 90ies from scratch, without "roots and wings" in mind, without a lot of available Sources, Concepts and Directions....!
So who is in charge now !? The People? in a Demosophia? or at Rio+20 ??
So can we respond to something we can not see or tough? Our Senses and reasoning is based on the tangible and "obvious", so what do we do with distant issues, issues which are intangible, virtual, or only distant so we can not check and compare with our "eperience"? Political Sciences call it the Problem of the levels or magnitudes, but they also have problems with other cultures, times, domains, sectors, ... So what can we do if we do not want to ignore what is political for us a local or global "community"? I can only invite to check: "GLOCAL" , see what we worked on in the Konrad Lorenz Institute Konrad Lorenz Institute , or this Interview for EuropesWorld? Maybe check for more later...

The matter of today is very close to me (so excuse emotions), not only the subject from yesterday about mindsets and mental models or the Internet and Society Institute so I felt alerted and make an extra day/night to cover the podcasts and TWITTER worlds as well. What I heard in the podium discussions so far was that much is "fiddling or crying in the dark" with too little Backgrounds, Ideas, Visions, Means and Approaches already there.....
At the podium they urge for example for a sorting by "relevance" but which cultures and receivers relevance?, who & where in space and time !?? They speak about the experienced living world want to arrange and classify (EIN-ORDNEN) and allot and assign (ZU-ORDNEN) without valid and transparent (embodied/concrete) order or schema ORDNUNG ! Speak PlastikWords, intangible, exchangeable, meaningless - lots of empty words without concrete ways, tools and ideas ! They speak about setting meaning - and I only think about the entry about Robert Jungks for NEW ENCYCLOPEDISTs and or DROPPING KNOWLEDGE "experiences" we had to make here in Berlin... Check it out in the links above and come back.

Tomorrow is another day ....
besides the ONLINE
I am presently here: SATURDAY 9.30 bis 10.30 Uhr Re-Think Journalism:
Politik und digitale Medien Keynote Tim Grieve, Chefredakteur von POLITICOpro, Washington Diskussion Tim Grieve im Gesprch mit Steve Herrmann, Editor, BBC News Interactive, London Arne Klempert, Fleishman-Hillard/ Wikimedia Foundation Paul Lewis, Special Projects Editor, The Guardian, London Moderation: Dr. Ralf Mller-Schmid, DRadio Wissen

the quality and interaction of panelists was great - a whole chapter to write - bt lets see how the day goes on, now there is SPEED DATING !

I receommend to follow the TWEETS ! and various websites !

http://dlf50.org/2012/01/fotos-zum-panel-postdemokratie/ - dlf50.org - dlf.de/50 - http://www.dradio.de/aktuell/1599517/ - http://wissen.dradio.de/50-jahre-deutschlandfunk-die-zukunft-des-radios.33.de.html?dram:article_id=14369 - check the discussion and podcasts !!
check: Audio-Livestream Programmablauf als PDF-Dokument zum Download at: check: Live-Stream and the BLOGS !!
the polytechnical Students promise to ahve the docu and Videos uploaded in the next few days....

unfortunately only 100 followers presently: dlf50konferenz
@dlf50conf Darmstadt & Kln
h_da-Studenten twittern rund um die @Deutschlandfunk-Konferenz. http://bitly.com/dlf50prog - tweets of h_da students about the conference #dlf50
http://www.dlf50.org

when you speak German and are bored check: WISSEN http://wissen.dradio.de/medienjournalismus-zwischen-propaganda-und-kompetenzmangel.126.de.html?dram:article_id=11655

___ STEINBRUCH: DRAFT ____

Politik und die Medien: Eine kritische Bestandsaufnahme
Internationale Konferenz zum 50. Jahrestag des Deutschlandfunk-Sendestarts
Der Fall Wulff zeigt: Digitale Medien bewegen sich mehr denn je zwischen aktueller Berichterstattung und journalistischer Relevanz. Der Deutschlandfunk und die Bundeszentrale fr politische Bildung veranstalten derzeit einen Kongress zum Thema.
DRadio Wissen Agenda
Sie knnen der Konferenz per Live-Stream folgen. In den Pausen bertragen wir das Programm des Deutschlandfunks.
Deutschlandradio Dokumente und Debatten

siehe auch:

Der Ort des Politischen in der digitalen Medienwelt http://www.dradio.de/dlf/sendungen/hintergrundpolitik/1646381/ PODCAST !
Chinas Mikroblogger

Das Internet ist zwar schon seit Jahren eine wichtige Plattform fr chinesische Regierungskritiker - doch erst seitdem Mikrobloggs wie Weibo zu einem Massenphnomen geworden sind, hat es massiv an Einfluss gewonnen. Doch auch die Regierung nutzt die Blogs inzwischen gezielt fr ihre Zwecke.

