• Short introduction
• Integrating our academicians and reflective practitioners
• Walking the talk & appreciative approach
• The role of humiliation
• Our HumanDHS organizational vision
• Our HumanDHS global network
• HumanDHS's Research, Education, and Intervention
• Our challenges
• Our achievements
• Our financial situation
• How can you participate?
• HumanDHS wish list for support
• What differentiates our various teams and what do they share?
Short introduction
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We, Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies (HumanDHS), are a global and transdisciplinary network and fellowship of concerned academics and practitioners. We are committed to reducing - and ultimately help eliminating - destructive disrespect and humiliating practices all over the world. Our work is inspired by universal values such as humility, mutual respect, caring and compassion, and a sense of shared planetary rights and responsibilities.
We are first and foremost a global network of people with the aim of raising awareness and creating framings and visions that promote equal dignity for all. We wish to fertilize and generate interdisciplinary research (both intra and interculturally) and disseminate information aimed at enhancing awareness of human dignity. We also encourage the application of creative educational methods and strategies, as well as fertilize more to-the-point intervention projects and public policy planning. Thus we work in four ways, firstly as a global network, secondly in research, thirdly in education, and fourthly with intervention. We address all levels, micro, meso, and macro levels.
Since we are a global network, the boundaries are fluid. We warmly invite all like-minded people to contribute. Please see our Call for Creativity. Our members do not "subscribe to" or "endorse" everything that is happening within HumanDHS. Everybody is called upon to contribute at best ability. We hope that the synergy that emerges from all contributions will facilitate new insights and action.
HumanDHS is primarily grounded in academic work. However, we wish to bring academic work into "real life." We therefore welcome both, like-minded academicians and practitioners into our network, accomplished or beginners, in sum, all people who wish to embark on the same path with us: please see our Welcome to Newcomers. Our research focuses on topics such as dignity (with humiliation as its violation), or, more precisely, on respect for equal dignity for all human beings in the world. This is not only our research topic, but also our core value, in line with Article 1 of the Human Rights Declaration that states that every human being is born with equal dignity (that ought not be humiliated). We agree with Professor Shibley Telhami, who advocates the building of bridges from academia as follows, "I have always believed that good scholarship can be relevant and consequential for public policy. It is possible to affect public policy without being an advocate; to be passionate about peace without losing analytical rigor; to be moved by what is just while conceding that no one has a monopoly on justice." We would like to add that we believe that good scholarship can be relevant and consequential not only for public policy, but for raising awareness in general.
Sociologist Neil J. Smelser, with his value added theory (or strain theory), analyzes what is necessary for a new social movement to emerge:
1. Structural conduciveness – things that make or allow certain behaviors possible (e.g. spatial proximity).
2. Structural strain – something (inequality, injustice) must strain society.
3. Generalized belief and explanation – participants have to come to an understanding of what the problem is.
4. Precipitating factors – spark to ignite the flame.
5. Mobilization for action – people need to become organized.
6. Failure of social control –authorities not clamping down (see, e.g., Swedberg, Richard (1990). Economics and Sociology: Redefining Their Boundaries: Conversations With Economists and Sociologists. Princenton, NJ: Princeton University Press).
We, as HumanDHS, address all six points:
1. We use the structural conduciveness of the internet.
2. We react to structural strain (humiliation fueling terrorism, for example, or humiliation causing general well-being to diminish).
3. We contribute to efforts to develop a shared understanding of what the problem is (we begin with what Ray & Anderson call the Cultural Creatives).
4. We try to ignite the “flame” of dignity,
5. and mobilize action,
6. while using the inclusive approach that human rights call for.
On this website, and in our work, we attempt to use a culture-neutral approach, as much as it is at all possible, since our scope is global. This entails that we pay the price of losing some credibility in all cultural realms, since we do not serve any dominant cultural propensity - see a discussion, for example, in What the World’s Cultures Can Contribute to Creating a Sustainable Future for Humankind, a paper prepared by Evelin Lindner for the 11th Annual Conference of Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies (HumanDHS), 23th June-1st July 2008, in Norway.
Integrating our academicians and reflective practitioners
The following three paragraphs are authored by Donald Klein (in a personal message to Lindner, December 1, 2004); the rest of the text is continuously being developed by Lindner, starting from first drafts in 2003.
There are those, such as Lois Holtzman and colleagues at the East Side Institute who believe that "thought" is inherent in performance and that, indeed, performance is the most effective way to mobilize thinking. In other words, they decry the dichotomy between thought and practice. Although I may not be as extreme in my view, I, too, have noted that academic work rarely incorporates the considerations that must be included if application is to be effective. Another way of looking at it is that the dichotomy between academic research and practice is contrived. Actually we are dealing with two kinds of practice (or performance): (1) academic inquiry, which is its own kind of "practice" and (2) application (usually referred to as "practice"). Academic research thus can be seen as a way to focus further research (which is the kind of practice that academicians are usually involved in).
