For More Than Two Decades
Available solutions of high-to-highest impact get stuck in the system by default
Today
Our long-standing approaches — supposed to solve problems and provide efficiency — were designed for a world gone by
Future
Bureaucracy and fixed ways of thinking prevent us from solving the problems
Possibility
An enormous solution potential is waiting to be unleashed
May we invite you, for a few minutes, to:
Let go of the practices and thinking we have come to rely on and…
…listen to what a group of senior experts — faced with this getting stuck situation — discovered when they asked questions like:
What do decision-makers and initiative owners REALLY NEED…
To make the problem-solving decisions?
&
Get the impactful solutions through the system?
Where is the bridge between…
Theoretical models of science lacking executability
&
The requirement for solutions being executable, scalable and durable at the system levels?
We Are All Part of Nature
So are the organizations we work for, the environments around us, and the systems we have created
Nature thrives when the environment is healthy
Nature’s Wisdom is waiting to be (re-)discovered — to resolve the getting stuck situation and unleash available and new solution possibilities
Let’s bring Nature’s principles and a few of its easy-to-apply Laws back into decision-making — the place where the difference between fueling or solving these problems is made
Let’s do it by TOGETHER asking Hard-to-Ignore and Guiding Questions as One whenever decisions are made
Invitation to Contribute — at Any Level That Feels Right
From
Simply sharing Calls to Action containing Hard-to-Ignore Questions anyone can ask
To
Concrete intervention possiblities &
Co-creating impactful solution packages
Simply share the Calls to Action and/or invite others to ask the Hard-to-Ignore and Guiding Questions in One available through the calls.
Published calls and notifications for new Calls to Action:
YouTube notification level:
When decisions are to be made, simply ask the related Hard-to-Ignore Questions (see also Level 1).
When more information is needed, you can point people to where additional details are available. This information can be found in the Calls to Action, our collection of questions and the health check.
Example questions to prevent costly mistakes and foreseeable failure:
At this level, the door toward fresh thinking is opened. In your environment, you ask relevant Hard-to-Ignore & Guiding Questions in One, and start the dialogue. You might do the exercise in Manifesto Tutorial 3.3.
You are free to use your own approaches, practices, and tools, or those of third parties. However, there are a few requirements:
A personal goal could be:
At Level 4, an Executable Solution Framework is co-created for a specific task or project. This can be done by yourself, or with individuals who have the necessary experiences and skills.
In addition to Level 3, the following applies:
Requirements:
Your goals could be
You have familiarized yourself with the following Manifesto tutorial as well:
Why accepting:
When much of it can be resolved and prevented through:
Getting started:
YouTube notification level:
Getting Started
Case for Change
Our long-standing practices, models, best practices, and frameworks — supposed to solve problems and provide efficiency — were designed for a world gone by
In today’s world, they tend to cross Tipping Points
Continued use of these practices, models, best practices, and frameworks
beyond the Tipping Points has created:
1.
An EXPONENTIAL GROWTH of UNNECESSARY bureaucracy and complexity
2.
Capacity Bottlenecks everywhere — waiting lists, shortage of skilled personnel, full agendas, and so forth
3.
Bureaucracy-reduction projects that create more bureaucracy and complexity at the system level than they reduce within their scope
4.
Scale-up of impactful initiatives getting stuck by default — because the obstacles created by Points 1 to 3 now exceed what these initiatives can realistically afford to address.
Two Laws of Nature have guided us to the highest-impact solution for Points 1 to 4:
One word to select what works well and avoid what does not,
a simple policy, and
using the existing bureaucracy to embed the policy in decision-making
The extended case — including the policy — is available through Manifesto Tutorials 1 to 3.3
After More Than Two Decades of Failed Solution Attempts
No mathematics required
Examples: Tipping Point and Capacity Bottleneck Laws —
as undeniable as the Law of Gravity
Beyond the Tipping Points, further Nature-aligned approaches
— adaptive, relational, and intuitive —
can restore flow, trust, system balance, and effectiveness
Emile van Essen, Founding Chair of World Sustainability Fund:
As far as I know, this is the only initiative worldwide responding to the following at the level required:
The Skill Set for Solving Complex Problems was Applied
The Polymath Skill Set and Approach guided this Manifesto’s co-creators
From:
To:
1.
How SOLVABLE ROOT CAUSES can be identified in highly complex environments
Example: The lost ability to apply relevant Laws of Nature in decision-making — especially when these Laws cannot be expressed in exact ways
2.
A few Laws of Nature and SOLVABLE ROOT CAUSES guiding towards highest-impact solutions at the lowest costs and risks
3.
