by Stephen Dinan

Abstract: This article explores a preliminary model of the development of what I call "transformational memes," movements or ideas that demand individual and collective growth before they can be integrated into a dominant culture or worldview. I examine five stages of this process -- pioneering, coalescence, maturation, confrontation, and integration -- and explore factors that accelerate development in positive directions or lead to pathology and stagnation. The goal is a better understanding of how to implement transformational movements in the culture as a whole.

I. Introduction

A dream or vision first forms in an individual mind as an image of a more evolved world, a better practice, or a more integrated understanding. Echoes of that same dream arise in the minds of others. Perhaps, if they are fortunate, these visionaries find each other and the dream begins to develop, coalesce into a movement, and gather students or followers. Decades, even centuries later the vision spreads to the extent that it is taken for granted as a baseline fact of existence. What was once undreamable has become unarguable. This article will examine how a vision is translated into consensus reality and incorporated by the culture as a whole, a process that can be summarized by a series of stages. Stage models, though often useful, do have their dangers. However, if we bear in mind that evolution meanders as much as it moves forward and that stage models should not be confused with reality itself, we can begin to explore the model’s outlines.

First, some terminology. Rather than use a potpourri of terms like ideas, visions, practices, research, paradigms, and innovations, I have chosen to coin a new term called "transformational memes." Richard Dawkins invented the term "meme," which has been gaining currency as a unit of cultural inheritance, much like a gene is a unit of biological inheritance. A meme might be an invention (e.g. a wheel), a political system (e.g. democracy), or a value (e.g. independence). Though the term meme is designed to invoke kinship with genes, the behavior and propagation of memes follow different laws than those of genes, which are largely constrained by reproductive and material limits. Memes can spread quickly and continue to evolve within the minds that carry them. Memes have, to some extent, a fluidity and plasticity genes do not.

What then distinguishes transformational memes from the larger category of which they are a subset? Transformational memes rock the boat of the status quo, demanding growth of consciousness, difficult changes in lifestyle, reform of institutions, or redistribution of resources or power. A typical new meme, such as a vaccine, slides easily into the current system. A transformational meme, such as the abolition of slavery, does not. One way to describe the difference is in terms of social friction. In the world of matter, physical friction results from the resistance to relative motion between two bodies in contact: the rougher the surfaces and the faster the relative motion, the greater the friction. In the world of memes, social friction results from dissonance between a meme and its larger cultural, economic, political, and psychological context: the rougher the fit, the greater the social friction.

As a first-order approximation, then, a spectrum of social friction can model how easily a new meme will penetrate the culture of its time. In such a simplified spectrum, we combine all the possible agents of social friction -- cultural, intellectual, legal, moral, political, economic, logistical, psychological, structural, religious, etc. -- into one general rating. Transformational memes rate high on this scale. Their propagation is often a dicey business, sometimes requiring generations. At the opposite end of the spectrum are those memes I will call, echoing Ken Wilber’s (1995) distinction, translational memes. Rather than demanding growth, they reflect and reinforce the prevailing views of the society as a whole. A more nuanced analysis would address differences between translational memes that actively thwart cultural and individual growth (e.g. the Inquisition) and beneficial translational memes that do not demand much growth (e.g. the Internet) . However, the rough distinction between transformational and translational memes suits our purpose here.

Strategies for the proliferation of transformational memes must examine what dimensions of culture will generate resistance and then lubricate the process intelligently. Factors that help midwife the birth of a meme and accelerate its initial evolution (e.g. the colorful clothing of hippies which bonded them into a community) may become less useful and even problematic as social friction shifts to new domains. In engineering, whole disciplines devote themselves to minimizing physical friction through the creation of ever-more viscous fluids, smoother surfaces, and more harmonious designs. Similarly, there is a science of "lubrication" that minimizes the social friction in meme evolution, though the science is far less well defined. After outlining what I see as the main stages in the development of transformational memes, we will look at some factors that help lubricate the process at each stage.