A colleague of mine (Kenneth Benne) from some years ago used to advocate a whole new "practice" which he called "research into application." Here is where the studies of the dissemination of knowledge probably fit. The field with which I identify (Applied Behavioral Science) is located within the area of applied research, namely, how to apply what we know to real life situations. It is within ABS that action research emerged as one of the most productive ways to merge theory building and application within the same research enterprise.
All of which suggests that in the Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies network we have the unique challenge of integrating our academicians and reflective practitioners within a single interrelated set of members.
Framing principles for our work: Unity in Diversity, walking the talk, appreciative approach or or "waging good conflict" (Jean Baker Miller's coinage)
Research shows the important effect of "framing." In experiments, when players are asked to play the Prisoner’s Dilemma Game as a "community game," they tend to cooperate, while players who think they are playing a "Wallstreet game" tend to cheat. Although the structure of the game is identical, the mere difference in the label has a profound effect upon whether or not players cooperate.
We wish to work for more dignity (thus transcending humiliation) and believe that the principle of
Unity in Diversity represents a dignifying framing. We wish to promote more cooperative unity and AT THE SAME TIME more enriching diversity (thus steering clear of uniform unity as much as of divisive diversity, thus using the Unity in Diversity principle as a win-win frame, not as a zero-sum frame).
To use music as a metaphor, there would be no orchestra if every musician were forced to play only the violin. For an orchestra, Unity in Diversity is not just an optional principle, it is its fundament: Unity (playing together) in Diversity (with different instruments). Likewise, it can be argued that Unity in Diversity is also the fundament for the survival of humankind. In the case of biodiversity, this is acknowledged (if not always in practice, so at least as idea), while it seems to be difficult to grasp in the case of cultural diversity (the need for unity is still widely interpreted as a need for uniformity, while many of those who wish to increase diversity believe that this can only be achieved through confrontational division).
We think that this can be made operational by applying the Subsidiarity Principle (matters are handled by the smallest or lowest competent authority, a principle applied, for example, by the European Union). This, in turn, can be made operational, we believe, by Walking the Talk or the Appreciative Approach of "Waging good Conflict" (Jean Baker Miller's coinage). We are convinced that this is valid for global and local institutions and organisations as much as for how we construct our identity (and even our brain works in this fashion, by using hierarchies of loops), and not least for our own HumanDHS work.
Since we believe that it is important for all of us to walk the talk, we wish to invite people into our group who are willing and able to promote our mission to embed our network's vastly diverse approaches to our topic into a cooperative relational spirit of humility and mutual support and respect (please see Relationship Tips developed by Judith Jordan, and Linda Hartling, at the Jean Baker Miller Training Institute in 2006). Competitive and adversarial behavioral styles that draw their strength from dominating and humiliating others have no room in our work. We wish to encourage "selfless leadership" and would wish to avoid including in our group autocratic "big-ego" styles. (Peter Drucker called for organizations to function like orchestras. See Concept of the Corporation - With a New Introduction by the Author, published online by Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick, NJ, in 1993; originally published in 1946 by John Day Company)
The overall framework for our work that we hold to be important is that we wish to work for and not against, namely for equal dignity for all. And, even though we aim at raising awareness for the destructive consequences of cycles of humiliation and the suffering of people who are being exposed to humiliating treatment, we do not wish to engage in humiliating humiliators, which would merely turn the spiral of humiliation further. We rather wish to promote respectful approaches also to humiliators and the non-violent humbling of humiliators.
We call our approach the "appreciative approach" or "waging good conflict." We aim at creating a humiliation-free, collaborative environment characterized by mutual respect, mutual empathy, and openness to difference. We believe that conflict can only be waged in a good way (as described by Jean Baker Miller), if it is embedded into mutual appreciation. We wish to refrain from engaging in inefficient monologuous "loudspeaker communication." We wish to resist the widespread misconception that appreciation forecloses clarity.
Hans Blix formulated a list of adjectives that would be desirable for the conduct of an inspector. This list fleshes out the concept of walking the talk:
• Driving and dynamic – but not angry and aggressive
• Firm – but correct
• Ingenious – but not deceptive
• Somewhat flexible – but not to be pushed around
• Calm – but somewhat impatient
• Keeping some distance – but not arrogant or pompous
• Friendly – but not cozy
• Show respect for those you deal with – and demand respect for yourself
• A light tone or a joke may sometimes break a nervous atmosphere.
- Hans Blix, quoted from http://www.un.org/. See also page 52 in Hans Blix (2004), Disarming Iraq: The Search for Weapons of Mass Destruction, London, UK: Bloomsbury Publishing.
