Relationship to existing need sets

Needs Communication: viable need patterns and their identification (Part #5)

[Parts: First | Prev | Next | Last | All] [Links: To-K | From-K | From-Kx | Refs ]

In order to clarify the nature of this approach, it is appropriate to consider some examples of need sets. Carlos Mallmann, for example, has produced a table of need categories in Chapter 2.(15) This makes the following four-term distinctions:

which group the following eight-term distinctions:

He also redefines the same need field in terms of nine-term distinctions:

Johan Galtung (Chapter 3) has, on the other hand, produced a list of 'basic human needs' that at the four-term level appears as:

He also chooses to distinguish more specific needs within each such category (as indicated by the numbers in parentheses), making a total of twenty-eight needs.

As is to be expected, there are various kinds of overlaps between the Mallmann and Galtung versions. Comparison is, of course, difficult because the meaning of the terms is necessarily elusive and there is no means of cross-checking the adequacy of mutual comprehension, however precise the verbal definition. Furthermore, Katrin Lederer makes the point that

as needs are theoretical constructs, any researcher's notion of even general categories of human needs is dependent on his or her perception and thus dependent on her or his value system. Therefore, any categorical system of needs is in principle as 'good' as the next one. There is no logical criterion for deciding that any system is more complete than others,(15)

There are therefore two problems to be faced:

1. comprehension and communication of the meaning of each term; and
2. comprehensiveness or completeness of the need set.

These are even more challenging if one requires of the above authors to each define their need sets at the two-term level, regrouping the four-term elements. In the case of Mallmann, this might be achieved with 'being' (i.e., existence with coexistence) and 'becoming' (i.e., growth with perfection).

At this level of abstraction, however, the adequacy of comprehension of such terms must be constantly called into question-even more so were the one-term level to be approached through this framework, leading perhaps to the term 'Me' in its richer sense. This is the need field labeled as a continuity to which other labels may also be applied, each clarifying an aspect of the human need at this level of abstraction. Paradoxically, the richer the sense of a one-term need set, the less 'operational' it becomes in the conventional context. (The converse is, of course, also true.) Were the accent to be placed on 'survival,' the task might appear less problematic. The question must always be how narrow or limited is the concept of the need associated with the label, for clearly the more inclusive the concept, the greater the convergence between 'life' and 'survival,' for example.

The completeness of the set may be tested, as suggested above, by asking of any need term (1) how it might be subdivided into subsets; and (2) with what it might be combined to constitute a superordinate set. The question is, What is the need (set) with which a given need (set) can be combined in order to enrich the significance conveyed by the individual term labels used and to render comprehensible the more abstract (fundamental, subtle) need set of which they are an articulation? And what alternative subordinate sets of needs can be identified to challenge and deepen superficial comprehension of any particular set of need terms?

It is interesting to explore the relationship between Mallmann's four-term and eight-term sets and the shift in significance in moving to the nine-term set. The whole question of the status of needs repressed from (or unexpressed in) such need sets requires careful exploration. It is too early to accept the judgment that it is only a question of the individual's predeliction and his ability to sway others to his viewpoint.

[Parts: First | Prev | Next | Last | All] [Links: To-K | From-K | From-Kx | Refs ]