Group items tagged

In ecology, commensalism is a class of relationship between two organisms where one organism benefits without affecting the other. It compares with mutualism, in which both organisms benefit, and parasitism, when one benefits while the other is harmed.

Public, private, and nonprofit institutions and organizations often work together in a coalition (an organization of organizations working together for a common purpose) with communities, neighborhoods, and constituencies. In this paper, coalition is the term used for a multiorganizational process that is also called a partnership or a collaborative (state-of-the-art resources on coalition building are available at www.ahecpartners.org).  Usually, coalition strategies for working together are described as networking, coordinating, cooperating, or collaborating, although the use of these terms is often confusing.  This paper suggests definitions of these four strategies used by coalitions to help clarify the most appropriate use of each in particular settings.  Although the examples that follow the definitions are based in health care, the four strategies are utilized in addressing a wide variety of issues.

Symbiosis, the "living together of differently named organisms" is far more important in the evolution of life and the functioning of organisms and ecologies than the competition-centric views of Darwin's early defenders asserted, and may be the key driving force in the evolution of life on earth.

" According to the parable of the tribes, civilized peoples have been compelled to live in societies organized for the maximization of competitive power. People become the servants of their evolving systems, rather than civilized society being the instrument of its members."

The Collective Action Toolkit (CAT) is a package of resources and activities that enable groups of people anywhere to organize, build trust, and collaboratively create solutions for problems impacting their community. The toolkit provides a dynamic framework that integrates knowledge and action to solve challenges. Designed to harness the benefits of group action and the power of open sharing, the activities draw on each participant's strengths and perspectives as the group works to accomplish a common goal.

Most of GEO's readers are practitioners of economic collective action. They may be wondering why GEO is dedicating an entire issue not only to the practice of, but the theory and research of collective action as well.

Computer-mediated communication systems are believed to have powerful effects on social relationships. Many claim that this new form of social interaction encourages wider participation, greater candor, and an emphasis on merit over status. In short, the belief is that social hierarchies are dissolved and that flatter, more egalitarian social organizations emerge. Networked communications, it is argued, will usher in a renewed era of democratic participation and revitalized community. But as with earlier technologies that promised freedom and power, the central problems of social relationships remain, although in new and possibly more challenging forms.

Gene Sharp founded the Albert Einstein Institute. His book From Dictatorship to Democracy has been used as a field manual in numerous liberation movements in Eastern Europe, in the Arab Spring and elsewhere. In his three volume The Politics of Nonviolent Action he examines the nature and control of political power and the methods and dynamics of nonviolent action. He identifies and document 198 specific methods of nonviolent action. Over half of these methods come under one or another heading of noncooperation.