written with input from Dr Don Beck
August 2005

 

 

 

Each participant in designing the South African transition from Apartheid to multi-cultural democracy during the early-mid-1990s will have his/her own version of what happened - and it doesn't always suit the politicians to give too much credit to the 'backroom boys'!

 

What is beyond doubt is that Don Beck was involved and used Clare W Graves' (1970) model to replace the skin pigmentation and ethnic origin categories with an understanding of the value systems and ways of thinking universally accessible to the human race. This provided a new language to understand natural differences and anticIpate major personal and societal changes. 'Whites' could now see the differences between Black-RED and Black-ORANGE; 'Blacks' could acknowledge that Afrikaners/l948 were not the same as Afrikaners/l988. All groupings could recognise the evolutionary dynamic that was at work in all South Africans.

 

Beck built up, over a 16 year period, a network of contacts and personal relationships. He appeared often on television talk shows such as the popular Good Morning South Africa on SABC-TV and was a frequent guest on Radio 702 and other radio outlets. He lectured at academic institutions, before the various medical and scientific societies, and even the leadership of the Dutch Reformed Church. A series of six articles he had published in all the South African newspapers in April 1989 influenced the release of Nelson Mandela and the start of the peace process. Beck worked with the teams of Mandela, F W DeKlerk and Mangasuto Buthulezi in promoting the peace initiative and in designing the post-Apartheid economic, political and educational systems and structures.

 

Just how influential Beck was at this time is reflected in the following transcript from the official record of the Debates of Parliament (Hansard, pages 342-343) on Thursday 7 February l991. Dr F Hartzenberg, one of the leaders of the Conservative Party, was speaking. He was attacking FW De Klerk, leader of the National Party and the State President of South Africa:

 

DR HARTZENBERG: The ultimate is that the hon the State President's Manifesto is actually a version of the advice which Dr Don Beck of Texas gave the Government two years ago. It appeared in a series of articles in The Star of 29 April l989. Everything contained in the Manifesto is what he says has to be done. I shall not mention everything to hon members but he speaks inter alia of "nation building" and says that is what the hon the State President should do and that is what the hon the State President is announcing now.

 

THE MINISTER OF HEALTH SERVICES AND WELFARE (Representatives): Schlemmer says so too!

 

DR F HARTZENBERG: He says that all discriminatory legislation must be removed, and the hon the State President approves this. He has a third point to make, in addition to the other points which appear in exactly the same form in the hon the State President's Manifesto and which were announced by the hon the State President. He says: Finally, an extensive evolutionary model for change would have to be developed and this would require summit meetings of the leaders of all groupings in the country, First World and Third World.

 

Beck first went to South Africa in l981. After two or three subsequent visits Beck and Clare Graves decided that this would afford a unique opportunity to field test the entire Levels of Existence theory since all of the historic value systems were compressed in that microcosm of the entire planet. They then created what was first known as 'Strategic Evolution' as a practical programme to facilitate the massive transformation that would be required. During the final five years of his life, Graves consulted often with Beck to give advice and counsel at many of the critical transitional stages.

 

Beck and his South African colleagues used what became Spiral Dynamics to map out several possible futures for South Africa and predicted, along with others, the HIV/Aids crisis, the out-of-control crime rate, the high levels of corruption as well as other manifestations of the value system (vMEMETIC) contours in that society.

 

A personal annecdote...in June 1999 I fell into conversation with a group of visiting South African students in Leeds. To my surprise, they not only knew of Don Beck but regarded him as something of a 'political hero'. (Two of them had actually seen him speak at a university appearance.) One of them told me that, thanks to Beck's work, race would be a dead issue in South Africa inside five years - and these students were from the Transvaal, hard Boer Afrikaner stock from an inherently-racist tradition!"

Race-as-a-dead-issue has proved hopelessly optimistic but the students' comments give a flavour of just how much impact Beck and Clare Graves' ideas had in South Africa in the 1990s.

 

Beck's own account of his early work in South Africa is given in 'The Crucible: Forging South Africa's Future' (co-written with Graham Linscott in 1991). The best-seller was dedicated to Clare W Graves as he had died in the winter of l986 before he could witness the first large scale application of his seminal work. A sequel is now being planned to offer guidance for the next stage of South African emergence.

 

After the establishment of multi-cultural democracy, Beck was commended by both President Mandela and Chief Minister Buthulezi and honoured by a joint resolution of both houses of the Texas Congress. Below is an extract from the joint resolution, initially proposed in the House of Representatives:-

 

By Hunter of Taylor
HR No. 224 74R6013 KMP-D R E S O L U T I O N
1-1 WHEREAS, The Texas House of Representatives takes great pride
1-2 in commending a truly remarkable Texan, Dr Don Edward Beck, for
1-3 his invaluable contributions toward the peaceful creation of a
1-4 democratic South Africa; and...
2-2 WHEREAS, In 1979 this outstanding educator resigned his
2-3 tenured position at the University of North Texas to devote himself
2-4 fully toward ending apartheid in South Africa, a decision that
2-5 received strong support and required great sacrifice from his
2-6 loving wife and children; and
2-7 WHEREAS, During the next 15 years, Dr Beck worked behind the
2-8 scenes with governmental officials, civil rights leaders, business
2-9 investors and owners, and international diplomats to develop
2-10 successful strategies for attaining a more peaceful transition of
2-11 power in that troubled nation; during the final four years of this
2-12 transformation, he was the only private citizen from the United
2-13 States directly involved in the high-level negotiations that
2-14 ultimately led to the release of political prisoners and the
2-15 triumphant dissolution of the apartheid regime; and...let it be
RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives of the 74th Texas
3-3 Legislature hereby commend Dr Don Edward Beck on his many
3-4 extraordinary contributions toward peace and understanding in South
3-5 Africa and extend warmest best wishes to Dr Beck and his family
3-6 for success and happiness in their future endeavors; and, be it
3-7 further
3-8 RESOLVED, That an official copy of this resolution be
3-9 prepared as an expression of gratitude and high regard by the Texas
3-10 House of Representatives.

Many South Africans are active in applying the Gravesian-Spiral Dynamics package in the post-Apartheid age. Among these are Loraine Laubscher, Alan Tonkin, Gernia Van Niekerk and Andrew Barker.