Missing mandalas: Development and theoretical gaps

The mandala is a fitting metaphor to act as a model for a more balanced conception ofdevelopment, one that recognizes culture as central to human resource development. Aglobalising world can be understood as a unity, in which cultural and material divisions -as well as connections – are more readily discerned. The mandala exhibits three keyattributes necessary for a more balanced world. They are the integrating elements of therelational, the educational and orientational – whereby cultural and ethical directionserves to bestow meaning in people’s lives. In the opposite direction, a disintegratingworld scenario would feature a loss of relationships and hence alienation, a reeducationprocess that serves prevailing ideologies, and the subsequent disorientation that comesfrom losing one’s sense of place, direction, and self. The mandala model of developmentin a globalising world is both missing and missed. It needs to be more fully theorized if itis to make a conceptual contribution to the pressing tasks of the day – not least of whichis the desperation of terrorism, involuntary migration and a loss of cultural capital.