II. The Long Journey

The first stage in the lifespan of a transformational meme is a period of pioneering, sometimes spanning decades or centuries. Pioneers who venture beyond the confines of the dominant worldview do so at risk to themselves, endangering professional reputations, friendships, and financial standing. When Carl Jung broke with Freud, his professional network evaporated and he was removed from the psychoanalytic roster. Wilhelm Reich’s pioneering ideas and devices landed him in an American jail. Pioneering is not for the faint of heart. In the pioneering phase of a meme, many related ideas surface only to be swallowed again by the shadows of history, sometimes oppressed, sometimes ignored, and sometimes failing to gain a champion. The cycle of emergence and submergence might repeat several times before the meme arrives to the next stage.

The next stage I call coalescence. Experiments begin to confirm the new meme. A handful of thinkers, innovators, or rebels find that their explorations or choices interlock. Communication quickens and community grows. The exchange of ideas between pioneers allows a refinement of the new meme and a gathering of momentum. Quite often, a term is created that encapsulates the new meme and helps people see their own work in a larger context. This is an exciting time for the pioneers who have often been working or living in relative isolation. New or experimental institutions and key geographic locations often play a role in bringing about this coalescence phase.

The next stage of transformational meme evolution I will call maturation. This is a time of dissemination and elaboration of the meme. Revolutionary action is no longer focused upon a single location or a small group of innovators. The meme spreads through books, papers, conversations, music, magazines, new institutions, or new programs of study. People far afield adopt the meme into their lives, research, and work, often adding personal innovations or creative insights of their own. This is a fertile period in which an increasing number of people spread the meme but do so without the fanfare of the initial innovators. The three primary forces leading to maturation are theory, practice, and research.

In the life of significant memes, a time arrives when they become threatening to the "powers that be." This phase I call confrontation. Those in the fringe movement have become contenders, and gradually the establishment comes to fear their surging influence. This acts as a rite of passage into true adulthood: the new meme is engulfed by the fire of public censure and ridicule. In the long run, this is important to counteract the grandiose, ungrounded, and lopsided qualities that almost inevitably attach to new ideas and movements. Hot fires produce the strongest steel: a rigorous rite of passage leaves a young movement far more capable of assuming the reins of power with wisdom and balance.

In the last stage of the lifespan of a meme, which I call integration, the distinction between old and new begins to blur. The new meme is either assimilated into the old, dominant paradigm or the most enduring characteristics of the old worldview are incorporated into the new. Ideally a stronger and richer amalgam of both emerges. Feminism as a movement, for example, will eventually die out once the essential gains have been made and the ideas have been embraced within the dominant worldview. The implicit goal of any valid evolutionary movement, then, is ultimately its own obsolescence: a nearly ubiquitous understanding of the world is simply no longer a "movement."

Thus, the broad trend of meme evolution involves five basic stages: pioneering, coalescence, maturation, confrontation, and integration. This trajectory assumes that the new meme is not derailed, which can happen at any stage of the process, especially the first two. The vast majority of memes never become a part of the dominant worldview, and many begin to develop and regress several times before integration occurs decades or centuries later.

III. Lubrication

Individual and collective barriers to this process can be enormous and resilient. Though it would be unrealistic to think we could create a culture with no resistance to transformational memes, we can nonetheless isolate some variables that allow us to minimize friction or resistance at the different stages.

Facilitating pioneering

Pioneering is somewhat romantically viewed as the province of mad geniuses, iconoclasts, and rogues. Alternately seen with rosy nostalgia, laughed at through parodies of their dramatic quirks, and vilified for their intemperate indulgences, pioneers are the stuff of legend, larger-than-life characters who carried a kernel of important truth or innovation. They share an openness to novelty and a certain tenacity in following their own independent path. To truly go beyond the past requires a great deal of drive, a solid dose of creativity, a willingness to experiment, and a thick skin to deflect criticism and rejection. Authentic pioneers, especially in the domain of transformational memes, are always fighting the current. The most balanced and integrated of them are able to blend with opposition in flowing ways, yet this seems the exception rather than the rule. Our challenge to accelerate this level of meme evolution, then, is to create social and cultural institutions that encourage a pioneering mindset.

