Integral Ecology: A Review of Part One

WHY?  Integral Ecology has been beneficial and fun to read.  Thus, rather than wait until I finished the whole book, I decided I would write a review after reading each part.  A second reason is related to the time it will take me to finish the whole book.  Because I have been so enthralled with it, I wanted to let other integral readers know about it sooner.  This way I can also put in more details and hence do more justice to it.  In Part One alone, consisting of the first 154 pages, I made notes on over 130 items that I found new and interesting. 

THE REVIEW:

There are four parts to this book.  Part One, which is reviewed here, is entitled: “The Historical Context and Conceptual Framework of Integral Ecology.”  Part Two is “The What, Who, and How of Ecological Phenomena”, Part Three is “The Who, How, and What Framework Applied”, and Part Four is “Applications of Integral Ecology in Self, Other, and World.”

  I thought that Part One, “The Historical Context and Conceptual Framework of Integral Ecology” would be a fast and perhaps a little boring read, since much of it is an introduction and explanation of AQAL theory for readers that aren’t familiar with it.  Wrong.  It was actually very informative and entertaining.  The authors gave many interesting examples related to ecology which not only educated me about that aspect, but it also helped clarify a number of integral theory areas I had not previously understood.  However, for a person with no integral theory background, it might not be quite so interesting and fun.

  The authors’ style is relatively Wilber-esque, such as having a lot of helpful repetitions and examples.  They also wrote at a technical level that for the most part allowed me to fairly readily follow and understand even relatively intricate discussions.  However, every now and then they got into some relatively esoteric discussions I did not either follow completely or understand their significance.  However, I also realize this was probably related to my limited background on the subject.  For example, on pages 84-91 there is a detailed discussion about Stan Rowe (a noted scientific ecologist) and his mis-interpretations of some of KW’s work.

   The main thrust of Chapter One, “The Return of Interiority,” was to deeply explore how the loss of interiors has prevented us from more accurately (and integrally) understanding and dealing with our ecological problems.  While for me they were singing to the choir, people who think integral Theory is too 3rd person (dry) will appreciate their emphasis.

  In Chapter Two, “It’s All About Perspectives,” they point out that AQAL is a 3rd person map and it is up to us to make it live (my words) in 1st person awareness.  They further discuss that AQAL en toto is a map, a theory, a framework, a matrix, a set of “1st, 2nd, and 3rd person perspectives of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd person realities”, as well as a post-disciplinary framework for 2nd person shared language and 1st person practices.  Whew, now that’s comprehensive!

  I also really appreciated that the authors introduced integral theory without being too overly zealous or making too hard of a sell.  In places they even gave qualifications like “If Wilber is correct…” or the Integral Model is “one model capable of….”.  I could say I was pleasantly surprised, except I wasn’t.  As I expected, this book was written with integrity and authenticity and so its pages speak for itself.  Helped, of course, by the authors’ clear and flowing writing style, good transitions, lots of painless clarifications, etc.  But when one is trying to determine the “truth” about a very complex problem, nothing succeeds like authenticity. 

  If nothing else, my vocabulary was greatly improved.  On practically every page they explained fascinating integral topics such as: panarchy, Peirce and pansemiotics, method hegemony, folk methods, structural coupling, umwelt, social autopoiesis, resonance threshold (a very important concept about why we’re in the mess we’re in), members versus parts, retrodiction, moral maturity, ecofascism, ecocentricism, reflexive modernity, and my favorite, the imperative of responsibility.  There were also several very good explanations and examples of “tetra-arising” that I found clarifying.  They even throw in a little humor, explaining that by adhering to Integral Methodological Pleuralism, we are being “IMP’s”.  On a more academic note, they explain that the three principles of IMP-ism are: nonexclusion, enfoldment, and enactment.  Last, they appear to create their own Bushism (my interpretation) in the section entitled: “The Quadrants Complexified”.

  The 3rd chapter, “The Developing Kosmos”, is about development and evolution, ecological style. Here they gave a detailed discussion of the physiosphere, biosphere, and noosphere, how they have evolved and how they are related to each other in specific interdependent and interpenetrating ways.  Their discussion of the difference between individual and social holons, parts and members, nature, Nature, and NATURE, as well as “volumetric hierarchy” was also very helpful.  By helpful, I mean their explanations opened a space that allowed me to see our ecological problems from a different perspective and gain additional insight into how the way we define a problem or a word can create or reduce further problems and even resolve some ecological muddles.

  The last chapter in this part of the book        , on “Developing Interiors,” was also very informative to me.  Even though it could be seen as a review of concepts such as psychographs, centers of developmental gravity, and Wilber’s color lines of development, because they gave examples of how each of these areas impinges upon and creates many of our ecological problems, it was gratifying to read.

  The authors conclude that it will be through our learning how to make ecological arguments that appeal to people at all levels of development that we will be able to make headway in solving these interlaced ecological problems. Implied in this section, my interpretation, is that to be able to do this, it takes a person of at least the Teal/Turquoise level of development.  Reading this book has enlarged my perspectives and stretched my mind.  In this way, I think that it has helped me to develop toward those higher developmental levels.  That benefit alone makes the book worth reading. 

THE BOTTOM LINE:  If Ken Wilber’s work has given us the skeleton of Integral Theory, then Integral Ecology adds the nerves, muscles, and organs, so that Integral Theory can live and function in the “real world”, not merely in the noosphere.

  I would be very interested in hearing about anyone else’s experience with this book, as I realize I bring a particular perspective to my review.