Integral theory
Integral theory as developed by Ken Wilber is a synthetic metatheory aiming to unify a broad spectrum of Western theories and models and Eastern meditative traditions within a singular conceptual framework. The original basis, which dates to the 1970s, is the concept of a "spectrum of consciousness" that ranges from archaic consciousness to the highest form of spiritual consciousness, depicting it as an evolutionary developmental model. This model incorporates stages of development as described in structural developmental stage theories, as well as eastern meditative traditions and models of spiritual growth, and a variety of psychic and supernatural experiences.
In the advancement of his framework, Wilber introduced the AQAL model in 1995, which further expanded the theory through a four-quadrant grid. This grid integrates theories and ideas detailing the individual's psychological and spiritual development, collective shifts in consciousness, and levels or holons in neurological functioning and societal organization. Integral theory aims to be a universal metatheory in which all academic disciplines, forms of knowledge, and experiences cohesively align.
As of 2010, integral theory had found an audience within certain subcultures, with only limited engagement from the broader academic community, though a number of dissertations have used integral theories as their theoretical foundation, in addition to ca. 150 publications on the topic. The Integral Institute published the Journal of Integral Theory and Practice, and SUNY Press has published twelve books under the "SUNY series in Integral Theory" in the early 2010s, and a number of texts applying integral theory to various topics have been released by other publishers.
Origins and background
Origins
Ken Wilber's integral theory is a synthetic metatheory, a theory whose subject matter he intended to organize and integrate pre-existing theories themselves, doing so in a clear and systematic way. A synthetic metatheory "classifies whole theories according to some overarching typology." Wilber's metatheory started in the 1970s, with the publication of The Spectrum of Consciousness, synthesizing Eastern religious traditions with Western schools of psychotherapy and Western developmental psychology. In The Atman Project, this spectrum was presented as a developmental model, akin to western structural stage theory, models of psychology development that describe human development as following a set course of stages of development.According to these early presentations, which rely strongly on perceived analogies between disparate theories, human development follows a set course, from pre-personal infant development, to personal adult development, culminating in trans-personal spiritual development. In Wilber's model, development starts with the separation of individual consciousness from a transcendental reality. The whole course of human development aims at reconnecting spirit to itself through developing a transcendental consciousness that passes through and then dis-identifies from a mature adult ego. The pre-personal and personal stages are taken from western structural stage theories, which are correlated with other stage theories. In his early work he posited four stages of properly spiritual development, going from the psychic to the subtle to the causal to the nondual. This model has a broad resonance with many Eastern models of spiritual development, particularly those found in the Hindu and Buddhist tantric traditions. They also find rough correlations with the concepts of the great chain of being and Aurobindo's elaboration of the five sheaths or koshas in Hindu thought.
Wilber's ideas have grown more and more inclusive over the years, incorporating theories of ontology, epistemology, and methodology, creating a framework which he calls AQAL, which is shorthand for "All Quadrants All Levels All Lines All States All Types." In this, Wilber's older frameworks are primarily reworked using what Wilber calls the four quadrant model. This model divides views of reality into the individual-subjective, the individual-objective, the collective-intersubjective and the collective-interobjective quadrants. This model can then be used to contextualize and comprehend differing views on individual development, collective evolution of consciousness, and levels or holons of neurological functioning and societal organization more clearly, ultimately integrating them into a single metatheory in which all academic disciplines and every form of knowledge and experience are argued to fit together.