A common foundation and path to restore the health of systems — in institutions, organizations, across systems, and in everyday life
Applicability across …
And more
And more
And more
Free to Use
Provided the spirit of the Manifesto is maintained, the Mainfesto parts are free to use and can be shared via Creative Commons (CC) license, even commercially.
Polymath Practices Applied
Please observe that in complex environments — depending on the specific situation — practices shown after OVER remain necessary. Combining and complementing both types of practices can create far greater value than applying them separately.
Listening to what is REALLY NEEDED in TODAY’s WORLD to solve the growing problems we face
OVER
Applying what worked in a world gone by
Listening to what worked where our long-standing solution approaches failed us
OVER
Applying established models, best practices, frameworks, tools, trends, and long-standing ways of thinking
Taking on responsibility for the whole — at the system level
OVER
Partial solutions that leave too many obstacles, gaps and conflicts unsolved
Seeking the exact and verbal rules of the highest impact — at the highest system level
OVER
Seeking only exact rules or rules for a part
Designing Executable Solution Frameworks of high-to-highest impact for the system level — FROM THE BEGINNING
OVER
Designing solutions for a part and assuming what works in a part can be scaled up in complex environments
More information about this skill set is available at Wikipedia and
through Manifesto Tutorial 3.4.3: A Skill Set for Solving Complex Problems
This led to
Fundamental Gaps and Conflicts in Today’s Thinking
The following gaps and associated conflicts prevent us from recognizing and unleashing the vast potential of available solutions
Gap 1:
What needs to be done DIFFERENTLY to unleash the enormous solution potential available today?
Gap 2:
We have not found people or entities working on or willing to address the gaps in this box to the required levels for executability and scalability in TODAY’s WORLD
What do decision-makers and their advisors REALLY NEED to make the problem-solving decisions?
What do initiative owners, innovators, experts, and project managers REALLY NEED to make their solutions executable, scalable, and durable at the SYSTEM LEVEL?
What delivered the needed results where our long-standing solutions failed us?
What delivered the HIGHEST IMPACT at the LOWEST COSTS and RISKS at the SYSTEM LEVEL?
Question:
Where are our leaders and influencers who take on the responsibility to get these questions answered to the levels required and give solution attempts a fair chance?
Gap 3:
New patterns observed
To solve complex problems, multiple groups need to work together. But the same expressions and practices — that get people on board within one’s own group — trigger people in other groups to conclude”this won’t work.” Consequences are a lack of support, resistance, and getting stuck.
As multiple groups must work together, adjusting communications and practices to fit each group’s expectations does not work anymore
Question for top-down and bottom-up initiatives:
Why communicate “my initiative won’t deliver the promised results or will fail” when this can be prevented?
Gap 4:
High-level demands and calls from movements, initiatives, and institutions
versus
Decision-makers, their advisors and experts missing the education, experience and knowledge to resolve gaps identified here
Question:
Where are the demands and calls that address what decision-makers, advisors, and experts actually need to make problem-solving decisions?
Gap 5:
Today’s typical approach to go about complex problems like those at the top of this page is to break them into parts
The following patterns emerged:
Solvable root causes of the highest damage and impactful solutions are missed, as they lie outside the addressed parts
Individuals with the skills and experiences to solve complex problems (Polymaths, neurodiverse, etc.) have been excluded by vacancy criteria and job advancement processes for more than two decades
Questions:
How can complex problems – let alone the Polycrisis – be solved while these patterns appear to be the standard situation in organizations?
The Law of Nature ManifestoTM
For Solving Complex Problems
Manifesto Approach
What matters is that the gaps and conflicts identified above, as well as environment-specific gaps and conflicts, are resolved to the level where:
1.
Decision-makers, their advisors, and experts know the Laws of Nature relevant to their fields and how to apply them — especially when they cannot be expressed in exact ways
2.
Solutions are designed — FROM THE BEGINNING — for being executable, scalable and durable at the desired system level (implementation can start in a small environment)
3.
Available and new solutions of High-to-Highest Impact get through the systems with high speed and reliability
When using the Manifesto:
The Manifesto
INTERVENTION POSSIBILITIES of the HIGHEST IMPACT at the LOWEST COSTS and RISKS
1.
Let go of the thinking that created the growing problems. Keep what works well: what works well and fresh approaches complement each other for far-reaching effects.
Patterns of what communicates “too much of the same thinking that created the growing problems”
These 8 Manifesto intervention possibilities and 7 more in two extensions
2.
Listen to what delivered the needed results where our long-standing solution approaches failed us
3.
