OPUS AT 25:
THE NEXT GENERATION

Report of an OPUS Workshop
held on Saturday 17th May 2003
at
College Hall, University of London,
Malet Street, London WC1E 7HZ

CONVENOR

Gabriella Braun - OPUS Associate

INTRODUCTION

Aim

• To begin preparing for the next 25 years by developing creative relationships across generation within OPUS.

Task

• To explore relationships and the impact of, for example, competition, envy and authority, between generations in society overall, and in OPUS specifically.

• To consider ways in which relationships between generations in OPUS can be developed creatively.

This report is necessarily subjective. Other views
are welcomed as part of taking forward this agenda.

KEY ISSUES

The key issues emerging from the workshop seem to me to capture some of the tensions about succession generally, and be particularly important in thinking about how OPUS moves forward:

• The issue of what is known and not known, and by whom; what is kept hidden; an opaqueness in the way OPUS operates (with an opaque management), was a major theme throughout the day. In giving feedback after the workshop, Tim (Dartington) commented on how taken he was with "the dynamic of collusive resistance (involving both establishment and new blood) to change, preferring opaqueness to clarity. . ." In stirring up loss, envy, rivalry, identity, placement/displacement, etc., dealing with succession and the changes it requires has to be difficult, but I wonder how much the issues also get used as a defence against change.
  
  
• Information in OPUS was seen as withheld at times. In reality, one piece of information which is withheld is about membership - the difference between being a member and an associate ­ why is it kept 'hidden'? And what does the fact that direct questions about membership seemed to be saved for informal spaces (over lunch), say about our culture and collusion?
  
  
• Curiosity about the past and origins was often met with frustration and irritation. In order to think about the present and future, we need to know something of the past, but how much do we use our curiosity to help us in thinking about the present and future, and how much does it mask our stuckness? Can the future look different, or can we only think of models which reflect our past? Are we then in basic assumption dependency ­ going back to history as a way of defending the status quo?
  
  
• There were two suggestions following on from the workshop that some kind of alternative or temporary structure was set up within OPUS to take forward succession issues. Do we believe that our existing structure is inadequate for this? Specifically, is the management group felt to lack the desire or capacity to lead our future? In part, this seems to represent an ambivalence about whether a new organisation is wanted, but it begs the question of how to exercise leadership, followership and authority and how to allow in new ideas without overturning the organisation. We need to think about the doubts ­ reality and fantasy ­ the cause and underlying purposes, so that we can try to identify when we are using them to move forward, and whether at times some of the doubts also serve to keep us where we are.
  
  
• Absence was seen as both those who weren't there ­ the missing generation ­ and what couldn't be said. Perhaps what was absent was a third voice or position: while there were three generations present (established, middle and new), the discussion often seemed to split into 'old' versus 'new', keeping us in a binary position. I wonder if part of the struggle at the workshop was between basic assumption and work group fight/flight, i.e. using aggression constructively or destructively for succession and development.
  
  
• There was some feeling that it was particularly difficult to look forward at the moment and think about the future, given what is happening in the world. Perhaps the challenge for us is to think about how we mirror succession issues from our global and national society, so that we can manage them a little more effectively.
  
  

WORKSHOP SUMMARY

Morning Session

Twenty five people signed up for 'OPUS at 25'. On the day, there were 21 participants. At the opening plenary participants identified their expectations of the workshop. The key themes were present throughout the day:

1. belonging;
2. succession;
3. absence, loss, death, and regeneration;
4. OPUS ­ why are we in it, what's its purpose, how does it operate.

The main session of the morning was in three pre-allocated, mixed OPUS generation groups (i.e. the length of time involved with OPUS). The task was to think about issues for different generations in society (e.g. in organisations, families, political groups) and in OPUS (e.g. as 'established' or 'new' members). Each group identified themes they wanted to take forward in the afternoon session.

The Broderick Room

The key themes in this group were:

• Age and death: being in-between ages ­ neither the old guard, nor the new; the wish for inertia ­ and death ­ against the wish for movement ­ and rebirth.
  
  
• Life today: different experiences of different generations; previously a certain/fixed life plan, now uncertainty; previously a sense of purpose/belonging.
  
  
• Authority and the Age: what does authority mean in a world of leaders who are not elected? Authority lost to authoritarianism; impact of technology on authority; the scripted news/media ­ the manipulation making it difficult to know what's real.
  
  
• OPUS before and now: a feeling that taking one's authority has been lost in OPUS ­ can we allow for different approaches? Often no product or outcome; if the outcome is to change society, why is this not addressed? OPUS as a Dickensian organisation ­ is it like the Masons (it does not allow people to join and information about membership is withheld)?

The themes identified to take forward were:

• OPUS and democracy:
  
  
  • Who wants it?
  • How to exercise stewardship (continuity and change).
    