Hintergrund 06.01.2012

100 years Alfred Wegener - ways/means for integrating the "whole Elephant"

Thu, 5 Jan 2012 20:27:48 GMT

Friday Jan 6th, exactly 100 years ago Alfred Wegener broke those days scientific porcelain in Frankfurt by what we call today a paradigm shift, a view which basically changed the way to see the world (years later). In this case the view of what we consider Planet Earth. He did so by combining the knowledge from all fields and not getting stuck in the old fixed and narrow picture sciences. The name of his theory? Continental drift (Kontinentalverschiebung) proposing 40 years before its general acceptance that continents were slowly drifting around the Earth. If you consider how long it takes to reach the people revisit the story Al Gore tells in his film about the Inconvenient Truth that his teacher in the 60th was not ahead of the times.... Well there are many more "inconvenient truths" - not only these days...

I feel we will have to dig right there in our "house of science" this year. I can only recommend to check out also: Wilhelm Ripl in this blog last May who sees us focussing on selected compartment or limited fields of science when we do Climate Sciences, and this impulse for an Institute for Internet and Society where we were try (keeping in mind Humboldt and Ritter) to go beyond pigeonholing and fencing not only of living things, but ideas !
Cousteau remembered he never encountered walls in nature, but in the minds of some people. Proposed here are virtual grids and frames, think about a "meridian" or latitudes, something to find your way even in "vague" areas, think about data-noise and -"fog".

Wegener is for me an "example or raw-model", one who had to fight hard and was not giving in against all the "everybody knows" and tried a knew synthesis, which was pragmatic and helped to see "with new eyes" the obvious. He like Carl Ritter was an integrator of not only geosciences, but history (evolution and systems concepts) not concretely cast into science, but considered only as vague and "fluid" only to be approached by vitalism and such schools.
I recommend to visit also the father of Holism: Jan Christian Smut and with Rupert Ridl on WORLD VIEW COMPOSITIONS !! an activity in an all year summer school opening in the place and sense of Konrad Lorenz many new doors for science, evolution, systems thinking and understanding. Regarding Smuts: only last year I heard him being mentioned publicly by a member of the Royal Society, before we were blackmailed when including him in the Wholeness Seminar in the mid 90ies. Here: Holism - a good starting point. As you can see, times change, but too slowly and often only the words on the surface....

For the Alfred Wegener Foundation's President I did a poster exhibition
(see above 2 exhibition posters with the eco-cube in front) presenting the foundation and its future necessary quests, potentials, and challenges for not only geo-sciences but also sciences in general. Unfortunately again the chieftains did not seem to have read or seen a need a need to respond - again the usual procedure, ignore and not react....
Now 20 years later it is time, high time as we see the Problematique challenging us more exponentially every day.... and respond to what has been presented in the German Chancellery 22 years ago ! to step back and see at least one "whole elephant"((as we say around future search, systems and facilitation)), the shared map, grid or picture (commons) as the image for the scope, width and depth of the Challenges to Sciences and Politics (title) we prepared in a public scientific exhibition with the title GLOBAL CHANGE.

Maybe we were too early - or too radical these days - even pointing with a poster to the work of the UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS position in the center of the German political system in May 1990 !! (as you can imagine the poster did not make it long - given the power of our scientific and policy ivory towers!! and the times of Walls coming down and Chancellors busy with other things....)

What I mean with Global Commons, Common Frames of References, and a Global Covenant I have covered many times elsewhere, but also in this blog: (blow) and maybe see this about diversity of mindsets and how to go beyond labelling and pigeonholing in our thinking and reasoning. See Mindprints !

Udo Lindenberg - uns Udo... now in Berlin

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 00:00:13 GMT

Our Udo Lindenberg: Uns Udo, unser Udo...
In the HAMBURGER BAHNHOF. in Berlin last night. A Primadonna and Maestro - written from the perspective of a critical fan and contemporary "follower"...

Times pass bye - I had my kick last night in the curated exhibition !
Not again as yesteday and the day before one "leaving us" but Udo alife in retrospect - a person with shared tracks "on the road". Incredible. In the early 70ies he only rocked in Onkel P in Eppendorf....
He had no place for rehersal these days.... - A "nobody" ... Well I had a neighbour playing her Querflute (German transverse flute) in his band, and I was in charge of our AULA in our Students Home HAUS BAUHTTE. So no big deal to convince the Kuratorium....

All this flashed into my mind last night when revisiting UDO 40 years ago, or so - so long before PANKOW....

Later I globetrotted to check out the "New World" - and he continued on his track on stage with the Panik-Orchestra - he stayed "as is" very successful - I moved and changed globetrotting first places, later issues...