Please see also:
• Is it Possible to "Change the World"? Some Guidelines to How We Can Build a More Decent and Dignified World Effectively: The Case of Dignifying Abusers, by Lindner, 2006.
• See also Creating We, by Judith Glaser, Platinum Press, 2005.
• Appreciative Nurturing (AE), a text in the process of being written collectively.
• Appreciative Leadership in Our HumanDHS Network: The Tree - Job Descriptions!
by Michael Britton, 2008)
The role of humiliation
The horrific events on September 11, 2001, in the United States shook and horrified the world. Terrorists acted as ultimate humiliators. Taking down the World Trade Center's Twin Towers was a cruel message of humiliation. History offers innumerous other examples of atrocious outcomes of cycles of humiliation. It is common knowledge to assume that World War II was triggered, at least partly, by the humiliation that the Versailles Treaties inflicted on Germany after the First World War. The urge to redress and avert humiliation powered Hitler and provided him with followers. War and Holocaust were the result.
Yet, cycles of humiliation do not only mar international and national peace. Organizational and private life is affected as much. Bullying and harassment, for example, entail much of the same logic. Not least ethnic and gender relations are beset with acts and feelings of humiliation. Even intrapersonal dynamics can be deeply shaped by processes of humiliation, for example, when I treat myself condescendingly. Macro, meso, and micro level are thus fields for humiliation studies.
Globalization is central to newly emerging feelings of humiliation. As soon as people move closer to each other, expectations rise and disappointments are bound to occur. Human rights ideals with their notion of dignity and respect are equally deeply interlinked with the concept of humiliation. The first sentence in Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights reads, "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights." Thus, the central human rights message stipulates that every human being has an inner core of dignity that ought not to be humiliated.
Wherever the human rights message is heard and accepted by people around the globe, people feel that their humanity is being humiliated whenever their dignity is violated or soiled. Human rights ideals squarely oppose hierarchical rankings of human worthiness that once were regarded as "normal" - and still are "normal" in many parts of the world. In the cross-fire between both paradigms, particularly hot feelings of humiliation emerge.
Current analysis of terror and violence, both in their local and global expressions, usually lacks the element of humiliation. If not pure unfathomable evil, then poverty, deprivation, or marginalization are often pinpointed as driving people into terrorist activities or other forms of violence, somehow automatically. However, why do we then see well-to-do and highly educated terrorists organizing and perpetrating atrocities? Why do poverty, deprivation, marginalization, ethnic incompatibilities, or even conflict of interest and struggles over scarce resources sometimes lead to cooperation and innovation and only sometimes to violence? When there is too little bread, we may share and not fight. Thus, all so-called "hard" explanations for violence and war may falter, because at times the very same conditions lead to innovative peaceful solutions instead of violent confrontation.
Humiliation is maybe the "missing link" that explains why conditions at times are perceived as illegitimate violations justifying counter-violence, at other times not, and why wealthy people may organize and perpetrate terror. It is perhaps possible to claim that humiliated hearts and minds are the only "real" weapons of mass destruction, particularly in a globalized and interdependent world that embraces the human rights ideals of equal dignity for all.
It seems timely and urgent to focus on the phenomenon of humiliation and the prevention and alleviation of its destructive outcomes. The phenomenon of humiliation should be studied, prevented, mitigated and healed in the context of globalization and human rights, culture differences and inter-group conflict, cooperation and violence, competition and negotiation, and power and trust.
Our HumanDHS organizational vision
Whoever wishes to build a new world, has to be very cautious with old solutions. This caution is not optional, but compulsory, if novelty is to have a chance.
"In times of change, the learners inherit the world, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists" (Eric Hoffer).
Our vision is to help build a world where every human being can live a dignified life. Our vision is Unity in Diversity, or more precisely, we wish to work for more unity and at the same time for more diversity. We believe that diversity is only dignifying as long as it is embedded into the unity of shared goals. We do not believe in global uniformity, nor in divisive diversity.
This has many implications for how we shape the organizational structure of our network. Let us address some, 1. locality versus globality, 2. heart versus money, 3. prevention & advocacy versus therapy, 4. day-to-day campaigning, and 5. hierarchical structures and titles.
1. Locality versus globality:
One of those implications is that we are bound to give primacy to our membership in one single human family and our shared responsibility for our tiny home planet, and put this global human identity before any other identity markers. Many of our members subscribe to the identity of global citizens: they put the humanity that they share with all human beings before any national allegiance, while cherishing and promoting all diversity that nourishes this shared humanity. Wherever our members subscribe and register, many do so as "global citizens with strong local anchorings."
If we wish to express this vision in our organizational structure, inherently, we need to avoid being defined by divisive local and national interests that oppose the interests of all global citizens, while at the same time avoiding global uniformity.
