Futures of integral futures: an analysis of Richard Slaughter\u27s analysis of Causal Layered Analysis

By way of exemplifying the problematisation of particular uses of Wilber\u27s integral approach and its address of postformal thought, this paper analyses Slaughter\u27s “integral” analysis of Inayatullah\u27s Causal Layered Analysis (CLA) which forms part of Slaughter\u27s article, “What difference does ‘integral’ make?” Futures 40 (2) (2008). Evidence given for Slaughter\u27s assertions is investigated. His assertions are then analysed partly by way of hermeneutics, CLA and deconstruction including address of Koestler\u27s holon theory, Jung\u27s archetypes, and Lakoff and Johnson\u27s conceptual metaphor. The potential of Slaughter\u27s analysis involves the opening up or furthering of generative dialogue, specifically through extending the possibilities of CLA. As instituted, however, it enacts a premature foreclosure of such potential, partly through offering an inadequate and inaccurate evaluation of CLA. This paper specifically problematises the notion that CLA is not substantively postconventional, whilst pointing to unproductive modernistic tendencies in Slaughter\u27s analysis. In so doing, it opens up new avenues for integral futures