Recently I read an interesting article titled, “Maslow got it wrong”. Many of us were taught Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs was both a model for self actualisation and creating strong, healthy communities.

But this was recently challenged this Eurocentric paradigm and that it would be a different hierarchy if he was a poor Black man living in Harlem when he wrote it.

My interested in the article, which tells the story of how Maslow learnt from the Blackfoot people but in doing so, he flipped the model upside down.

Maslow’s model ends with Self Actualisation, the Blackfoot model begins with it.

Maslow did not credit the Blackfoot as his source, although many suggest he was ‘inspired by’ the Blackfoot hierarchy of needs. The teepee shape is very familiar, and as someone who is used to being plagiarised, this also stood out.

The article is relevant to the conversation about Social Enterprise as for many First Nations Communities it is the ‘Social’ that has precedent over the Individual but in a consumer driven society that is often reversed.

The Blackfoot model describes the inverse of Maslow’s Hierarchy:

Self-actualization.
Where Maslow’s hierarchy ends with self-actualization, the Blackfoot model begins here. In their view, we are each born into the world as a spark of divinity, with a great purpose embedded in us. That means that we arrive on earth self-actualized.

Belonging.
After we’re born, imbued with a divine purpose, the tribe is there to love and care for us.

Basic Needs & Safety.
While in Maslow’s model, we find love and belonging only after attending to our basic needs and safety, the Blackfoot model describes that our tribe or community is the means through which we are fed, housed, clothed, and protected. The tribe knows how to survive on the land and uses that knowledge and skill to care for us.

Community Actualization.
In tending to our basic needs and safety, the tribe equips us to manifest our sacred purpose, designing a model of education that supports us in expressing our gifts. Community actualization describes the Blackfoot goal that each member of the tribe manifest their purpose and have their basic needs met.

Cultural Perpetuity.
Each member of the tribe will one day be gone. So passing on their knowledge of how to achieve community actualization and harmony with the land and other peoples gives rise to an endurance of the Blackfoot way of life, or cultural perpetuity.

Interesting…