Yet, how can this be expressed organizationally? So far, most organizations in this world are framed within national boundaries. It is difficult to transcend those boundaries. For the status of a non-for-profit organization, for example, we would like to submit our application to a democratic Unity-in-Diversity World Government that works for the global village to be a Decent Global Village and not a ramshackle global village (Avishai Margalit defines a decent society as a society with institutions that do not humiliate their citizens). However, such a Global Village Government is precisely what is lacking. We therefore have no choice but to maintain a balancing act in staying as global as we can, while using local affiliations only as much as they support our vision. We therefore attempt to build our network as a truly global network, not even as an inter-"national" network, because we wish to transcend nationality. We wish to highlight the individual citizen of this global village, its men and women and their dignity, and not force them into group categorizations.
We furthermore do not want to replicate the limits of nationality by creating headquarters or national centers. What we can have are perhaps regional centers. However, since we also wish to avoid wasting resources on office space, we can define each person, wherever she is, as one of our centers.
There is a desire, among human beings, to make things "tangible" in order to achieve a sense of security. However, as much as the mere fact of being married does not "secure" the quality of the relationship between the spouses, also the fact that there is an office does not mean that the organization who owns the office does good work. We, in our HumanDHS context, wish to highlight this fact. Merely taking the marriage certificate, or the presence of an office as "proof" that something "tangible" is there, is tantamount to creating a false sense of security. We wish to face the fact that, if we want to create a new quality of relationships at micro, meso, and macro levels, we must face the fluidity of relationships, the fact that relationships need continuous nurturing in an atmosphere of freedom and loving respect, and cannot be "tied down" (see more reflections, for example, in Weak Ties Can Further Social Peace).
We therefore consider our network to be anchored globally, wherever our members are based, in their respective organizational and institutional context. We have the non-for-profit status in New York State, however, we invite our members to apply for this status for us all over the world. Our Global Virtual Coordinating Team nurtures and coordinators our work, together with our Board of Directors, Global Core Team, Global Advisory Board, Education Team, Research Team, and our Intervention Teams.
2. Heart versus money:
There are more aspects to this balancing act. For example, we need to always keep our enthusiasm and love in the first place, allowing funding never to become motivator number one. If money were to become our main motivator, our work would disintegrate, since our vision to nurture dignity would be violated at its core. As soon as money comes first for a person, s/he can no longer promote our work: heart is not optional, it is at the core of our endeavor.
3. Prevention & advocacy versus therapy:
Some of the people who visit our website are looking for therapy or other services to help heal individual experiences of humiliation. When we learn that abuse has taken place (entailing humiliation, for example), we find ourselves feeling moved by the suffering of the person who is contacting us and want very much for them to receive help to achieve the better place in life they so rightly are seeking for themselves.
As a network, however, we had to confront the question of whether we are in a position to provide that kind of help, either as a network or as individual representatives of the network on the coordinating team. We realized that we as a network have very definite limitations in terms of energy and resources, and that we could easily lose focus on the primary mission of the network, which from the first has been our commitment to fostering social and cultural change. Our efforts and energy are directed toward changing the social and cultural conditions that lead to and perpetuate humiliating practices. We don't have the resources to do this and also provide individual therapy. Therefore, in responding to people who have very real and very legitimate needs for therapy, we have to be clear that Human DHS does not offer therapy or referral services. While this can be painful for us, and for the person who approaches us for help, the mission we have undertaken at Human DHS is the confrontation of abuse, rankism and the humiliation endemic to it, on the historical scale. We are working for a different world. We therefore entrust to others the task of helping the victims of this world as it is today to become freed of its debilitating effects, while we are taking on the conditions - the cultural and institutional structures - that condone and perpetuate abuse. Although it is our objective to respond to all who are interested in the network with care, we are concentrating our energy on advancing large-scale efforts to prevent and end humiliating practices. Therefore, we encourage those who have suffered individual experiences of humiliation to seek appropriate therapeutic services through other professional organizations and social services in their communities.
To put it another way, our work has taught us that we cannot achieve our goals by attempting to heal individual cases of humiliation. That will only leave the structures intact that will create still more victims. Therefore, we, as a HumanDHS network, have chosen to lovingly redirect individual victims of humiliation to seek other services with appropriate care providers in their communities. We owe it to our overall aim to keep our energy and resources focused on social and cultural change.
By way of sharing with you some history as to how this view was arrived at, Evelin worked as a clinical psychologist until 1991, helping wounded souls recover from their wounds. What she saw and heard, made her feel there an urgent need to change the larger systems that were producing wounded souls in the first place. She changed her focus toward addressing the conditions that make abuse possible, in order to influence those conditions and diminish - and ultimately eradicate - humiliating conditions and practices.
As a network we respectfully leave it to those who work to help the wounded recover, while we do a different part of the overall task, we work to prevent the creation of more victims in the future.
We would be thankful for any help to compile a list of relevant therpeutic approaches on our World Therapy for Equal Dignity page.
