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''The Salesian Family re-interpreted as an ethical economy''

The Salesian Family now consists of 26 official groups, the core groups being the four directly founded by Don Bosco himself: one of 16,000, a second of around 14,000 and a third a little harder to count because more loosely organised but estimated to be around 240,000. The remaining 23 groups range from a few hundred members to several thousand per group. The groups are autonomous but share an identifiable common spirit and recognise a single 'father' known by the rather quaint term 'Rector Major' (which has a simple linguistic explanation, in fact, as a form transliterated many years ago from Italian) who is a guarantee of unity in this spirit. We have already made reference to the core element in this spirit, the Preventive System, not just with its three key words of reasons, religion, loving-kindness, but with all the value and by now inculturated practice it entails.

While retaining the autonomy that each group has, this Salesian Family is now being called even more forthrightly to act together under its common charter and common mission statement, on behalf of young people who are poor and at risk in every corner of the globe. It talks about 'synergy in mission', about 'greater visibility'; it has a range of means and structures for achieving these ends – and is open to new ones. I suggest that such a 'family' with such an important mission relating to education and evangelisation, might benefit powerfully from the kind of digital world it now exists in, and even see this effort as peer to peer production, an ethical economy with all that this implies, if we can spell out the implications.

The language of such a family as the Salesian Family, with its tradition rooted in Catholic Piedmont of the 19th Century, will undoubtedly be very different to that of the Peer to Peer Foundation, but one has little difficulty in seeing connections. Put the following comment of Bauwen's, in a recent interview (Cosma Orsi, Italy) next to a passage from 1 Corinthians, for example:

-> In our encounter with other human beings we both look for difference, and for affinity. The difference is what enriches us and what is common unites us. We know from each other that we contribute to widely different projects. Each person therefore needs to be honoured for his/her unique mix of skills and contributions, and deserves a general income for his contribution to social wealth, which he produces through the very fact of being alive and to be always-already related. ----- -> ''Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord. There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons. But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit or the common good.'' (1 Cor 12:4-7)

However, what might the Salesian Family do differently, in order to achieve its vision, as a result of learning from the approaches of this 'ethical economy'?

Doing things differently(:nl:)