Join us for R&D Unplugged #11 with Marc Santolini
Reinventing wisdom: charting paths to collective fulfillment
In the face of intersecting global crises - climate instability, social fragmentation and a growing sense of existential uncertainty - the capacity for collective intelligence has become increasingly critical. However, collective intelligence does not arise spontaneously; it requires intentional facilitation, structured spaces and an understanding of the relational dynamics that underpin productive collaboration. Psychological safety, second-person inquiry, deep listening and emotional regulation are fundamental to enabling the forms of awareness and coordination necessary for systemic change. Recognizing the need for new approaches, a range of transdisciplinary communities and wisdom-inspired initiatives are designing frameworks that emphasize relational embodiment and dialogic inquiry to foster collective flourishing. These efforts reflect a growing recognition that transformation is not just about knowledge production, but also about cultivating the relational capacities that sustain long-term change. These initiatives underline the importance of process-led rather than outcome-led approaches, focusing on how collaborative dynamics develop over time. In this talk, I review these initiatives and present our work on multi-level group practices, participatory methodologies and AI to foster collective intelligence and relational well-being. I also present ongoing research using network approaches and natural language processing to track the dynamic evolution of relational quality and group development. This move towards conscious process monitoring offers new perspectives for learning transitions and collective flourishing, while highlighting the relevance of wisdom traditions in contemporary systems thinking.
open to all!
More about the speaker
Presentation of the speaker :Marc Santolini is a practitioner-researcher who studies collective intelligence, open innovation and relational well-being in complex systems. With a dual background in the physics of complex systems and epistemology, he holds a PhD from the École normale supérieure in Paris and specialized in network science at the Barabási Lab in Boston. Today, he heads the Interaction Data Lab at the Learning Planet Institute, where he integrates network approaches, participatory methodologies and AI to enhance collaborative dynamics. He co-founded Just One Giant Lab to foster large-scale open research communities and explores how wisdom traditions and facilitation practices can inform systemic transformation.
R&D Unplugged is organized by’Learning Transitions research unit. For more details on the R&D Unplugged format, as well as information on past and upcoming events, please visit our website.