4. Day-to-day campaigning:
Our aim is not to become a political group that engages in day-to-day campaigning. We would like to make an effort to work in a more long-term fashion and above fault lines. As a network, we cannot sign petitions or declarations, however, we wish to encourage our members to get active wherever they see fit. Please see also our Intervention Ideas (including our declarations page), as one way for our members to address specific issues that are related to dignity and humiliation.
Note also: The views expressed on this website, as in any of the HumanDHS publications, do not represent any official HumanDHS position. All HumanDHS publications present the views and research findings of the individual authors, with the aim of promoting the development of ideas and discussion about major concerns of human dignity and humiliation studies and related fields.
5. Hierarchical structures and titles:
Since we wish to "walk the talk" and express equality in dignity also in our organizational procedures and structure, we are particularly careful with titles that emphasize hierarchy. We wish to highlight functional hierarchy (the pilot of a plane needs to be the boss!), but avoid unecessarily essentializing hierarchy.
• Linda Hartling recommends the following book as background reading:
Barbara Pachter, and Susan Magee (2000). The Power of Positive Confrontation. New York, NY: MJF Books.
• Please see also:
•
Evelin's query and Michael Britton's and Brian Ward's reflections
• "The End of the Organization?" by Michael C. Gilbert, in Nonprofit Online News, February 7th, 2008.
Our HumanDHS global network
The Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies group addresses the challenges of studying, preventing and healing humiliation. We wish to contribute to a large-scale, world-wide paradigm shift that moves our world towards more dignified lives for everybody (see, for example, our Decent Global Society page). The Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies group is anchored globally.
We have four Agendas:
- Building a Global Network, including Annual Conferences for mutual enrichment, support, and the generation of ideas that fertilize our research, education and intervention agendas
- Research, so as to study the phenomenon of humiliation and better understand it
- Education, so as to disseminate research findings
- Intervention, so as to prevent and heal humiliation
The initiator of Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies is Evelin Gerda Lindner, who is a cross-cultural social psychologist and physician. She holds Ph.D.s in both medicine and psychology. In 1996, she designed a research project on the concept of humiliation and its role in genocide and war. From 1997-2001, she carried out this research, interviewing over 200 people who were either implicated in or knowledgeable about the genocides in Rwanda, Somalia, and Nazi Germany.
Lindner does not wish to dominate HumanDHS with her work, but wishes to develop HumanDHS as a platform for a wide variety of approaches to the topic of dignity (and humiliation as its violation). Her approach is selfless leadership and the diffusion of leadership tasks in the HumanDHS network. "Walking the talk," i.e. building an arena where all participants enjoy respect for equal dignity, is central to HumanDHS's work.
HumanDHS's Research, Education, and Intervention
Our activities are designed to move forward in three areas:
1. Research that increases understanding of the nature of the humiliation dynamic, destructive outcomes resulting from humiliating strategies and tactics, and factors contributing to its use in international affairs.
2. Education of both children and adults that both increase understanding of the negative consequences of humiliation and generate support of alternative approaches that promote human dignity.
3. Interventions that promote the use of appreciative and affirming approaches in interpersonal, intergroup and not least in international relations so as to promote an increased sense of global community.
HumanDHS is network of scholars, researchers and practitioners that is independent of any religious or political agenda. At the core of our work is the use of transdisciplinary approaches for generating and disseminating knowledge about human dignity and humiliation. We are committed to a wide range of knowledge creation and dissemination, from shifts in awareness and practice at the local micro-level to larger changes at the level of the global community.
Since we are a global network, we do not engage in activities as an organization. Instead, we wish to develop our global network and website as a platform for opportunities for whoever resonates with our vision and desires to contribute to bringing it to life. In the spirit of this vision, we hope to nurture an organic growth of our activities, by inspiring the creativity, passion, and dedication of our members. We need new solutions - after all, humankind faces new challenges - and therefore we need to be cautious with old solutions and old expertise. By keeping our vision of equal dignity for all humankind at the center, we trust that new sets of skills and solutions will grow out of this orientation.
Our challenges
Please let us begin this section with some quotes highlighting the challenge entailed in keeping up momentum in the face of slow progress or even setbacks:
David Crystal writes (in Creating a World of Languages):
There comes a point, in any campaign, when 'campaign fatigue' sets in. It typically arrives a decade after the launch, when the originators have used up most of their energy – and
probably most of their money – in launching the campaign, when they have come to realize
that not everyone in the world shares their vision, and when the real size of the task facing
them has become evident.
Mario Osava reports from Rio de Janeiro about The World Social Forum (in The Risks Posed by Success, 2005):
The World Social Forum could become a victim of its own success, as loud calls for translating ideas and talk into action and practical results threaten to generate divisions and frustration.