    
• Political Dimension
  
  
  • What is OPUS for?

The Founders Room

The key themes in this group were:

• Belonging in OPUS ­ e.g. would new people fit in?
  
  
• Loss, death and regeneration ­ e.g. the pain of getting old; the optimism of youth pulled away by those nearer the end of life; is OPUS relevant to the missing generation; OPUS finding its way again now and taking ideas out of what is known.
  
  
• Change and development in society and in OPUS ­ e.g. global openness versus secrecy; where will technology and politics go and how is this mirrored in OPUS? Is handing-over an illusion? Does the younger generation necessarily seize power and/or does the older generation give it?

The themes identified for taking forward were:

• Handing over:
  
  
  • Are they the right hands?
  • Is there an idea that there is something to hand-over?
  • Is power handed over, evolved or seized can multiple power sources coexist?
    
    
• Taking over:
  
  
  • How are the tensions managed between old and new?
  • Is it a smooth transition, gradually evolving?
  • What about the violence expressed by separation/differences?
    
    
• Environmental affects of change/technology:
  
  
  • What is open and what is not?
  • Who is in the know and who not?
  • Choice versus closed debate.

The Robinson Room

The key themes in this group were:

• Belonging: who belongs where; where do we come from and can fundamental aspects of our past be taken forward into the present? The dislocation of transition (involving shame and sacrifice) ­ the price of belonging? Tension between belonging/separateness and intensity of tension between feelings of inclusion/exclusion; belonging here, now ­ fantasies of being the only new member.
  
  
• OPUS: what did we look for in OPUS? The pecking order in OPUS ­ how we move through the generations; finding our level; envy and competition versus love and merging; a notion of schooling the next generation so that the old generation can step aside/feel pride in the succession.
  
  
• Appreciation between generations.

The themes identified for taking forward were:

• Working with absence
• The young liking what they hear from the old
• What don't we tell them?

Plenary

In the plenary at the end of the morning the ambiguity about OPUS itself was highlighted in its name: OPUS versus Opus dei ­ a secret Catholic society. What can and cannot be brought in was important: the absence of people or a generation at the workshop; the absence of talk about envy and competition (one new member had felt as though she had dropped a bomb in her group when she raised this) ­ did these represent what could not be allowed? Difficulty in understanding between generations seemed to get expressed in, for instance, concerns that groups would not understand each other's presentations. One member commented that new isn't always beautiful, but can be quite vulgar. I connected this to someone saying in the Founders room, that some organisations should just die. Was this, I wondered, about OPUS and linked to a fear that the new generation (which in part I was representing) will not maintain the line of succession, but is vulgar, unwanted?

Afternoon session

In the afternoon, participants chose a group (on the basis of the topics being worked on). One of three groups was abandoned (due to lack of people); it didn't seem irrelevant that this was the group in the Founders room and that the themes they were going to take forward were perhaps the most overt in terms of succession.

When members of this group joined the other two groups, it became clear that they had unconsciously divided by generation, with the 'founders' or 'establishment' joining other founders in the Robinson room (the group which in the morning had the three of the four absent members). Had the Founders group frightened people off one member questioned.

Robinson Room
The Robinson room continued to be the smallest group; there were now eight participants, five of whom were from the 'old' OPUS generation; one 'middle' and two from the 'new' OPUS generation. They included the Director and the two longest serving members of the Management Group present at the workshop. Some of the original members had thought that this might be the abandoned group.

The themes were:

• Absence: this theme continued from the morning; what can't be brought, what gets transmitted between generations? Children never find out about the parents ­ they are excluded from the primal scheme. The fantasy of golden age, that we spoil with our conception?
  
  
• Tradition, religion, morality: was there not enough encouragement to associates to let their minds go ­ to play? What is kept out, with a model of OPUS in the mind that is serious and disapproving of acting out? An image of a highly moral synagogue like holding on to tradition. Instead, the group were feeling staid, with no space for anti-social adolescents. An 'old' member was concerned at seeing OPUS as a religion or a cult (an abusive closed system) ­ he could more accept that it operates as a sentient group in basic assumption pairing. A new member wondered what would be tolerated ­ a radical feminist group? The idea of a confederation of perspectives.
  
  
• The past: old soldiers' stories' were told. All death was traumatic - Pierre Turquet, Eric Miller (what, thought one member, if Ken Rice had lived? How different might it have been?). The minority younger generation listened politely but got restless. Associations to "The Leopard", the ageing aristocratic losing his virility. Actual pairings in the past were difficult to look at. Olya (Khaleelee)was not being mentioned. A new member asked who the sexy pair are now.
  
