Twin Oaks' Sociocracy Homepage

(sO"sE-ok'ru-sE) , —n. A theoretical system of government in which the interests of all members of society are served equally.

"Even though we call ourselves democratic, we still make and obey authoritarian decisions, we often allow ourselves to be led by religious faith and superstition and in many situations, even when far-reaching decisions are involved, we follow the dictates of our instincts, our intuition, our premonitions, feelings, fears."

We seem to rely on reasonableness, diligence, honesty, and, above all, solidarity of our fellow humans, but people are also uncaring, idle, and unreliable egotists. To deny, not to mention suppress, these qualities and needs will always lead to frustration and resistence.

More than guaranteeing the familiar tolerant attitude to minorities and individuals who deviate from the norm, we must systematically guarantee optimum tolerance for each individual and group when establishes rules for decision-making.

And that guarantee comes from....

SOCIOCRACY

The previous three paragraphs are quoted and paraphrased from Gerard Endenburg's book Sociocracy: The organization of decision-making.

Much of what is in this website is a result of what Endenburg and the Dutch Sociocracy Center have learned the hard way. (The link to that Center has been closed.)

The remaining pages, with the following content, were removed in 2012 with the remake of the Twin Oaks website:

Some very good reasons to use sociocracy
About Sociocracy The Four Main Principles
Meeting format Proposal format Elections Facilitation Proposal Template
Circle Processes Vision, Mission, Aim
Decision-making forms FAQ What We're Doing at Twin Oaks
Links

The content for this site was accumulated by Ted. This page was updated July 24th, 2002 by Ted. Some minor edits were made in late 2023.