America has a worldwide reputation for invention and pioneering in all realms of endeavor, a fact often attributed to our system of democracy and respect for human rights, to minimal class stratification, to the frontier values of independence and autonomy still present long after the settling of our vast land, and to the large number and high mobility of cultural, regional, and ethnic groups. California best exemplifies all these qualities and it is California that has dictated the trends of the last thirty years, from the rise of the hippies to the triumph of the computer chip. In its tolerance for deviance and originality, California has no peers. This cultural dynamism comes with a price, but it certainly does produce more innovation. Without too much chest-thumping, we can say that cultures modeled around similar principles should produce a higher percentage of pioneers.

On an individual level, the pioneering mindset is a combination of creativity, originality, and ego strength. Systems of education that foster healthy independence from authority, non-linear thinking, and high degrees of creativity will undoubtedly create a higher percentage of pioneering personalities. Though genius will likely always be the rarest of human commodities, we can nevertheless create educational systems that facilitate its emergence. Also, since research is beginning to show the benefits of spiritual practice in maintaining a fresh perspective and accelerating growth on various scales, we may see more pioneering individuals as more people engage in spiritual and psychological work.

Facilitating coalescence

Coalescence is characterized by a rapid surge in interconnection; community and communication both rise. A journal might be founded, a name chosen, meetings convened, a school created, a location chosen to serve as a teaching or living center, or relationships forged with fellow pioneers. Since relatively few people are involved in the development of the transformational meme at this stage, most activity takes place below the cultural radar. Traditionally, coalescence centers around one location since this allows a sheltered place to lay the groundwork of the meme away from the criticism of mass culture. By creating a small sub-community which can gather around the meme, something resembling a movement begins to take shape.

The transition from pioneering to coalescence is marked by a problem, one that dooms many movements to failure, and that is what to do with the charismatic and quixotic pioneers. The same single-mindedness, charisma, and independence that allows people to effectively pioneer new terrain also lends itself to personality cults. In a typical scenario, the pioneer demands full authority and is threatened by any claim to authority besides his own. The coalescence phase is then marked by increasing dogma, if not engendered by the pioneer himself, then by his "top sergeants" who enforce the party line. The latent neuroses of that figure become inflated, celebrated, and even enshrined. Unless the pioneer is a person of remarkable balance, compassion, and clarity, he is prone to fall into a variety of power traps, feeding on the deference of the followers. At the very least, such movements will remain blinded by the biases and shortcomings of the theory and practices of the founder, and the evolution of the meme will be circumscribed. Though occasionally such a movement will gain a large and loyal following, it is rare for them to proceed all the way to the final stage of cultural integration, unless the pioneer dies and a new dynamic commences.

If we recognize that the great danger in coalescence is for a single pioneer to gain pre-eminence, our task becomes one of harnessing the insights, passion, and charisma of the pioneers in the service of a movement that goes beyond the pioneer’s intrinsically narrower horizons. The hero of the coalescence period is the person with sufficient charm, social grace, group management skills, and connections to organize the pioneers into something larger. The skills are those of a diplomat, a host, a conductor, and a group facilitator wrapped up in one, usually seasoned with a good dose of humor. The effective coalescer may be a pioneer in her own right but her skills lend themselves to the job of creating networks, smoothing differences, and bringing down barriers. A coalescer shapes something more powerful and more effective than the pioneers could have done on their own, which means she must also be able to see a larger gestalt.

Transformational memes are ultimately much larger than one person or mind can encompass. To deny that fact is hubris. And as the ancient Greeks made clear, hubris is the downfall of many a hero. Facilitating meme evolution at this stage, then, rests on two factors in combination: 1) creating oases of tolerance where pioneers can meet, befriend each other, and organize a more unified movement and 2) smoothing interactions and collaborations between strong-willed pioneers.

Facilitating maturation

Whereas pioneering and coalescence often center on one prime location, like psychoanalysis did with Vienna and Freud, or the human potential movement did with Esalen, the maturation phase is characterized by work taking root far afield. I imagine this much like the dispersal of spores from a plant, some of which may be carried on the winds for hundreds of miles. These winds can be books, workshops, magazines, videos, newsletters, music lyrics, potlucks, speeches, friendships, or marches. The maturation period thus is characterized by an increasing diversification of roles, from organizers to writers to entrepreneurs.

