There is an excellent book by an Oxford Professor Peter Checkland called ‘Systems Thinking, Systems Practice’. It teaches us all about how to think in terms of systems and helps us see the world through the systems view of life; which is always one credible way to interpret life.
Systems thinking is really an organic way of thinking about the world and to appreciate all realities; to figure out relationships and connectedness and then to use such a perspective to analyse reality. The current alternative, which we were taught in the industrial era, is called the mechanical view of reality.
Every aspect of the current world does matter, and is also material, as already established by modern science but such a worldview also teaches us that things (no pun intended) that are not material are immaterial, or not relevant. Consequently, by the stroke of the modern pen we wave off all spiritual reality as non-material and therefore immaterial. But immateriality is a judgment, not a rational, logical conclusion.
Our institute of integrity
I wrote a previous column on institutional integrity. In that column I repeated my wishful prayer below:
My prayer for Malaysia therefore is that the new president of our Integrity Institute will then set up an entire division for reviewing institutional integrity of all our public institutions in Malaysia. “Kebanyakan cakap tak serupa bikin.”
I now have reason to understand that this new president has received his appointment letter and will start real work by June 1, 2015.
Therefore, my next four columns are also dedicated to his term of office; both, to him personally and to them, institutionally. He knows well that all of us out here are prepared to help him re-establish the integrity in this nation-state, which Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (Pak Lah, photo )) hoped for when he set up this one-of-a-kind institution in Malaysia.
My friend is also exceptionally qualified to help us achieve this, and we as Malaysians deserve a more conscious and knowledgeable definition of systems-level integrity.
What is systemic integrity?
Any system is organic and contains subsystems which are fractal replicas duplicated multiple times throughout of the whole system. So long as they incorporate all parts and parcels of the original DNA of the system; these subsystems remain enjoined and reflecting the original system. If not, like any viral infection in any system, the foreign DNA subsystems will invade the current system and take over the entire original system.
When that happens we call it ‘systemic failure of the original system.’ We see this evident in the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MBD) right now. In human terms, it means death of the human body as a system. Cancer violates the human person in exactly this way.
In the case of national sovereignty, it means a total and complete intervention by a foreign system or culture, values and beliefs. This is made real by Isil’s agenda in the Middle East. They promote something the rest of the world hates.
In terms of Organisational Culture (i.e. a real and existing culture of any organisation as originally envisaged by the founders and owners; usually recorded as history to teach and guide future generations), it means the introduction and a new and different culture and organisation philosophy, but which is totally alien to the incumbents, and therefore is usually rejected.
Human dignity and culture
Any change of values, beliefs and attitudes is only possible if the majority of incumbents want and willingly adopt such a change usually incorporated by new leadership. Otherwise, all such change will be rejected over time, as only some people will accept it some of the time, and the middle majority will reject it over a longer frame of time.
To me, this is going to be the abject failure of PAS leadership as they choose to ‘impose Islamic values by force and by the backdoor’, as my dignity studies established that our God-ordained human dignity which belongs to every human being cannot be bought or renegotiated with material forms of exchange or compulsion.
Human dignity is the presence of personality and an image of God that every human experiences integrally as part and parcel of his/her identity and such a sense cannot be simply changed or manipulated by anyone else; so long as the human person is educated to know their personal identity as a citizen of our modern world.
Alternatives models were possible in the feudal world of the past. Social media technology has changed all that permanently, and will do more.
Institutional integrity in Malaysia
I have been reflecting, in this column series, on the question of whether we would ever become 1Bangsa of Malaysians. My answer to that question is, not, if we cannot establish serious and honest integration between all our people groups or ethnicities while recognising the historic Organisational Culture already argued for and defined within our Document of Destiny; as Professor Shad Saleem Farouqi calls our federal constitution.
My next four columns will review different aspects of the lack of integrity which are obvious to those who can see through all the façade and smokescreens. Politics is only interpretations of both; current reality, and the potential future of this nation-state by different players, who hope to influence the future in different directions. I am simply arguing for yet another direction.
Please enjoy reading and carry on your interactions but I am taking a break of one month and will rejoin you all sometime in June 2015. Thank you and May God bless Malaysia.