Portuguese Nobel literature laureate Jos Saramago expressed that tension when he called for turning the World Social Forum (WSF) into an instrument for action based on concrete proposals and ideas with broad support, rather than a Mecca for an annual pilgrimage by the Left to engage in discussions and debates on utopias.
Byron Bland, Brenna Powell, and Lee D. Ross write (in Building a Peace Constituency for the Achievement and Implementation of a Peace Agreement in the Middle East, 2004):
Political engagement between the two sides following Oslo succeeded in producing unprecedented consensus about the need for, and the broad outlines of, a Middle East peace agreement. Nevertheless, in the face of dashed hopes and failed expectations, the level of enmity and distrust between the two parties has never been greater.
The story of the World Court represents another example. It has its origins in the enthusiasm of a small group of American peace activists, who thought that nations, in order to settle conflicts with other nations, should have the opportunity go to court instead of having to go to war. However, since accepting the verdict of a court requires considerable humility, humility in the face of this institution, and humility in face of the common interest of all, the World Court soon faced aggressive opposition, not least from citizens from the same country that had initiated it.
These quotes highlight the challenge entailed in keeping up momentum in the face of slow progress or even setbacks. It seems that creating hope entails considerable traps. Staying on track for short periods oftime is comparatively easy, however, staying on track in the face of long-term setbacks is not. More so, disappointment and frustration might even destroy the very basis of a movement and blacken the most worthy ideas and visions.
In
our HumanDHS network, we as our aim to stay poised in the long term and not engage in creating short-term expectations fueled by high enthusiasm, only to descend in quick burn-out and impatient mutual finger-pointing when progress is slow. Our aim is to keep calm and steady and stay independent of quick wins and sudden set-backs. We wish to keep up awareness that historic transitions usually take time and that set-backs are to be expected.
Our achievements
• Our website is accessible around the world and we continuously receive reactions from all over the world
• A daily increasing number of papers is being posted on the publications page of our website discussing aspects of humiliation
• We have an ever increasing Global Board of Advisors, and our Global Core Team, Research Team, and Education Team are ever expanding
• We have a Research Initiative, with large global research projects in the pipeline. More and more researchers include the topic of dignity/humiliation in their work, see, for example, Jennifer Goldman, who defended her doctorate at Columbia University in 2007, Vegar Jordanger, who stimulates research at Trondheim University, or Lynne Edwards, who creates a Napier HumanDHS Group.
• We have an Education Initiative, where we work on founding an e-classroom.
• Good news for our Office Cockpit Project! We have a Director and Coordinator! Please welcome Sigurd Støren!
• We have a Business Initiative
• We have a Journal of Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies (first issue March 2007)
• We have two major meetings each year
• A substantial number of papers has been presented at the NY 02, 03, 04, 05, 06 meetings
• A substantial number of of papers has been presented in Paris 03, Paris 04, Berlin 05, Costa Rica 06
• See Lindner's book Making Enemies: Humiliation and International Conflict 
: Good news for our work to promote equal dignity for all and transcend humiliation! This book has been honored as Outstanding Academic Title by the journal Choice in its 2008 list!
Thanks to YOUR inspiration and support, this has been possible!
• We have a Special Issue of Social Alternatives "Humiliation and History in Global Perspectives"
• The 2006 SBAP Award for Applied Psychology was awarded to HumanDHS and its founder
• We are the only international, collaborative organization dedicated to examining the experience of humiliation
• The number of people who are on our email list and the number of world regions is ever increasing
• The News Section displays new information almost everyday
Bernard Hoffert, distinguished scholar from Australia, kindly commented on our work, on 19th May 2006:
"Considering violence and oppression from the broader perspective of humiliation opens a paradigm through which most aspects of culture can be viewed. The range of content brings an extraordinarily diverse group of disciplines together exploring the dimensions of this paradigm. One of the strengths of the research is that it is linked by concept rather than discipline and can therefore address knowledge which intersects laterally rather than defining it within the confines of a specific disciplinary context."
Our financial situation
We would love arriving at a system where volunteers commit a certain
number of hours per year to help. We need, for example, a fundraising committee.
We are seeking funding to support our work in the following ways, among others:
• Scholarships for Doctoral Research
• Participation in Meetings
• Administration
We envisage building a scholarship program for doctoral researchers from less privileged parts of the world, who wish to work on topics related to dignity / humiliation. At the moment, we need to create funding for two current projects: Terrorism and Humiliation and Refugees and Humiliation.
For example, it has been suggested that members of the network could use HumanDHS as an umbrella
organization to add stature and depth of scholarship and experience
to their own grant-seeking requests and give HumanDHS a fee for its
sponsorship and collaboration.
