Handbook Annex
POSTSCRIPT The preceding pages constitute an orientation HANDBOOK for potential use with new staff members, board members, volunteers, and other interested parties associated with the Institute of Cultural Affairs (ICA) in its many manifestations around the world. It has been licensed with Creative Commons...
Organizational Wisdom
How ICA Works: 4d
ICA demonstrates its values and keeps them alive as a learning organization During the past 50+ years, ICA has undergone many transitions. While some have involved subtle changes, others have been much more obvious. ICA has changed its name and strategic endeavors. Particular programs...
How ICA Works: 4c
ICA operates through consensus nurtured by facilitative leadership ICA's biggest program around the world, the "Technology of Participation (ToP)" ®, offers practical methods for consensus building. Yet, despite this background, ICA's history also includes many painful experiences of dysfunction when the consensus process went...
How ICA Works: 4b
ICA's commitment to diversity addresses systemic contradictions Biomimicry is an approach to innovation that seeks sustainable solutions to human challenges by emulating nature’s time-tested patterns and strategies. In the natural world, the more genetic variety within a species, the higher the likelihood of resisting...
What ICA Does: 3d
MENUMENUCollaborative Networking CollectionIErDAccelerate77ANCAMovement of Movements ICA connects people and organizations to spark collaboration An often-repeated phrase is "It's not what you know, it's who you know." It points to a truth: social change occurs when creative people connect and act with each other in...
What ICA Does: 3c
ICA facilitates group action and strengthens organizational capacities ICA's work is built on participatory methods that have evolved from many sources. At its heart is a commitment to the indicatives of life rather than the imperatives -- beginning with what "is," rather than what...
What ICA Does: 3b
ICA focuses on local responsibility and action within a global perspective Community development, where local responsibility is undertaken and driven by those who live, work, and are otherwise engaged in communities, has been a central feature of ICA programs since the beginning. Other particular...
What ICA Thinks: 2d
Culture is key to addressing economic and political contradictions Since its early days in the 1960s, a major feature of ICA’s community work has been to address issues in a comprehensive manner. While particular actions might be focused on immediate objectives, they are understood...
What ICA Thinks: 2c
Behavior changes when images change The concept of an “image” and its relationship to behavior has been foundational to all ICA programs since its very earliest days. It has provided the underlying theoretical framework for ICA’s educational and facilitation programs as well as its...
What ICA Thinks: 2b
The external situation is never the problem Life is full of limits that are beyond human control. These limitations, which we cannot change, are simply the given reality in which we live our lives. This reality, the external situation, is not our problem. It...