The Whole Social: Audio

Listen (21 min): Approaching Rudolf Steiner's ideas on organizational development

Seth Jordan — Tue, 13 Jan 2026 05:00:01 GMT

The 20th century spiritual researcher Rudolf Steiner is known for his work in many fields — education, agriculture, medicine, economics, religion, etc. — but his work in the field of organizational development is almost entirely unknown. In this talk (given at Harvard Divinity School on December 15, 2025), Seth Jordan shares an overview of those ideas, bringing together the advice that Steiner gave to individual institutions with Steiner’s social ideas more broadly.

You can find a written version of this talk (though by no means an exact transcript) here and a video version here.

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Is it possible to "threefold" an organization?

Mon, 10 Nov 2025 14:40:07 GMT

Seth Jordan, Nathaniel Williams, and Omri Elaad discuss how Rudolf Steiner’s social threefolding insights pertain to organizations. They look specifically at two texts that can be found here: https://thewholesocial.substack.com/p/possible-to-threefold-an-organization

At the end of WWI, Steiner worked tirelessly to wake people up to the threefold nature of society, to the fact that it has distinct realms — political, economic, and cultural — and that each require independence in order for society to be healthy. But in all his books and lectures, he rarely spoke about the threefold nature of organizations, even though, as he said, “we can only work and act as modern people through and within organizations,” and even though, as he also said, every organization is itself threefold:

“We divide social life into these three parts best when we comprehend that all of life’s institutions implicitly contain a threefold nature, and when we understand how to organize individual things so that the threefold impulse underlies them.”

But how should we organize our initiatives so their threefold nature can express itself in a healthy way? Over the years, some anthroposophists have tried to threefold organizations by distinguishing and dividing up governmental, economic, and cultural activities (often in the form of committees overseeing agreements/bylaws, work, and learning/inspiration). But Steiner himself never suggested this to the organizations he worked with, in fact he ridiculed it when members of the Anthroposophical Society brought it up. So how should we think about it?

Listen (21 min): How can we overcome prejudice? By "mapping" our differences.

Seth Jordan — Mon, 25 Aug 2025 17:50:49 GMT

This is a recording of an article from July 12th, 2025 (you can find the written version of the article here, and a brief description of the article here). Pictures from the original article, which are referred to in the audio article, are below.

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Listen (11 min): The Supreme Court thinks it should decide what kids read

Seth Jordan — Wed, 11 Jun 2025 15:46:14 GMT

On April 22nd, 2025, the nine justices of the Supreme Court discussed a number of children’s picturebooks being taught in the nation’s schools and asked, What concepts are age-appropriate? What’s content neutral and what’s pushing a certain agenda? The justices felt responsible to answer such questions — even though they have exactly no expertise in this area — because of a fundamental and widespread misunderstanding of the constitution’s first amendment.

This is a recording of an article from April 30th, 2025. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (14 min): The dying throes of a terminally ill country?

Seth Jordan — Fri, 16 May 2025 17:28:28 GMT

More and more it feels like our political life is driving us to the breaking point. But if we look a little more closely, then the illness can point us towards its cure — specifically, to the two constitutional changes we need to turn things around.

This is a recording of an article from April 4th, 2025. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (16 min): The first major takedown of "The Telepathy Tapes" only exposes its own magical thinking

Seth Jordan — Tue, 22 Apr 2025 15:44:32 GMT

The recent hit podcast The Telepathy Tapes gives a fascinating description of what appear to be telepathic abilities in non-speaking autistic children. How to understand this phenomenon is a vital question, but unfortunately, one that most mainstream scientists and journalists will likely never ask. Instead, most will ignore it while a few will dismiss it, which is what we saw in early March with the publication of “The Telepathy Trap” in The Atlantic.

But such dismissals are still incredibly important. They are a form of engagement, and they demonstrate just how confused, how lost at sea, the mainstream scientific community is when it comes to such questions. But not only that — the flaws in their logic can be doorways for our own thinking, bringing us deeper into the phenomenon and, in the process, helping us to better understand it.

This is a recording of an article from March 15th, 2025. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Understanding "The Telepathy Tapes" in the light of Rudolf Steiner's anthroposophy

Seth Jordan — Thu, 20 Mar 2025 15:35:16 GMT

On Tuesday, March 18th, I sat down to discuss The Telepathy Tapes and Rudolf Steiner's anthroposophy with three longtime teachers — Gleice da Silva, Jan Göschel, and Becky Rutherford — all of whom have worked extensively with children with developmental disabilities.

We had a delightful, wide-ranging conversation where we explored some of the possible reasons why the children described in this podcast are reporting such extraordinary experiences, and also how many of these experiences are actually much more common amongst “neurotypical” individuals than is normally thought. I hope you enjoy the discussion as much as I did!