However, so far, we largely work pro bono. Considerable personal sacrifices are being extended by many of our group members. This is often not understood.(1)
Evelin Lindner has adapted her personal life to the task of building the global HumanDHS network by living as a global citizen, supported by a global network of friends. This entails great personal sacrifices. She has received offers for full-time teaching positions at universities, however, she wishes to design her life in accordance with the need to build HumanDHS as a global group - "problems have no passports, and we need solutions without passports as well" is her motto. She stands up for her global citizen life, even though not having a full-time employment compels her to live on a minimum of financial resources, less than 10,000 USD per year. Flights and health insurance basically consume these funds and the situation requires her strictest discipline: no taxi, but public transport, no visits to restaurants, no memberships anywhere, etc. - without her global network of friends and supporters hosting her, she would not be able to manage. From 2004, until summer 2005, half of this amount was offered to Lindner, generously and kindly, by Ragnhild Nilsen Grødal, who, with this, intended to show her appreciation for HumanDHS and would like to encourage Lindner to continue her work, inviting others to join her. Evelin receives ca. 100 emails per day and invests around 5 hours per day in maintaining our website and develop our global network. The rest of her time she is writing (wishing to have more time for writing), meeting people for our network, and teaching (please see some pictures here that give your an impression).
Eric Van Grasdorff has built this website pro bono. Judit Révész works without a salary; she only received support from within our group for a few distinct items and purposes, as a sign of our group's appreciation for her daily pro bono work. The participants in our annual conferences usually pay for their travels and housing themselves. Only for our 2004 NY meeting we received kind funding from the Alan Slifka foundation, however, this covered not more than a tiny fraction of the travel costs for a few participants - Alan Slifka was the person who has to be credicted and thanked for having encouraged Lindner to found a group/organization addressing humiliation in the first place, back in 2001.
In summary, all members of our group throw in huge amounts of time and sacrifice whatever financial means they have at their disposition, in order to develop our HumanDHS initiative.
In the future, we hope to be able to secure funding, firstly for our research activities. We would like to offer scholarships for doctoral students from less-privileged world regions who research the topic of dignity and humiliation. We would like to develop, among others, our World Clothes for Equal Dignity project in ways that allow us to generate funding for such scholarships.
We plan to develop our HumanDHS initiative in a decentralized way, a global umbrella and local sub-organizations, thus making links between the global and the local possible. In other words, our education and intervention groups around the world need to found their own local sub-organizations that link up to the umbrella of the global network. These sub-organizations will be in need of various amounts of financing, according to their respective goals. Furthermore, we need to find funding for an administrative person for our global network and for our annual conferences.
(1) Lindner was aggressed when she was not willing to side with victims of humiliation by ways of condoning violent responses. It was insinuated that she had a financial motivation for promoting a nonviolent stance that honors the humanity of all conflict participants, namely that she was being paid, by Columbia University, for example, to "betray" victims of humiliation.
We would like to make clear that Columbia University does not extend funds to our group.
Furthermore, we would like to affirm that we wish to work for discontinuing cycles of humiliation and not perpetuating them, and that we developed this vision and conviction through our work, independent from any outside influence or any financial incentive. We wish to promote inclusive Mandela-like solutions and help avoid any deepening of violent humiliation cycles. Mandela did not unleash a genocide on the white elite of South Africa. We are aware the process of social change in South Africa is not without shortcomings, however, we feel that Mandelas achievements are not diminished by that. We wish to applaud Mandela's firm moderate stance. We wish to honor inclusive moderation that avoids painfully perpetuating cycles of humiliation and instead attempts to discontinue them and heal the wounds inflicted by past humiliation. We wish to honor the dignity and humanity of all participants in a conflict and intend to refrain from dehumanizing certain parties as "enemies," supposedly "worthy" of violent treatment.
We feel that we would betray victims if we promoted violent retribution, and that we protect victims by empowering them for constructive change. The Hutus who perpetrated the 1994 genocide in Rwanda against their former Tutsi elite, in a narrative of "the humiliated needing to kill their humiliators," are in a wretched situation today; they compounded their misery and augmented suffering on all sides, instead of ameliorating any victimhood...
How can you participate?
Since we are a global network, our boundaries are fluid. We invite all like-minded people to join our network. With "like-minded" we mean two things: First, we wish to build a more dignified world that entails less disrespect and humiliation, and, second, we wish to live our ideals in our own lives, in our work, and, not least in the way we contribute to HumanDHS. Short, we would like to invite everybody who "walks the talk."
If you wish to contribute to our work, you do not need to "subscribe to" or "endorse" everything that is happening within HumanDHS. Everybody is called upon to contribute at best ability. We hope that the synergy that emerges from all contributions will facilitate new insights and action.
Please see our Call for Creativity.
Why should we develop a sense of global responsibility? Please see here some calls. Please send us more videos!