Intervene where the highest impact can be made at the lowest costs and risks™ AT THE SYSTEM LEVEL
After 2+ decades of failed solution attempts, large groups have learned to intuitively recognize when a new solution attempt or movement applies too much of the same thinking that created the growing problems. They respond with a lack of interest and support or opposition.
Common patterns of ‘the same thinking that created the problems’ include:
Hard Laws of Nature, typically available from physics, mathematics, chemistry, and biology cannot be overruled or ignored. Nature does not allow it. Yet, it happens day in and day out, resulting in huge damage, such as crippling bureaucracy, available solutions getting stuck in the system, resistance, and violent opposition. Several of the same laws provide practices to intervene where the highest impact can be made at the lowest costs and risks AT THE SYSTEM LEVELS. That’s without worrying about mathematics and across industries, fields, and challenges.
A simple introduction of the two Laws of Nature almost certain to occur in complex environments is available through the Manifesto Tutorials 1 & 2 of the Guidance Package of Intervention 4.
One word, derived from two Laws of Nature, is bound to provide the highest-impact solution at the lowest cost and risk for the crippling bureaucracy and overwhelming complexity. It prevents decision-makers and experts from unconsciously fueling bureaucracy and enables them to select practices that reduce bureaucracy, resistance, and opposition.
How this word can be applied is available via the Guidance Package of Intervention 4, Tutorial 3.3: One Word to Make …
4.
Resolve the knowledge-experience-solution gap of how complex problems can be solved by TREATING IT AS A SINGLE GAP
With the growing problems being complex and the long-standing solution attempts having failed us for 2+ decades, it has become evident that the gap of how to solve complex problems must be resolved with a fresh approach.
When the Manifesto’s co-creators could not find any group, institute, or organisation addressing or taking on this matter at the required levels in the field, they took it on. Highest-impact knowledge from science and experiences with what delivered needed results where our long-standing approaches failed us, led to an extension of this closing-the-gap intervention and a Guidance Package of surprisingly short video tutorials.
5.
Get solution possibilities EARLY ON over the Tipping Point where they become executable, scalable, and durable at the SYSTEM LEVEL
The Guidance Package of Intervention 4 includes a fresh approach to get over this Tipping Point EARLY ON. This approach is available through Tutorial 3.4.2. When, despite the efforts, it remains unclear how this Tipping Point can be crossed, foreseeable failure can be prevented by:
It is clear how the system level can be achieved and this is part of the identified approach. Differences with the long-lasting but failed approach of ‘start small, scale up (and get stuck)’ are:
Scalability and system-level needs can be dropped when the problem to solve is within a small environment and the following criteria are met:
The early-on need can be dropped when the criteria for a small environment are met, and the analysts and solution designers are highly experienced in the cross-disciplinary knowledge and solution possibibilites of this Manifesto.
1 Value includes non-financial value such reducing (virtual) capacity bottlenecks like those of skill shortages, productivity improvement from motivated employees, and clients trusting vendors and institutions
6.
Ignite the PROBLEM-SOLVING thinking by asking THE SAME HARD-TO-IGNORE QUESTIONS which guide DECISION-MAKERS and EXPERTS to the HIGHEST-IMPACT SOLUTIONS
Examples
When decisions are to be made, the following questions can be asked:
The Manifesto’s collection of HARD-TO-IGNORE questions guiding to HIGHEST-IMPACT SOLUTIONS
7.
Verify decisions against relevant Laws of Nature, Core Human Values, Essential Behaviours and Value Cases
Decisions with far-reaching consequences are made day in and day out. Decision-making is the ‘place’ where the difference between fueling or solving the growing problems we face is made.
Manifesto Tutorials 1, 2, and 3.2 of the above-mentioned Guidance Package identify:
Tutorial 3.3 identifies how a single word, derived from two Laws of Nature, opens the door to get out of this trap and how this drastically reduces bureaucracy and complexity.
What created the gap: Observed patterns
Until the late 1990s, decision-making was based on a combination of numerical and pattern-based information1. Thereafter, it was believed that decisions should be predominantly based on hard information such as numbers, dollars, and euros, along with step-by-step proof. However, this approach only works up to the Tipping Point of complexity, and this critical limitation was overlooked. Beyond this Tipping Point, even mathematics cannot provide reliable outcomes.
Missing this limitation led to pattern-based information being overlooked and overruled by numerical and bureaucratic requirements, resulting in the LOSS OF A STRUCTURAL FOUNDATION FOR SOLVING COMPLEX PROBLEMS –More on this and the following is available throughout the Guidance Package and in particular Tutorials 1, 2, 3.2 and 3.3.