Udo - all too often was too stoned when I saw him - but so is life. We had more time in 2000 at EXPO 2000 in Hannover - and we sang some unsung songs ....

Today him feartured alife in an exhibition that is quite something.
Definitely: AFTER THE HORIZON - THERE IS ANOTHER DAY. Hinterm Horizont gehts weiter....

strange times those days - sooo much freedom we had those days - and so strange things we did when we were young, when the skies were more open and the ranges more free, as we innocently justed moved on...

Horst Eberhard Richter has passed away

Tue, 20 Dec 2011 15:41:49 GMT

I am sadened learning that Horst Eberhard Richter passed away yesterday, age 88. What a loss. A psychoanalyst who cared for not only the individual and groups, but the psychy of the societies and nations.
We have seen him only recently with full energy and spirit, fighting spirit for Humans, Justice, Health, and Peace at the recent IPPN meeting and now he is gone... Nobody talking and talking from the floor with such a vevre... With Bernard Lown and Horst Eberhard Richter I had the chance to meet the premier movers and spirits for Peace and Survival at IPPNW: International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War. See: http://www.ippnw.org/ and the Blog: http://www.ippnw.org/blogs.html

RECIPES FOR SURVIVAL - 30 years physicians & physicsts for Peace / against War
Presently revisting milestones from 30 years IPPNW. Gottstein and Horst-Eberhard Richter were a moment talking I strongly recommend to check the programme and website.

See also The Nuclear Free Future Award - IPPNW & 25 years Tschernobyl in 2011

Rushing now I only want to resvist the little hand-out I did on his request after a statement form the floor at his 80th birthday celebrations: Increasing the Horizon of Compassion & And Reducing the Scale and Degree of Suffering in the World - Den Horizont des Mitgefhls erweitern & Das Ma des Leidens in der Welt reduzieren

What a loss ! Sadened Heiner Benking

Diversity of mindsets and beyond boxes

Mon, 19 Dec 2011 02:07:53 GMT

I am thinking much about the posters we have in Germany in the streets. In the UN year of AntiDiscrimiation linking deep-rooted Monocultures and Fundamentalism.

The posters show that no human can be fitted into one single box and labeled, and then shelved away, with boxes closed and never inspected again. The important message for me is that not only living things and objects, but also concepts and ideas can not be easily labeled as even the words have different meaning depending on their context and the space between them !

I came last week from the Denkerei, a new, interesting, and "deep" place in Berlin which is focussing much on the same idea of going beyond "schools of thought" and their linear and dualistic approaches. More about this later! as I looked into the hirarchy of subjects in knowledge organisation how we word with trees and root conceptualizations, also quite the same mindset putting items into boxes or into lines. My thinking is conceptaulizing issues and thoughts in the fields or rizomes whcih can overlap and interact. more later - maybe start with "oversimplifications" and enjoy the picture, which show us humans being discriminated into boxes with labeling us by our sex, gender, age, belief, colour, ....

Václav Havel - left this place

Sun, 18 Dec 2011 17:36:02 GMT

Vclav Havel has left this world today ... He very dear to us, here I want to focus on his efforts with the Council of Europe in the Early 90ies, he was ill when we after years of preparation had this event, he continued but many ideas seem to have been lost: NEW IDEAS IN SCIENCE AND ART - A New Space for Culture and Society
We looked with his brother into the big picture of governace and civil society but it it sadening how little if anything we progresses after the wall came down...
Maybe someone is ready these days for this eulogy in view of governance and civil society and community building, the need to unite and look "beyond".
I hope you care to check a critical period into looking into the fabric that connects: the Longing for Unified Knowledge an essay by Vclav's brother Ivan Havels.

Maybe it is time and a good idea to celebrate the urge of the need to unite and bridge the incompatible... an original drive of responsibleesharing caring and taking responsible action beyond the individual urges ...

Omipotence or Impotence? The Drama of Climate-Research, -Politics, and -Actors

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 13:39:02 GMT

I am just comming from the Climate Lecture 2011. http://www.tu-berlin.de/climatelecture
After Sir Nicolas Stern Sir Nicholas Stern, Elinor Ostrom. , today with Achim Steiner (UNEP) quite an event.
More so when you see it with Jo Schellnhubers Lecture last Sunday in the Renaissance Theater with his title the Tragic Triumph. description. and the Foreign Office briefing of Diplomats towards Durban 2011 (COP-17) Pre-Durban: Climate Research and Climate Policies - Flickr Pictures:

In Geneva last month we have delivered messages not only to Ban Ki-moon, Christiana Figueres, and Achim Steiner and others at the GYC2011, maybe start here: and check the Youth recommendations from the GYC 2011:

Speakers' Corner - Falling Walls, Democracy, and Political Beauty

Wed, 9 Nov 2011 16:56:34 GMT

Toady we celebrate 12 years Berlins' Wall crumbling. check also FACEBOOK and the homepage of Falling Walls - Berlin Conference on Future Breakthroughs in Science and Society assembling an array of top scientists, politicians, movers, changers, and inbetweeners worldwide. Our Geman Government spoke of the 20 leading scientists to make a difference...

