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How to use dynamics?
A lot of organisational problems, regarded at face value, seem to point to a simple and direct solution. Problems are mostly described in a negative formulation: goals are too vague, expertise is lacking, no one keeps agreements. The solutions seem to be the inverts of the negatives: define goals more clear, start capacity building, agree on agreeing.
But simple solutions often fail, because other forces are at work. Underlying mechanisms often affect the potential capacities of the organisation. We call these forces the dynamics of the problem. The dynamics often explain why a specific problem was not solved by the self healing capacity of the organisation. The dynamics may invisibly nourish the problem. They prevent simple solutions to work. Growing individualism for instance explains why top down commands in hierarchical organisations have become less effective.
Knowing the dynamics of a problem may help to take the underlying factors into account when trying to solve the problem. Recognising the dynamics may help to prevent looking for simple solutions.
The dynamics themselves are always refractory and hardly ever manageable.
Ethnic contradistinctions in the region are very old. These underground dormant ethnic tensions were exploited by political leaders. They defined the cause of existing problems as national or ethnical.
A lot of women organisations, partly developed in the anti war movement, partly founded to alleviate suffering of women with war related traumas, kept ties over the borders with each other, acting against the nationalistic tendency of ethnic separatism. These organisations shared ideas, discussed the future of the region and that of women in particular.
All kinds of groups, organisations or NGO's started in or after the war, had to deal with ethnic differences. Especially anti-war organisations and ideology driven women organisations tried to deal with differences in a productive way. One NGO representative states it as follows: “We were never blind for differences but we tried to overcome them by creating common grounds. We were actually very proud of this and we have put as a statement on all our publications, leaflets etc. that we worked with and for women regardless their national, political and religious background and sexual orientation. We were anti nationalistic but not in denial of differences”. Their work was often characterised by fighting the gaps between groups of various ethnic background. They often fought discrimination and promoted reconciliation. People traumatised in ethnic conflict were often the target group for these organisations.
Ethnnical contradistinctions know a long history in former Yugoslavia. Other than ethnical contradistinctions also existed: in social class, religion, economics and political. These differences are mixed up and differ for parts of the country, regions or –nowadays- states. All these factors together played a common role in the falling apart of former Yugoslavia, in the many conflicts and in the ten years of war violence.
At the same time the history of Yugoslavia also shows moments of mutual ties on societal, economical and political areas. For instance the joint rebuilding of Yugoslavia after the second World War is an example of going beyond differences, made possible by a forceful political system and the very strong statesman Tito. But without such a dominant bonding power the regional tendency is to stress differences.
Even nowadays there is a explicit tendency to stress the national differences, for instance in matters of language. In former days everyone could understand each other, from Zagreb to Belgrade. At this very moment in Croatia an own language is created. As a matter of fact it is a sort of re-introduction of the antique Croatian language, in order to be able to distinguish the Croatian people from the other peoples in the region.
However genuine some NGO’s may fight the wrong way to deal with differences, no individual or group can place itself outside the history of its country or region. The history of Yugoslavia provides a risk of re-defining conflicts in terms of differences: national, ethnical, religious or whatever. The ethnical or national (or whatever) frame of reference offers a common script only avoidable by explicitly rejecting it. Sometimes problems in organisations show themselves along lines of differences, along ethnical or national lines for instance. The formation of subgroups, including intensified contact within the subgroups, is done along these lines. Conflicts tend to be described along these lines. Splitting up can happen along these lines. This phenomenon is a serious and painful risk for NGO's.