1 Creating patterns is how our brains makes sense out of complex information.
Consequences of this gap: Observed patterns
Initially
Large groups learned to recognise when
The new approaches of agility and self-organisation failed for higher levels of complexity as executable guidance was missing (exceptions granted)
The situation escalated
Large groups withdrew their support from the establishment and backed other movements, even if it meant creating an additional dimension of problems, and moving us further away from solving the exponentially growing problems.
Solution needs
Over the past two decades, we have seen many attempts to solve this decision-making gap, such as demanding ethics, value-based decisions, regulations, and the like. Even if they are brought in line with the relevant Laws of Nature and further elements of this Manifesto, it remains hard to see how they can be made executable during decision-making processes and provide the value required. This led to these needs:
1. Value Cases need to complement business cases
2. A set of Core Human Values & Essential Behaviours is required:
If needed, they can be complemented with executable elements of ethics, regulations and the like.
Core Human Values, Essential Behaviours and a Value Case approach are available through the extension to this intervention.
8.
Consider one enterprise or system-wide project removing mountains of obstacles
Across industries, fields, and subjects, a common pattern emerged
High-to-highest-impact strategies, solutions, projects and the like are undermined and get stuck by the same obstacles, such as the obstacles of bureaucracy, complexity, and practices of a world gone by. These obstacles are usually outside the sphere of influence of these strategies, solutions and projects, and hiding below the surface. To create powerful strategies, make hidden solutions visible, and unleash their value potential, an enterprise or system-wide project aimed at removing these obstacles may be necessary.
Example: Simplification project –Good intention, but worsening the problem
What do we do when environments become too bureaucratic or complex? We start simplification projects in a few boxes. However, bureaucracy at the system level easily increases more than it is reduced within these boxes. This happens when the damage created from the changes outside the boxes exceeds the value created inside. In our connected world, it worsens when different groups chose different solutions and drift in different directions.
More on this and the simple solution are available in Tutorials 3.2 and 3.3, as well as in section 3.4 of the Guidance Package.
Manifesto Extension 1 — to Intervention 4:
Resolve the knowledge, solution, and experience gap of how complex problems can be solved
4.A
Learn practices for analysing complex problems and designing impactful solutions
When we understand where the highest damage is created, we have guidance on where the highest-impact can be made. Further patterns became:
With the growing problems we face, humanity can no longer afford to miss out on fundamental principles of science.
Yet, WHEN PROBLEMS TO BE SOLVED WERE COMPLEX, the Manifesto’s co-creators could not find anyone working with or responding to applying the following principles of science, neither in organisations nor in science itself. Typical responses were “doesn’t fit my discipline,” “what’s a Law of Nature?” or no response at all.
The following principles urgently need to be (re-)integrated into decision-making, research, strategy design, innovation processes, and much more:
Experience: A small number of such laws can have a huge problem-solving impact
Example of where these principles were applied: this Manifesto
The following practices emerged as foundations for re-creating trust. To make it happen, relevant practices may need to be part of a larger package designed to get over the Tipping Point where the package becomes executable, scalable, and durable at the system level (Intervention 5):
For Core Human Values and Essential Behaviours, see Manifesto Extention to Intervention 7
This is to enable people of various groups, fields and subjects to move into a common direction and act as a single entity
The guidance
4.B
From the Manifesto, the Laws of Nature and the Guidance Package, select what is relevant
Knowledgeable representatives of the groups involved and impacted decide TOGETHER what is relevant and will be used. The rest can be ignored.
Other solution elements you or the groups involved and impacted may have, as well as third-party guidance packages can be used, provided they:
4.C
Integrate relevant guidance into decision-making at all levels, problem analysis, solution design, innovation processes and Best Practices
4.D
Create complementary research and innovation processes
Based on:
Funded by:
For more information, see Manifesto’s Tutorial 3.4.4
Manifesto Extension 2 — to Intervention 7:
Core Human Values, Essential Behaviours, Value Cases & Hard-to-Ignore Questions
Health
This is the health of the people, organisation, environment and the planet1
As health requires biodiversity, it includes a healthy biodiversity
Safety
Includes climate and peace1
Basic Needs
Clean water and air, shelter, food, and energy1
Truth Seeking
What may be seen as the truth today can change over time. Establishing truth can be challenging. That’s why this value is truth seeking.
Freedom by being in harmony with each other
Everyone should be able to live freely. However, the freedom of one person ends where the freedom, health, or safety of another person begins.