In the beginning of maturation, the transformational meme is still developing beneath the cultural radar and attracts little attention from the "establishment." Eventually, though, journalists arrive, perhaps highlighting the meme’s deviance, immorality, or threat, perhaps reporting on it with curiosity or neutrality, or occasionally -- if the developing meme is fortunate -- reporting on it with enthusiastic interest. This marks the dawning of popularization, a time in which the original formulation of the meme may undergo profound changes as it is adapted to the habits and norms of the dominant culture.

Important transformational memes must encounter social friction to be implemented and integrated in the culture as a whole. Whereas the early stages of meme development take place in oases of tolerance, the maturation phase builds resources to confront much more powerful sources of social friction. For the eventual confrontation, a solid and trustworthy base of support is necessary, which comes from three main areas: theory, practice, and research. Theory builds an intellectual case for the validity and importance of the transformational meme. The ideas themselves become increasingly rich, grounded, and based on new developments in practice and research. This leads them to be more substantial, like trees that sink deep roots and can therefore withstand high winds in a storm. Practice can be as simple as adopting a new way of living or as complicated as training for years to be a teacher or healer. Practice is theory and research grounded successfully in daily life. Research examines what is most important, valid, and worthwhile in a meme and what is least plausible or irrelevant. Is it, for example, important to chant the names of Hindu gods in Sanskrit in order to develop an effective yoga practice?

The bane of the maturation period might be called, to be playful, "premature ejaculation." Premature ejaculators are those folks whose genuine and passionate enthusiasm for a transformational meme leads them to unveil it to the world before it has grown a solid base to sustain the backlash of social friction. Enthusiasm must be tempered with patience during the maturation period for it is patience that allows research, practice, and theory to develop into a compelling case, even for skeptics. Also, since transformational memes sometimes require growth before one can be adequate to understand or enact them, it is necessary to allow time to pass for enough people to experience the "truths" of the meme for themselves.

The best kind of promoters might be called "patient popularizers," and they have a knack for packaging transformational memes into more palatable forms, thereby reducing social friction. Ideally, these patient popularizers have credentials the establishment respects, a good mind, and a bit of charisma. Herbert Benson has played this role in meditation research by focusing on the "relaxation response," a term intelligible to average Americans. Dean Ornish has been quite successful at this with his integral approach to heart disease. And I personally believe that Deepak Chopra does so in an astute way as well.

Facilitating harmonious confrontation:

A stage comes in the life of every transformational meme when it moves from being perceived as marginal, idiosyncratic, or weird to a time in which it is perceived as threatening to the power structures in certain fields. The move to accept homosexuality, for example, is perceived as extremely threatening to religious morality; the move to implement environmental reforms is perceived as extremely threatening to business and economic interests; the move to give women equal opportunity has been perceived as threatening to the "old boy’s network." Confrontation thus begins.

In the life of an ideal transformational meme, confrontation is delayed until sufficient theoretical and practical foundations have been built and popularizers have increased acceptance. This results in a confrontation in which the lines between "us" and "them" are less distinct, and many people on the inside of the dominant power structures are sympathetic to the transformational meme. The key to accelerating evolution at this stage is dissipating the tension between opposing sides, fostering kinship rather than discord. The principal pathology of this level of meme evolution, then, is the "stand-off" -- an antagonism that increases, forcing people to choose sides. When this happens, further evolution of the meme is delayed or disrupted.

The heroes of the confrontation phase of meme evolution are the "double agents." Double agents in a war secretly work for both sides; likewise, double agents in meme evolution operate easily in both camps. We see this, for instance, in the rise of "green business," in which environmental principles are incorporated into the structure of a company while it remains a successful enterprise. The leaders of green business act as a bridge between hot-headed eco-revolutionaries and traditional business leaders, both of which can then begin to see points of possible alliance. I see signs of this double agency with preachers and priests who are now taking a strong, public stand for the acceptance of homosexuality. By showing that the battle lines are not quite so clear, they pave the way for eventual harmonious integration.

