dimensions of power

‘As we know, there are known knowns – things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns – that there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns – the things we don’t know we don’t know’.

1) The sheep, shepherds, and farmers compete for power over choices and decisions, and you know who has power by seeing whose choices / preferences prevail - 'success in decision-making'. Maybe this is like the known knowns - things we can see. The rustlers, bandits, drifters, and gypsies have little success in this decision-making.

2) The above ignores 'non-decisions' - matters that never appear on the agenda, cos not perceived as relevant, or deemed inappropriate, etc, or simply because the agenda consists of responding to someone else's agenda imposed from elsewhere e.g. by people like HMI's etc......some agenda's are privileged. Abandoning the annual slaughter of sheep and cattle is never an agenda item ..........the debate tends to be narrow - how many cattle to send to market and for what price.

NJR
When my kids were little I gave them a choice at weekends of 3 things we could do - they got to choose.....democracy in action. There were actually 7 things we could have done, but I never told them about the other four - the rustlers, bandits, drifters, and gypsies.

Maybe this is sometimes like the known unknowns - we sense the agenda is incomplete, but we comply with it because we cannot articulate or see the alternatives properly, or don't want to rock the boat, or we want to please the farmer or shepherds, etc. We sense the rustlers, bandits, drifters, and gypsies are there, may even be a bit enticed by them, but their presence can't be expressed.

3) Manipulation / shaping people's preferences / wants. Some things are just not perceived, they are 'non-issues' - unknown unknowns....... long-term agenda-setting has shaped the sheep's preferences and mind-set.....they think like the farmer and shepherds on all the key issues - the farmer's paradigm sets the boundaries and limits. The farmer, shepherds, and sheep bicker a lot about details and minor things, but none of them can grasp the concept of vegetarianism. The rustlers, bandits, drifters, and gypsies are still there, but there are fewer of them, and they are outlaws.

The bandits, et al, are all those alienated by the mainstream agenda, paradigm, and personality types, because they are not catered for by them. Some are runaway sheep, and others are rogue farmers and shepherds. But each of the four also represents ideas - alternatives. To know what these alternatives are you have to talk to them - but they are wary, sceptical, disbelieving. You also have to talk to the sheep, because vegetarianism is the real interest of the sheep, and they could be coaxed out of the meat eating paradigm.
But it's hard and slow................and the bandits, et al, are doing their own thing in the highplains.
Not much help really am I. I'm away with the gypsies, et al, and we're engaged in what we're each doing - and FE has lost us.

There's a recent book you may want to read.....'The Art of Not Being Governed', by James Scott .....and other books of his. College managers, HMI, etc, have rarely read them.