1 Based on “Sustainocracy: The new democracy.” Jean-Paul Close. https://sustainocracy.blog/what-is-sustainocracy/
Acting With Adaptive IntegrityTM
We give our word (a promise, commitment, etc.) when we have sufficient confidence that we can keep our word. As soon as we know that we cannot keep our word, we inform all parties counting on us and clean up any mess that we caused in their lives. 1, 2
People, objects (organisations, products, services, etc.), and systems are IN or OUT of INTEGRITY.3
This is the practice of the Integrity Law
1 Integrity: Without it Nothing Works. Jensen, Michael C. Harvard Business School. Jesse Isidor Straus Professor of Business Administration, Emeritus. April 6, 2014. https://ssrn.com/abstract=1511274
2 First sentence adjusted to meet an executability need
3 Seminar. Jensen, Michael C. Erasmus University, Rotterdam. 2011.
Seeking the Truth
Being Authentic
Originality, worthiness, seeking the truth, kindness and compassion to see beyond ourselves and without neglect
Listening Authentically
Of course, this cannot mean listen to everybody and everything. Such approaches would quickly be in conflict with the Tipping Point and Capacity Bottleneck Laws of Nature. As such conflicts occur, a switch to other practices is required, like those most relevant to everybody, which brings us to the Core Human Values and Essential Behaviours provided here. A further practice is that of co-creation on equal terms, and with knowledgeable representatives of the groups involved and impacted.
Learning From Failure
In complex environments failure is guaranteed to happen as every situation can or will be different and the ‘unexpected unexpected’ keeps popping up. The following pattern surfaced: Learning from failure and an attitude of preventing the same failure from re-occuring reduces failure rates structurally.
Take Ownership
Taking ownership is about taking the initiative and communicating regularly with stakeholders to ensure that expectations are shared transparently
Personal responsibility and accountability
Within boundaries, individuals and teams are given the freedom and means to solve complex problems:
Like Business Cases identify high-to-highest impact information in the form of money and numbers, Value Cases do the same with patterns. For more information, see the additional information at Manifesto Intervention 7 above.
Patterns are reliable practices because creating patterns is how our brains make sense of complex information. A benefit is that we do not have to go through endless discussions, for example, about agreeing on definitions. Everybody can have a somewhat different view. As long as we understand each other, decisions can be made.
With the numbers AND patterns at hand, hard-to-ignore Guiding Questions — such as those in the dropdown box below, and in the collection of Manifesto Intervention 6 — are responded to.
Example patterns:
When decisions are to be made
Does the decision improve or worsen the health of the people, organisation, environment, or planet?
When stress, burnout rates, or cost saving-pressures are high
When productive employees are laid off
When decisions are made
Where is the project to reduce the unnecessary bureaucracy and complexity to healthy levels by applying the Tipping Point and Capacity Bottleneck Laws of Nature (more in Tutorials 1, 2 to 3.3)?
On Adaptive Integrity
Is the person, group, organisation or system IN, or OUT of INTEGRITY?
Is the object (i.e. a product), solution, or service IN, or OUT of INTEGRITY?
On Attitude
Is the person’s attitude in line with relevant Core Human Values, Essential Behaviours, Value Cases approach, and Laws of Nature?
Is it based on
On Learning from Failure
Is the organisation’s culture one of learning from failure, or is it one hit by the same failures being repeated?
What delivered needed results where our long-standing approaches failed us
What delivered needed results where our long-standing approaches failed us
Examples that applied relevant elements of the Manifesto
Tutorials
A group of independent individuals with extensive experience in what provided needed results where our long-standing solution approaches failed us
Core Team
Netherlands, Germany
Polymath | Initiator of the Manifesto
Senior Analyst, Consultant, Inventor
Contributing Co-creators
Emile (Glans) Van Essen
Netherlands
Founding Chair WORLD SUSTAINABILITY FUND
Polymath
Many sustainability projects across the globe have received (large) funds. Emile became a co-creator when he discovered that the Law of Nature Manifesto was addressing many of the obstacles undermining the projects funded and he didn’t see anyone else doing this.
Margie Charpentier
Netherlands
Background support and out-of-the-box contributions
Sponsors
Cooperatieve Vereniging AiREAS U.A.
A value-driven co-operative organization: Together for clean air and health in local environments
Website maintained by ComDyS
Experience and knowledge contributions
Copyright © 2025 by the Law of Nature Manifesto initiative. All rights reserved. Provided the spirit of The Manifesto is maintained, the main Mainfesto parts are free to use and can be shared via Creative Commons (CC) license, even commercially. Please click here for the CC licenses relevant for the parts you like to share or use.
A special thanks all those who contributed one way or the other over a period of three decades. For foto and illustration credits click here.