Some relevant resources:

A look at some of the controversy around The Telepathy Tapes: https://thewholesocial.substack.com/p/telepathy-tapes-telepathy-trap
The Camphill Academy, which offers adult training in anthroposophic Inclusive Social Development, and where Gleice, Jan, and Becky all currently teach: https://camphill.edu
The Camphill School, where Gleice, Jan, and Becky all taught in the past:
https://camphillschool.org
The Section for Inclusive Social Development at the Goetheanum in Switzerland: https://inclusivesocial.org/en
Larry Bisonette (mentioned at 16:04): https://www.wretchesandjabberers.org/bios/larry-bissonnette

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Listen (28 min): John Steinbeck, social mystic

Seth Jordan — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 11:31:09 GMT

John Steinbeck was one of the great novelists of the 20th century, winning both the Pulitzer Prize and the Nobel Prize for Literature. His works are multifaceted — one can find scathing social critiques, rich humor, and gentle humanity between their covers. But I wasn’t aware of his spiritual leanings until reading one of his earliest works, In Dubious Battle (1936), where he speaks about the reality of spiritual possession, as well as a kind of ‘group soul’ that emerges whenever a mass of men are gathered.

This is a recording of an article from January 7th, 2025. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (11 min): How can we work for threefolding?

Seth Jordan — Sat, 23 Nov 2024 15:58:34 GMT

If we want to bring about real social change, then we need to understand society — we need to learn to see it whole. This is the task of social threefolding. But developing a new understanding won’t automatically bring about change, we need to find ways to enact it. So what have threefolders done over the last 100 years, and what ways of working can we imagine in the future?

This is a recording of an article from October 19th, 2024. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (25 min): Most Americans think the system is broken. Here’s what a new one would look like.

Seth Jordan — Fri, 11 Oct 2024 15:36:08 GMT

The US presidential elections are less than a month away. Most Americans think the country is in desperate need of change — radical, systemic change — but who has any actual ideas that could change the system?

Instead the candidates are busy trying to lure voters through tax cuts and social programs, and to paint their opposition as the antichrist and this election as the last stop before Armageddon (from the lips of Elon Musk: “this will be the last election in America if you don’t vote”). But if Armageddon comes, it will be because the American people have been so riled up that they resort to violence.

What we need are real ideas for systemic change. We need to get to the roots of what’s making society sick.

This is a recording of an article from June 30th, 2024. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (13 min): Polyamory and the future of relationships

Seth Jordan — Wed, 17 Jul 2024 10:01:56 GMT

Polyamory — the practice of having multiple romantic partners at the same time — is having a moment right now. But is it just a moment, or is it part of a deeper trend in the evolution of relationships? And how should we work with relationships in the future if we want to bring them to health?

This is a recording of an article from April 28th, 2024. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Real social change seems impossible. But looking back in history, it has always seemed that way.

Seth Jordan — Tue, 04 Jun 2024 18:07:30 GMT

I want to share one of the most interesting books I’ve read recently. On the surface, it’s a history of Roger Williams, the founder of Rhode Island, that describes an amazing life of high adventure lived between the courts of British royalty and the wilderness of 17th century America. But really it’s the history of an idea — the idea of freedom of thought, freedom of conscience — and how that idea shaped America, and the world, in the centuries that followed.

Most importantly, this book illustrates the evolution of the human soul — the evolution of consciousness — that’s essential to understand if we care about the work of social change. What ideas are right for our time and how do we introduce them? To answer this, we have to develop a sense for where we’ve come from and where we’re going, which I try to describe a bit in this podcast.

I refer to a couple articles in this podcast. One on the state’s overreach into the realm of disinformation and truth…

…and the other on the separation of nation and state.

And a quick tip: If you prefer listening to books instead of reading them, you can get audio books for free through your local library and an app called Libby. I’ve found it to be a fantastic resource.

Hope you enjoy!

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Listen (22 min): Rudolf Steiner on building healthy organizations

Seth Jordan — Wed, 10 Apr 2024 16:19:00 GMT

It’s not easy to work together. There’s a tension in it: Sometimes we want to be together — we find it inspiring and easier to get things done — but sometimes we want to be alone — we want freedom. So which side is right?

Of course both sides are right, but also neither of them, because what we’re really looking for is something we won’t find with a few superficial changes — there’s no perfect hybrid model. In reality, the whole nature of working together in organizations has to be understood at a much deeper level. The social insights of the 20th century social reformer, Rudolf Steiner, are invaluable for developing this understanding.

This is a recording of an article from February 12th, 2024. You can find the written version of the article here.

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How can we bring health to society?

Seth Jordan — Wed, 20 Mar 2024 14:16:02 GMT

I was recently teaching a course up in Toronto, and was invited by Eli Will of the Threefolding substack to give a public talk entitled “What will it take to bring health to society — the present-day challenges and prospects of working with Rudolf Steiner’s insights into a healthy threefold society.”

