At Dunya, we are continuously stressing the use of cross-cultural and intercultural tools, models and approaches in order to convey the added value of intercultural resources within companies and organisations. In this context, earlier on this forum we have discussed the dhammavijaya of Emperor Ashok, and we have established that in this, Ashok was absolutely a role model with regard to sustainability, ethical governance and corporate social responsibility.

Key to it all was the aspect of building a fully committed community, and it is in this area, most of all, that best practices, warnings and lessons are there for the taking.

Clearly, the Ashok vision on how to build a community, and what kind of qualities an ideal community would entail, was modern by all means, and we might very well be bedazzled by the sheer enormity of the enterprise.

But let us not be fooled too easily. For just as any of modern clients of the near endless procession of so-calledly innovator training organizations and brightly refreshing management gurus, all with their self-acclaimed uniquely adequate USPs, must have realised: those who really present new stuff are few and far between. And surely, the consultant who whispered dhammavijaya into the ears of the Emperor was no exception.

Indeed, even the project headline itself, dhammavijaya, the Conquest by Righteousness, was coined not by Ashok or his principal advisor, but by no less an authority than Kautilya, aka Chanakya (350-285 BC), the chief minister to his grandfather Candragupta, and author of two of the greatest classics on management of all times, A Manual on Justice (arthashaastra) and A Manual on Leadership (neetishaastra). But apart from the name of the program, what Ashok and his project team envisage is clearly the development of some kind of a co-operative community along the lines of the sangha, a Pali concept copied from the Buddhist community, which had existed in India for about three to four centuries, and a word which can roughly be translated as an association, an assembly, or a community, with a commonly shared vision, a common goal, and a common purpose.

To appreciate what the sangha really means in the historial Buddhist context, the best thing to do is to refer the suttanipaata texts, which are chanted on a daily basis till this day by all theravaada communities in the world. For our current purpose, it is most in particular the ratanasutta, or Discourse on the Jewels (but literally A String of Jewels), which draws our attention. The essay, which is meant as an invocation of the triple gem of the teacher (buddha), the project (dhamma) and the community (sangha),  is arranged according to a meticuously planned outline, each part of which is easily identified by the recurrent verse etena saccena suvatthi hotu, straightforwardly translated as by this truth, may there be hapiness – which of course is nothing else than the pritiraso or general personal satisfaction referred to in the Ashok dhammavijaya.

Now what are the qualities of the  community (sangha) proper? From the text itself these may not be easily identified since, as is the case with so many of the Pali suttas, the stanzas in praise of the sangha are uncommonly rich in shortscript, brief references and allusions – which means that the reader is supposed to have an in-depth knowledge of the fundamental teachings of Buddhist philosophy. As a matter of fact, exactly for this reason the proper meaning of the ratanasutta has often been named by many authors, commentators, coaches and trainers elusive rather than enlightening. This is a shame, for not much more than some basic research reveals a text which is a pure delight for any reader, and with this I mean not just the Buddhist monk or daily practicioner, but the general public as well, and even (or most in particular) the student of leadership, people management studies and organizational development.

First of all, the text refers to who are the members of the community, the sangha, and it says that these are eight persons constituting four pairs. Now, having recovered from our initial bafflement from this weirdest of sentences, we see that, most interestingly, the sangha seems to be organized not along the lines of any kind of truly hierarchical structure, but rather along the lines of what we would call in current management vocabulary a division according to the degree of development of competences. Indeed, the four pairs refer to the four degrees of competence development identified by the historical Buddha. The proper denominations of the four steps need not concern us here, for not only are they poetic by nature, they also deal with specific degrees of gaining full enlightenment in a purely Buddhist frame of reference. What tickles me, however, is the inspirational insight, perfectly in line with the methods and constructs of modern competence management, that competence comes by degree, and that each step constitutes a pair, of which entering the path (magga) comes first and achieving the fruits (phala) is the second. The sangha, then, is the community of everyone involved in the process, from beginners to experts.

Furthermore, the ratanasutta, in the same stanza, claims that for every member of the community, what is given to them yields abundant fruit. Clearly, then, in a true community or sangha, everything is about give and take.

Now that we know who the members of the sangha are, we are about to learn more of their commonly shared commitment to the targets of the project. Of this, the ratanasutta explains that all the stakeholders are

steadfast in mind,

well applied in the community,

free from external disturbances,

winning their targets,

and reaching deathless emancipation, 

where they are always ready to enjoy satisfaction which is obtained without receiving tangible personal benefits. 

Further down, the tenth stanza of the ratanasutta explores the overall goal of the Community of Righteousness Project: No sooner than the assembly of stakeholders achievies full competence, reaching the last level of competence in its phala or fruit-bearing aspect, the text goes, the three main weaknesses of the ordinary community are cast aside, viz.

the illusion of an identifiable identity (akkaaya ditthi),

doubt (vicikicchitam),

and whatever faith in rites and cults (silabbatam vaapi yadatthi kinci), or, translating this in a slightly more common-sense context, blind faith in conventional models and approaches.

But this is not all. Achieving full competence also means that all members of the community are freed from committing the six sins (chacaabhi thaanaani abhabbo kaatum), the poem declares – and any Buddhist would immediately recognize these as (1) having improper thoughts or ill faith, (2) using idle language, (3) acquiring undue material gain, (4) willingly speaking untruly, (5) committing violence against living beings, and (6) behaving improperly towards each other.

In other words: all members of the community are now fully committed to the commonly established goals. 

A formidable endeavour indeed, this sangha. And notoriously demanding as such, even for the nuns and monks of the original Buddhist order, let alone for the lay members of just any community.

Surely, the originality of Ashok, if not with the initial proposition of the conceptual ideas of dhammavijaya and community (or sangha) building, has been with the daring innovation of introducing to the general public a prerequisite for kings from Kautilya and a community challenge for monastical purposes from the historical Buddha – both with the aim of establishing a society in which every member would at the one hand have full ownership of its vision and mission and values, and at the other would be entitled to fully enjoy the output and the benefits thereof.

Francis Laleman