Ideological Considerations
What?
Ideological considerations would include factors such as the goals being focused on, the queries within those goals, as well as potential partnerships you may want to establish for the program. These considerations would also guide conversations amongst participants throughout the different stages of the program. To help you better understand what we mean by ideological considerations and how they might change according your objectives, here is summary:
1. Goals/themes
Goals are the broad subject areas that you would want discussions to be conducted on. To narrow down on the goals that you would want to focus on, you should assess your objective for conducting the program.
If your objective is to explain the Methodology, then you can use a diverse set of goals to diversify conversations and help participants understand how the Methodology would play out for different topics. However, if the objective of your program is to use the Methodology to find solutions to a particular goal or problem, then you could narrow down on the goal that would initiate conversations on that topic.
At The F.A.I.R. Project, given that our objective is in part to explain the Methodology, we conduct conversation on the 8 goals of 8one which include: Well-being, Gender Equality, Peace, Environment, Hygiene, Nutrition, Education and Employment.
However, if you would want to focus on solutions for the goal of Hygiene, then you could have queries specifically on topics surrounding Hygiene.
2. Queries
While a theme is a broad goal, queries are those questions within the theme which participants would answer. It is recommended to structure the query in the form of a question which is broad, yet familiar. In terms of it being broad, the subject of the query should be wide enough for participants to explore it from different standpoints. With respect to familiarity, the query should be something that participants would broadly know about, something they may have seen around them or experienced.
The number of queries would depend on the number of themes and the number of participants.
For example, if you have one theme i.e., Hygiene and 20 participants, then you can have 5 queries within the theme of Hygiene. This would also ensure that participants are evenly divided in groups.
At The F.A.I.R. Project, one query is structured for each of the 8 goals wherein the 32 participants are divided into 8 groups of 4. This is illustrated below:
Well-being:
Mental health assistance walks a tight rope between timely intervention and becoming a trigger. Do we need to underplay our public communication of mental health while privately engaging with individuals aggressively?
Gender Equality:
In an attempt to balance the gender equality narrative, are we destined to be exclusionary or is a prioritised approach the most efficient way forward?
Peace:
Recognising that peace processes often originate from the existence of conflicting views between minorities and majorities, are there scenarios where the majoritarian lens is not the one through which peace is viewed?
Environment:
Acknowledging that technological and industrial advances have allowed for progress that would otherwise have been unthinkable, is it right to now question our environment’s ability to foster innovation?
Hygiene:
Is there a dichotomy between personal and community hygiene which leads to a situation where positive personal habits result in lower community hygiene and parallelly, put those in charge of the latter at risk?
Nutrition:
Within the paradox that exists between food wastage and food shortage, are countries justified in prioritising food over nutrition, or is this notional distinction the cause for further widening the food security gap?
Education:
Recognising the extent of both absolute and disguised unemployment, is there a need to further vocationalise our education system in contrast to the policy calls for promoting liberal education?
Employment:
While universal basic income aims to reduce income inequality by securing individuals and allowing them to choose their career paths, does it ignore ‘reward without effort’ as being a well-established demotivating factor?
How?
While you could use the same dimensions of the flagship program of The F.A.I.R. Project, you could also tailor each of these factors in a manner that would help serve your capacities and objectives better.
The F.A.I.R. Project is conducted for individuals between the ages of 18-27 years. Given this age range, the themes of the program were structured as complex questions to increase deliberations and to help participants with their thought process. The use and access to resources also played an important role in this. Similarly, the role of the team members with respect to explanations was deliberately short to help participants gather their own understanding. However, you can choose to customise this to better fit the age range you choose. For example, if the age group you want to interact with is from 14 – 18 years, then your themes would be structured in a manner that is more relevant to them.
Therefore, as long as you have the broader ideas in place, the remaining program would become easier to accustom to.