Projects & writing

Authority, ethical imagination and changing forms of work

A question runs through my recent writing: what helps people think and act when familiar forms of authority are under strain? In work on ethical imagination, I ask how people respond to difficult social and organisational dilemmas, including the resistance that can accompany new possibilities for association. My writing on online Group Relations considers how digital space changes presence, absence, authority and cooperation. More recently, I have been examining AI in organisations: how predictions acquire authority, where responsibility for judgement lies, and when a technical system supports thinking or becomes a way of avoiding it.

Some texts are still developing. Earlier publications, doctoral research and presentations are listed below.

Ethical imagination in practice

Drawing on David Armstrong's account of ethical imagination as an active, resisted response to dilemmas in social and organisational life, I am exploring how groups might face difficult realities while discovering and shaping possible ways of working together. A Group Relations conference that explicitly takes up ethical imagination is being developed in New York. The question will be studied through experience; the concept is not being offered as a settled method.

The conference is planned for 13–15 February 2027 at Stony Brook University, Long Island, New York. See the event details ↗

The Territory

The Territory is a bespoke virtual environment for experiential learning developed by Dr Mónica Velarde Lazarte with Dr Benedikt Hegner. It gives participants freedom to move and choose where to meet, making the use of space part of the inquiry. In the 2025 online conference Exploration in Human Relations in Shifting Virtual Environments, hosted by the New York Center for the Study of Groups, Organizations, and Social Systems ↗, the planned migration from Zoom to The Territory was a way to study the psychodynamics of beta testing. The platform was in development; its spatial design and technical failures affected how people could meet, hear one another and exercise authority. After a hosting disruption, members were presented with options and voted for a workable arrangement: plenaries returned to Zoom while Review and Application Groups continued in The Territory. This was both an organisational decision and material for inquiry into the social and technical conditions of learning. Explore The Territory ↗

Group Relations in the Peruvian Amazon

Over seven years, I worked with Indigenous participants and local, national and international stakeholder groups in the Peruvian Amazon to develop Group Relations conferences that had to learn from their setting. The designs brought questions of authority and social responsibility into contact with community life, different cultural understandings, and ecological conditions. They included new ways of negotiating entry, observing the wider setting and working with sustainable community initiatives, alongside training for local consultants.

My doctoral research studied the early adaptations and the difficult work of trust across groups and institutions. Participants also carried initiatives beyond the conferences, including an intercultural learning centre and farming projects. Those initiatives belonged to them and their communities; the conferences were one part of a wider process.