David,

I would like to say that the reason that I sent you those three items is because they are three ways that different people and groups evaluate well being. None of them is a blueprint for building community.

Maslow's pyramid of needs was developed looking at the development of individuals who in fact reached the top of the pyramid and one of the main points is that he contended that there was an order that had been (needed to be) followed for the path to self actualization.

Max-Neef was a Chilean economist concerned with third world human and economic development.

Max-Neef and his colleagues have developed a taxonomy of human needs and a process by which communities can identify their "wealths" and "poverties" according to how these needs are satisfied.

Human Scale Development is defined as "focused and based on the satisfaction of fundamental human needs, on the generation of growing levels of self-reliance, and on the construction of organic articulations of people with nature and technology, of global processes with local activity, of the personal with the social, of planning with autonomy, and of civil society with the state." (Max-Neef et al, 1987:12)

The main contribution that Max-Neef makes to the understanding of needs is the distinction made between needs and satisfiers. Human needs are seen as few, finite and classifiable (as distinct from the conventional notion that "wants" are infinite and insatiable). Not only this, they are constant through all human cultures and across historical time periods. What changes over time and between cultures is the way these needs are satisfied. It is important that human needs are understood as a system - i.e. they are interrelated and interactive. There is no hierarchy of needs (apart from the basic need for subsistence or survival) as postulated by Western psychologists such as Maslow, rather, simultaneity, complementarity and trade-offs are features of the process of needs satisfaction.

The inclusion of the MDGs was just to show the things that are currently viewed as measurable indicators of progress in human/cultural development.

With your definition of needs (needs for physical, emotional and economic security and hope for a better future as the basis for all the various kinds of organizations we form.), there are two things I would like to address:

1. NONE of the other models is a model for organizational formation or structure.
2. How does one measure hope? Here, I am not denying that this is a reason that people enter relationships or groups but I am not sure how you identify it.

My feeling is that when you are dealing with people in an organization, you would be wise to look at how Maslow and Max-Neef play out in the management. This has nothing to do with why people join an organization. I do think however, that attention to those needs identified by Maslow and Max-Neef will improve the quality of the interactions.

As a simple example:

One of the topics that kept coming up at the BALLE conference was businesses working to provide a living wage rather than a minimum or fair wage. This perspective is taking into consideration both the physiological and security needs of the people. We also heard of companies trying to build "family" kinds of ties that I would estimate are a hair deeper than friendship.

I could go on but I think you can see where I am going here.

As we study groups and organizations, we need to have things that are unambiguously identifiable and somehow measurable.