We have today also the Brandenburg Gate SPEAKERS CORNER a Speakers Corner.
One poster was: "We are the People. The power of the free speech".
It is organized by a group campaigning for "political beauty". POLITISCHE SCHNHEIT doing art event and political and cultural campaigns since some years in Berlin. The event was sponsored by GOOGLE. See picture show.

Key speakers where from the Parliament, Citizens, Elders, Religious and Academic groups, and the civil society. Most reknown is Gesine Schwan who was the candidate for the German Presidency of the Social Democratic Party and has founded the Humboldt-Viadrina School of Governance.
Here you can see some VIDEOs:

I "pitched" what I feel needs to be said about living democracy, empowering, co-creation and harnessing collective action. Trying for the first time to cover what for me connects dialog and descision cultures, voting and deliberations, empowerment and policy making, dialog, decision cultures and peace-making - in the requested 5 Minutes !! - without questions or chance to dig deeper where needed...

Maybe see also my barcamp pitch for the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society where I had some more time to go into OPEN GOVERNMENT, STAMMTISCH cultures, STRUCTURED DIALOGIC DESIGN and AXIOMS, voting and demagogy. More in this Blog entry:
as this lecture around Alexander von Humboldt and Carld Ritter and what that might mean for us today, maybe check the GLOBAL YOUTH CONFERENCE contribution where there was also some more time available.... check: http://benking.de/open-forum/GYC/GYC-2011-Autumn-Heiner-Benking-S.pdf

The issues there about shared meaning and actions are for the political discourse and culture very important. Please check this course book to be used in schools to have groups come to shared understandings on complex issues "A democratic approach to sutainable futures"
and a deeper look into the matter with "Harnessing the collective Wisdom of the People":. The Matter is not trivial and deserves highest attention and concern as a SWARM is very unreliable in complex, unprecedented, and dynamically changing situations. The hto just let people vote, even when they do not know about what they vote about is dangerous. We asked for informed, concerned, and responsible decisions by stakeholders and resposible risk-takers, so understanding the scope, scales, proportions and consequences, with space and time horizon! [more about context, frames, order and orientation] or see this "white paper": Which_Languages_and_Mindsets_for_Democracy.

Heiner Benking @ Berlin Speakers Corner

Just voting opens all possible doors to demagogy - not just media and visual demagogy and manipulation. I work and write a lot about this since years, but this article in our weekly ZEIT - ONLINE is a master-piece, highy recommended: Mainstream: Der Sog der Masse

After that we had a whole day this MAYOR EVENT about society, policy and technology with our Chancellor and the top 20 leading scientists of the world, our ministry / th organizers wrote so... FALLING WALLS !!.
FALLING WALLS WAS A MAJOR EVENT - WELL ORGANIZED AND GIGANTIC - pls. check the link above !

Both events make me recall what happened here in Berlin 2 years ago. I strongly invite you to check: NO WALLS. This we did not only around this gathering: THE 10TH SUMMIT OF NOBEL PEACE LAUREATES, BERLIN, 9-11 NOVEMBER 2009 - BREAKING DOWN WALLS AND BUILDING BRIDGES

And in parallel also around GOOGLE's claim to bridge old and new walls - explore some potentials, discrepancies, and challenges. I just remember our challengbe with UNESCO and GOOGEL at Frankfurt's book fair around introducing GOOGLE MAPS and what we cared about and around maps and literacy:

Two years ago we celebrated 10 year wall comming down ! Have a look - with leace laureats and google in the Hotel de Rom: The title is close to this years: WHAT DEMOCRACY - WHAT WALLS?

In closing,
here my favourite citation and poem about walls and borders.

"Borders? I have never seen one. But I have heard they exist in the minds of most people." Thor Heyerdahl

Whoever imagines mental deep permeable barriers
which actually do not exist and then thinks them away, has understood the world.
As space is entrapped in geometry's network of lines,
thought is caught in its (own) inherent laws.
Maps make the world comprehensible to us;
we are still waiting for the star-maps of the spirit.
In the same way than ambling through fields we risk getting lost,
the spirit negotiates its terrain. Friedrich Rckert
(as cited at the Nobels event above, see here for ) more (slide2).