It’s not completely clear to me whether the question is:
What are the forms that SoFA has?
vs
What forms of capital does SoFA have that individuals value and how?
I’ll go with the first
- Material Capital – Mostly somewhat abstracted assets like web domain names and virtual servers, and services as Ted mentioned. SoFA has few material assets.
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Intellectual Capital – This is a huge facet of what SoFA has and the primary capital asset SoFA leverages, and seeks to grow and develop! The interesting thing is that the value of this asset will diminish to the degree SoFA’s mission is completed
I dream of the day when SoFA’s worked itself out of a job
However, we don’t just have sociocracy as intellectual capital, but a host of associated ‘social technologies’ from NVC to agile and beyond. They have varying degrees of formalization and adoption within SoFA though.
- Experiential Capital – Perhaps this will continue to be the capital that SoFA can never quite loose (provided it keeps it up!) even as other learn the intellectual elements of socicoracy. SoFA also has growing capital in the way of nonprofit and business management, not to mention an wealth of experiences through case studies both published and un-published.
- Cultural Capital – It seems there’s great overlap between intellectual capital and cultural capital for SoFA - I think there’s much that could be said about the overlap and difference between the two, however for me it comes down to praxis. The culture of what we do and how we do it. The individuals of SoFA bring so much in the details, such as the words we say as we close meetings, how we present concepts, and the many ways we embody the practice of sociocracy.
- Social Capital – It’s clear that SoFA has a huge amount of social capital via the relationships that specific individuals have, especially in the intentional communities sector. I look forward to seeing how Ecosystems Circle and Sector Circles can really cultivate that! Excited about that vision for sector circles in particular @rhonda.baird (Ecosystem Circle’s recently selected leader!) Intentional Communities circle was recently talking about having a Pacific Northwest Ambassador (@marilyn.kakudo ). It’s also an International circle thing! (@lea.shani ) I really appreciate the ways polyglot-ism and supports social capital across national and cultural boundaries, and I think there can never really too much of that!
- Natural Capital – SoFA does not have any natural capital as it has no rights to any natural properites or assets.
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Spiritual Capital – To me, sociocracy is radical - as in fundamental, from the ‘roots’ - and this is a spiritual shift. It cannot be untangled from the deepest philosophies. For me, it is a practice of the balancing of yin and yang in Daosim, the profound respect for autonomy seen in Anarchy, the deep acknowledgement of the complex mutualistic relationships and perspectives that are embodied in folk cultures the world over. These things are spirituality. For me, the praxis is spirituality. The bi-directional practice of bridging the gap between our experience and our understanding, and bringing our understanding into reality. This is a practice of doing that together.
It seems clear that for others as well there is spiritual benefit. Most recently this came up in a performance review. The significant, profound and ongoing personal growth individuals have spoken to from their experiences working with SoFA is apparent, but highly personal.
To me, this again is a synthesis… of the intellectual, cultural, social, and experiential capital all being shared. - Financial Capital – SoFA has some financial assets, you can check out our budget here! It doesn’t describe all of them, but it might be interesting to know that some folks donated stocks with last year’s year end fundraiser - did you see the “magic is where people get together” song?!
What’s interesting about many of these capital elements is that many are generative.
Perhaps it depends on how each are used, but it seems clear that things like intellectual, social, spiritual can’t exactly be spent. Rather, the more they are given and shared, the more they grow.
This is interesting when looking at conventional capital models and management techniques which tend toward a model of capital which is scarce.
Natural capital is an extra interesting example, where in this modern world regenerative management techniques are rarely used (when we could be! - see permaculture…).
Also true for regenerative currency modules and different economic frameworks than are most endemic in this age.
It reminds me of the book Sacred Economics. Perhaps a book club possibility