  
• Envy: envy looking back on the Tavistock founders immediately post-war was described by one member, and there was acknowledgement of the need to recognise and dissipate that sort of envy. A link with a societal context of a certain kind was made: post-war was one thing, but now we are in a world now where there will always be war. How do we live with this sense of ever-present threat?

Broderick Room
This room now had 13 members, the majority of whom were middle or new generation. Was this, it was asked the evangelical group?

The themes were:

• The political dimension: what do we mean by that? Different views, e.g. political as questioning the war; campaigning but also understanding the political dimension's impact on our understanding; every intervention or lack of it is a political statement. The wish for (fantasy of) an organisation that represents all of its membership was talked about but, it was said, this organisation does not have a political voice.
  
  
• What is OPUS for: for society (a messianic brief) or the membership's development or society's development? Why named OPUS? Who is it accountable to? Democracy is limited; the concerns are the process rather than the outcome, so the results (application) vary with each member; if there were an OPUS view the process would get lost; what OPUS offers is its technology.
  
  
• How does OPUS operate: again talk about lack of transparency. Is it a management that offers benign neglect or negative capability? Ambivalence about whether a different organisation was wanted. Where is the power in OPUS? Outsiders and newcomers do not know. What can be known; is OPUS an elite; are we silenced to be members of the elite; can we speak and take authority?

Final plenary

The final plenary was difficult and fractious. There was a lot of talk about the opaqueness of OPUS and its origins (what were they, were they dubious, does it matter?) The issue of not knowing was keenly felt. The difference between not knowing, deliberately keeping things opaque and vague, and not wanting to know, was ambiguous. What was truth, what was myth? Was there opaqueness (largely identified by new members) or was this part of the myth (seen as such by some old members)? How useful were the myths and to whom? For a time we were stuck, with fighting between (some) 'old' and 'new'; creative dialogue between generations seemed very difficult. Where there was communication, it still felt like side taking (e.g. when an 'old' member joined 'new' voices in raising concern about the origins of the industrial society and relief that this was being talked about, it felt as though she had shifted sides). But, hope was also voiced ­ in raising the issues, having them out in the open, a possibility of creativity emerging from the conflict.

We began the plenary by getting feedback from the two groups. Whereas I invited the first group to do this, the second group made their own space. I connected this to the talk about attacks on management and opaqueness. My feeling of being superfluous in the plenary linked to my experience during the afternoon of finding it physically difficult to enter the Broderick room (which was crowded to bursting point), and being identified as the 'floater' as I entered the Robinson room at one point. In the plenary I became 'management.' This seemed to me to be both an attack on management (was I now seen as part of the 'opaque management'?), but also, given my holding in a sense representation of the new generation, an attack, sabotage, of that newness.

What sort of management was this? Who, people wanted to know, was behind it ­ who are the Directors? The fact that this information is published, suggested some desire not to know; this also seemed to be present in the feeling of not knowing, as an associate, how to make suggestions or give views.

It seemed that some of the inter-generational power struggle from the small groups was more active in the plenary. When a new(ish) member made a suggestion about OPUS having a research role, which was not taken up, a new member questioned whether individuals can take something forward, or whether we have to wait until we're asked. Will there be censorship? What will be allowed? Do we stop ourselves because we think we might be stopped?

The tensions and ambivalence were also about the political aspect of OPUS. How do we come together and under what banner: OPUS against war for instance, seemed unacceptable, but OPUS member against the war, was okay. We seemed to become, in our political and organisational agenda, revolutionaries versus diehards. The unifying factor was about the process of our work.

The workshop was seen as part of a process of change within OPUS. Perhaps, it was suggested, the talk about origins was part of the existing leadership putting down the burden; perhaps the idea of growth without death might now be set aside.


EXPERIENCE OF LEADERSHIP

Since my experience of running the workshop and producing this report is so bound up with the theme, I want to note it as part of the learning. I got extremely anxious before the workshop, when what suddenly and forcibly struck me, was that this was a kind of 'coming out': not only had I never run a workshop like this before, and not only did OPUS workshops seem exclusively run by the 'great and good', but in a workshop about succession, I was putting myself forward as a new generation leader. The prospect of what might come my way taking up this particular role, was rather daunting!

Producing the report has, I think, also been part of this process. I nearly, but didn't quite, finish it soon after the workshop. External circumstances aside, I'm sure this again related to my anxiety about exposure. Taking my authority, standing out, taking up a leadership role as an associate, as part of the new generation, evoked feelings and uncertainty about being good enough, acceptance/rejection, legitimacy. My role added to these feelings, but they are part of the emotional undertone we are operating in.

The reality was that I inevitably got attacked in my role, but I also got tremendous support, which I think suggests that alongside our collusive dynamics in our resistance to change, we have the willingness and capacity to engage in these issues.