• Melisa Pivic
• Henrik Jacobsen
• Sverre Urnes Johnson
• Silje Cathrin Brattheim
• Lone Alice Johansen
Course PSYPRO 4030 (kull 22) "Humiliation," Autumn 2006 at the Department of Psychology, NTNU, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway, 2nd-6th October 2006
HumanDHS "wish list" for support
Please let us share with you some very good news: Our Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies network has grown and is
flourishing very much!
We would love arriving at a system where volunteers commit a certain number of hours per year to help. We need people who identify with our shared vision, and who wish to bring their love and passion into our group and our work. We need to build a virtual office, staffed by devoted people with expertise in various fields, from answering emails in an appreciative way, to fund raising.
Please, could you help us find virtual staff for our Global Coordinating Team? Perhaps you know people who are about to retire, with lots of wisdom, time, and energy, who, instead of being idle, would like to invest some years into a greater cause? Developing our global network with the aim to build a world of more dignity and less humiliation would represent such a greater cause!
Perhaps you know somebody like that, somebody who would love to commit to several years of caring contributions to our work, several hours per day?
If yes, could you perhaps share this message with him or her?!
The "wish list" describes specific activities that supporters could help us with:
• We need a fundraising committee.
• We need help with our conferences, see a list over our conferences.
We need support with a) organizing and coordinating these conferences, and b) with recording them (rapporteurs, notetakers, proofreaders and editors of the notes).
• We need help with our Intervention projects. Many of these projects are currently "sleeping ideas"! Please see, for example, our World Clothes for Equal Dignity project. Companies who are already in the fashion business, might be interested! See also our World Art for Equal Dignity project, where Peter Max offers us to paint portraits and give the 20,000 - 30,000 USD remuneration to us! Please find able people who wish to have a portrait by Peter Max and donate to us what they pay for it!
• We need help with doing research (we need more research on the phenomenon of humiliation and its relevance, for example, for public policy making).
• We need help with our educational activies!
• We need helpers for the day-to-day administration of our network, people who would love to commit for a longer time period, who would have ample time (like half a day per day), who would know, for example, how to write appreciative emails, and how to maintain a website!
• We need help with uploading news that are relevant for our network on our News Section.
• We need help with making a literature review of survey instruments relevant to human dignity and humiliation.
• We wish to collect stories/cases/witness accounts of dignity and humiliation.
• We wish to seed our Call to Creativity with actual examples to encourage people to submit their own achievements and ideas. We would like to use this for public and press relations and create a Call for Creativity Month, which could get some press attention (thank you dear Neala, for this idea!).
Dear future supporter! If these ideas do not really describe what you envisage, please have a look at the rest of our website (Who we are - e.g. at our Global Core Team, Global Advisory Board, Research, Education, Intervention) and let us know whether you would like to contribute to other activities.
What differentiates our various teams, and what do they share?
Please let us first welcome everybody who feels called to join in! You are welcome in all of our ever-growing teams!
Please let us begin with giving you a short overview over what our teams all share. We envisage our network to be a seed for a future alternative global community, together with all similar efforts others than ours, and we therefore wish to welcome like-minded people from all corners of the world into our network, people who "walk the talk." All our teams share that we wish to give eminence to relationships over "products." Giving primacy to relationships between people who walk the talk means that everything else is secondary. It means that it is ok if a new member to our network does nothing for the first twenty years or so, and, perhaps, suddenly, after twenty years, has an idea for a project that s/he wishes to contribute with to our work. In other words, "products" such as activities, tasks, etc. are secondary to building appreciative relationships among us. Therefore, becoming a member in our network "requires" walking the talk, nothing more. There are no other obligations. Walking the talk entails only to keep in mind that our network wishes to open up space for creativity, for creative ideas as to how we could promote more dignity in the world and how we could diminish humiliation.
What differentiates our teams? The differences evolved over time, as the need arose. Please let us give you an overview further down.
• Global virtual HumanDHS Office, or HumanDHS Staff: This is our global staff, those among our members who, in a collaborative effort, wish to attend to daily tasks, such as daily incoming emails, organizing of meetings, etc. We need always more help! Your help is welcome!
• Global Core Team: Here you find our members who wish to contribute actively to our work
• Gobal Advisory Board: These are our senior honorary members, who wish to offer the weight of their names to support our work, even though they might not have the capacity to be very active
• Supporters: These are our members who wish to indicate their support to our work without being able to become active
• Sponsors: Here you see our members who have been kind enough to support our work with funding
• Partners: This is an ever-growing list of of institutions and organizations with whom we wish to develop more cooperation
• Links: This is an ever-growing list of institutions and organizations that - in various ways - share our vision. We hope that this list is interesting and enriching to our members and other interested parties.
• Education Team: Here you meet our members who wish to develop our educational activities
• Research Team: Here you meet our members who wish to develop our research activities
• Intervention Teams: Here you see many ideas that are being developed, or wait for being developed, all by their own teams.
A very warm welcome to you!
The HumanDHS Team