The most evolutionary heroes of the confrontation phase are those who, like Gandhi, M. L. King, or Mandela, operate from a place of courage and warriorship that is not founded upon hate or violence. Their sword is the sword of love, and though their efforts may provoke bloodshed (usually that of the revolutionaries themselves) the ultimate goals of truth, justice, and peace transcend the divisions of the moment. They are the ultimate double agents, for their vision of universal love includes those who vilify and oppress them. These peaceful warriors can turn confrontation into transformation. Without such leaders, movements begin to adapt the tactics of the entrenched power structures, resulting in a changing of the guard without a changing of the heart.

Facilitating integration

The integration phase will look quite different depending upon the transformational meme’s sphere of action. The basic principle is that the old order and the new meme form a useful coalition or amalgam, and power structures begin to reflect this unification. Sometimes laws are changed; other times the result is more philosophical or economic; and still other times it is a quiet change in the way a field operates . For example, since the National Institute of Health opened its Office of Alternative Medicine, the interest in incorporating the best of alternative approaches into mainstream medicine has expanded quickly. By cracking open the door of the most important citadel of allopathic research, the alternative medicine movement made a decisive step into the integration phase. The nearly ubiquitous trend in medical circles is now towards integrating mind, imagery, emotions, social factors, diet, herbs, and support groups into the old-style reductionism of medicine. Integration is underway.

By this stage of meme evolution, so many players are involved that it is challenging to isolate the most important roles. In some cases, the heroes are legislators who take the risk to propose and pass new laws protecting rights, distributing resources, or incorporating disenfranchised groups. In other cases, the heroism is more diffuse, with practitioners who begin, for instance, to incorporate new ideas into their daily work. The full integration of the meme into a culture or field often takes a generation or two as the old school dies out or relinquishes positions of power.

A final note. Ken Wilber (1995) claims that, though most facets of psychological development can be accelerated, human beings cannot "skip" stages of development. A person who tests at the pre-conventional level (stage 1 or 2) on Kohlberg’s scale of moral development cannot suddenly wake up to a post-conventional level (stage 5) without first passing through the intervening stages. He then goes to show that cultures as a whole have passed through stages of development that parallel the stages of individual psychological development. By inference, then, cultures must progress systematically; they cannot make large leaps forward. Evolution proceeds step by step. Transformational memes that demand a significantly higher level of functioning than is typical in the culture simply cannot be fully integrated, since the apparatus of comprehending and enacting them is, as yet, unavailable. This perspective helps us to reign in our enthusiasm for highly transformational memes, such as those from esoteric spiritual traditions. Such memes can have a robust effect on those who can comprehend and enact them, but it is overly idealistic to expect them to be implemented on a wide scale quickly.

IV. Conclusion

This model becomes a lot more fun once we apply it to the historical development of different memes but, alas, that task goes beyond the space allotted here. Below, though are a few major transformational memes of recent years and a preliminary appraisal of their stage of development.
Integration: Humanistic psychology, feminism, civil rights movement, mind-body medicine
Confrontation: Environmental movement, acceptance of homosexuality, sexual liberation movement
Maturation: Transpersonal psychology, somatics, arts as therapy, spiritual emergency, the inner game of sports, green business, vegetarianism, socially conscious investing
Coalescence: Energy medicine, integral philosophy (evolutionary panentheism), integral transformative practices, socially engaged spirituality, ecopsychology.
Pioneering: Transformational economics (human or integral capitalism), mind-body-spirit education, energetics (fields that work with subtle energies), transpersonal sexuality & relationships (including polyamory), transformational approach to criminality.
Though any stage model collapses a complex world into simplistic equations, I do believe they can be useful. All five stages of the process of meme evolution -- pioneering, coalescence, maturation, confrontation, and integration-- have their unique needs, important roles, and distinctive pathologies. The heroes of one stage can become liabilities at the next. This essay, I hope, is a small step towards a day when we will more fully understand the most effective way to orchestrate revolutions and thereby to make manifest our deepest visionary dreams.
Reference
Wilber, K. (1995). Sex, ecology, and spirituality. Vol. 1: The spirit of evolution Boston, MA: Shambhala.