The talk was video recorded and I’ve also turned it into a podcast for those who prefer to listen. If you have any thoughts, please do share them in the comment section below.

(Much thanks to Richard Chomko for recording and producing this video.)

Listen (9 min): The only solution for a lasting peace in Israel-Palestine

Seth Jordan — Wed, 28 Feb 2024 18:06:23 GMT

Many people have chronicled the history of violence — the actions and reactions, attacks and retaliations — that is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But the structural, systemic causes of the conflict have gotten far less attention, even though they’re far more significant. The most important cause of the conflict is the internationally-celebrated idea of the nation-state — “national self-determination” — from which the Zionist project for a “Jewish state” was born.

But the nation-state idea is an absurdity in today’s multi-ethnic, multicultural world, an absurdity that inevitably leads to violence. As Robert Lansing, the secretary of state under Woodrow Wilson, described it: the principle of national self-determination is “a principle loaded with dynamite.” To understand why, listen to this article (and you can also find other articles on this topic here and here).

This is a recording of an article from December 19th, 2023. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (14 min): Critics of school choice have it wrong. It doesn’t violate the separation of church and state. It finally upholds it.

Seth Jordan — Wed, 10 Jan 2024 11:55:55 GMT

As more and more US states create programs that give parents choice in education — including money to send their kids to private and religious schools — critics claim it violates the separation of church and state. But a clearer reading of the 1st amendment shows it’s actually the opposite: Public schools are the ones trampling the constitution.

The 1st amendment is all about freedom of thought; it declares that government should have no role in influencing what we think and believe. But now we have government schools shaping the minds of our youth. How does that make sense?

This is a recording of an article from November 5th, 2023. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (12 min): Has Andrew Sullivan found the only way to end the culture wars around gay and trans rights?

Seth Jordan — Sun, 26 Nov 2023 23:20:09 GMT

As the culture wars continue to rage, there’s almost no one looking at the question of peace: How could a lasting peace come about? What are the principles by which we can live together? So I was incredibly surprised to find the political commentator Andrew Sullivan discussing such principles in a recent article, and even more surprised to find I generally agreed with him. If you want to leave a comment, I’d be interested to hear what you think.

This is a recording of an article from July 23rd, 2023. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (17 min): The New York Times' publisher just wrote a generation-defining essay on independent journalism. And showed that he fundamentally doesn’t get it.

Seth Jordan — Thu, 17 Aug 2023 12:29:43 GMT

This past spring, the publisher of the New York Times, A.G. Sulzberger, wrote a major essay defending the ideal of independent journalism. At least, that’s what it claimed to be. In reality, it was an essay defending the ideal of objectivity, and attacking independence… which is all incredibly strange. I untangle this mess in the above article.

This is a recording of an article from May 30th, 2023. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Listen (15 min): MacKenzie Scott is giving away her fortune. The next step is doing away with Big Philanthropy all together.

Seth Jordan — Fri, 09 Jun 2023 14:26:41 GMT

While MacKenzie Scott’s philanthropic approach of “no-strings-attached giving” is a step in the right direction, it’s still part of the much larger problem of Big Philanthropy — the fact that billionaires play such an outsized role in the development of our cultural and political life. This has to change. People need an equal voice in their politics and need to be free to direct their own cultural life. To do this, we’ll need “community-supported culture.” This article gives a number of concrete suggestions for how we can get there.

This is a recording of an article from April 28th, 2023. You can find the written version of the article here.

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Talking threefolding on The Conscious Bro Show

Seth Jordan — Mon, 22 May 2023 20:42:50 GMT

Listen on Spotify, Apple podcasts, or the app of your choice…

Last week I had a really great conversation with William Kyle Glenn on the Conscious Bro Show. Kyle is a friend and a colleague from Viroqua, Wisconsin, where we’re both part of Threefold Driftless, a group focused on community organizing through social threefolding. It was a pretty wide-ranging conversation, and we got into a lot of interesting areas. Kyle mentions a few of them below in his description of the show.

As always, I’d be interested to hear what you think if you want to leave a comment.

On this show we explore society at large…
What is it going to take for everyone to be heard?
How can we prioritize amazing ideals such as Freedom, Equality, and Solidarity all together in one system where neither feel encroached or impeded upon?
How can the Structure of society be set up to reflect the natural layout of the human being and nature around us from a physical and spiritual point of view?….
Is it possible for the right and the left to both feel honored and appreciated by leadership simultaneously?
To answer some of these questions I had my friend, writer, teacher, and activist Seth Jordan come speak about Social Threefolding… a field he’s been studying and working with closely for over 16 years.
Social Threefolding is a philosophy pioneered by Rudolf Steiner that is designed to heal the Social Organism and, in my opinion, solve many of the issues we are still fighting over today…
So what is exactly?
How does it work?
How can it change the way we live together and treat each other for the better?
And how do we implement it!
Find out the answers to all these questions and more…

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