The Origin of RDS:
A Cybernetic Response to Community Crisis
by Matt Taylor

Editor's Note: The following article provides context as to where the RDS idea came from. Since the early 1990's, MG Taylor and Affiliates have developed new capacities based upon the RDS model, including the RDS Response process described on this page.

When crisis hits a segment of our society, we have many mechanisms in place to respond to it. What is unfortunate, however, is that these are incremental, parts-focused, and tend to fix rather than recreate.

A process and tool kit is not provided that facilitates a large social system, such as a town or region, to move significantly beyond the conditions and intrinsic model that has just been so clearly proven to be vulnerable by the crisis. Too often, people just build back the same design-strategy - only "stronger."

The idea of the RDS is to deploy a capacity to facilitate a far better design process than happens in the political vacuum that is too often the afterbirth of a crisis. To provide a neutral, creative place where a community can deal with crisis and recreate itself. To do this without any upfront costs or obligations on the part of the community and then incorporate the community as part of a ValueWeb™ system going forward that returns the favor in an appropriate way, at the the appropriate time - a gift economy. Increasing returns.

Continued at matttaylor.com
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