Main influences
Sri Aurobindo
The integral yoga of Sri Aurobindo describes five levels of being, akin to the five koshas or sheaths, and three types of being. The psychic being refers to the higher reaches of mind. It correlates with buddhi, the connecting element between purusha and prakriti in Samkhya, and correlated by Wilber with his transpersonal stages. Aurobindo focuses on spiritual development and the process of unifying of all parts of one's being with the Divine. As described by Sri Aurobindo and his co-worker The Mother, this spiritual teaching involves an integral divine transformation of the entire being, rather than the liberation of only a single faculty such as the intellect or the emotions or the body.Structural stage theory
Structural stage theories are based on the observation that humans develop through a pattern of distinct stages over time, and that these stages can be described based on their distinguishing characteristics. In Piaget's theory of cognitive development, and related models like those of James Mark Baldwin, Jane Loevinger, Robert Kegan, Lawrence Kohlberg, and James W. Fowler, stages have a constant order of succession, later stages integrate the achievements of earlier stages, and each is characterized by a particular type of structure of mental processes which is specific to it. The time of appearance may vary to a certain extent depending upon environmental conditions.Jean Gebser
The word integral was independently suggested by Jean Gebser, a Swiss phenomenologist and interdisciplinary scholar, in 1939 to describe his own intuition regarding the structure of human consciousness that would follow the modern or mental structure. Gebser was the author of The Ever-Present Origin, which describes human history as a series of mutations in consciousness. He only afterwards discovered the similarity between his own ideas and those of Sri Aurobindo and Teilhard de Chardin.Spiral Dynamics and collaboration with Don Beck
After completing Sex, Ecology, Spirituality, Ken Wilber started to collaborate with Don Beck, whose Spiral Dynamics is based on the work of Clare W. Graves, and which shows strong correlations with Wilber's model. Beck and Christopher Cowan had published their application and extension of Graves's work in 1996 in Spiral Dynamics: Mastering Values, Leadership, and Change. Wilber also referenced Graves's emergent cyclical levels of existence in Sex, Ecology, Spirituality, when he introduced his quadrant model, and began to incorporate Spiral Dynamics in the "Integral Psychology" section of The Collected Works of Ken Wilber in 1999, and gave it a prominent place in the 2000 edition of A Theory of Everything.Wilber and Beck put a strong emphasis on the distinctions between the 1st tier vs 2nd tier levels, associating integral thinking with the 2nd tier. They developed the concept of the "Mean Green Meme" regarding the Green level of Spiral Dynamics, which they associated with postmodernism. Wilber further developed this idea into the "Boomeritis" concept, devoting a chapter to each in A Theory of Everything. As Beck explained:
Cowan and his business partner Natasha Todorovic disagreed with this view, leading Todorovic to publish a paper refuting it based on psychological trait mapping research. Todorovic charged that when the Mean Green Meme concept is used to criticize a person making an argument, it "usurps arguments by undermining an individual before the debate has begun." After his collaboration with Cowan ended, Beck announced his own version of Spiral Dynamics, namely "Spiral Dynamics integral" at the very end of 2001, while Cowan and his business partner Natasha Todorovic stayed closer to Graves' original model.
In his 2006 book Integral Spirituality, Wilber created the AQAL "altitudes" through which different lines of development move. The first eight of these "altitudes" parallel Spiral Dynamics, but the new concept was argued to create a more comprehensive, integrated system. By 2006, Wilber and Beck had diverged in their interpretations of the Spiral Dynamics model, with Beck positioning the spiral of levels at the center of the quadrants, while Wilber placed it solely in the lower left quadrant. Beck saw Wilber's modifications as distortions of the model, and expressed frustration with what he saw as Wilber's undue emphasis on spirituality, while Wilber declared Spiral Dynamics to be incomplete, as those who study only Spiral Dynamics "will never have a satori". Beck continued to use the SDi name along with the 4Q/8L system from A Theory of Everything, while Wilber went on to criticize both Beck and Cowan.
Wilber's metatheory
In Sex, Ecology, Spirituality, Wilber introduced his AQAL metatheory, a framework which consists of five fundamental concepts, sometimes called the five elements. This includes the four quadrant model, levels of development, lines of development, states of consciousness, as well as the notion of types. In this schema the four quadrant model is foundational, and the remaining four elements are then added to flesh out topics more fully. According to Wilber, the AQAL model is one of the most comprehensive approaches to reality, a metatheory in which all academic disciplines and every form of knowledge and experience fit together coherently."Levels" are the generalized stages of development, from pre-personal through personal to transpersonal. "Lines" are specific domains of development - akin to the concept of multiple intelligences - which may progress unevenly in a given person or a given group. That is, different lines can be, and often are, at different levels or altitudes at the same time. "States" are states of consciousness. According to Wilber persons may go through a wide variety of states. These can include higher spiritual states, as well as states of depression or anxiety, as well as psychologically regressive states that are holdovers from earlier stages of development. "Types" is a category meant to describe idiosyncratic styles or emphases that one might bring to any of these other elements. For example, a certain culture might bring a particular style or emphasis to the actualization of a specific stage or state, i.e., the experience of higher spiritual states within Zen Buddhism might be colored by Japanese cultural norms, while the higher states experienced by a Hindu might be colored by the philosophy of Advaita Vedanta. Types are considered non-hierarchical and non-normative, whereas other features of Levels and Lines and States can be understood hierarchically. The individual building blocks of Wilber's model are holons, a term first introduced by the philosopher Arthur Koestler, which means that every entity and concept is both an entity on its own, and a hierarchical part of a larger whole.
In order for an account of the Kosmos to be complete, Wilber believes that it must include each of these five categories. For Wilber, only such an account can be accurately called "integral," describing AQAL as "one suggested architecture of the Kosmos."