Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

The Wakefield Doctrine is a perspective on the world around us and the people who make it up.

It is predicated on the idea that we, all of us, are born with the potential to experience the world from one of three perspectives, that of:

• the Outsider (clarks)
• the Predator (scotts)
• the Herd Member (rogers)

At a very early age we all settle into one of these three, referred to as ‘predominant worldviews’ and grow up and mature and develop our attitudes and our social strategies, aka personality types.

While we all live out our lives in one of these three realities, we never lose the capacity to see the world as do, ‘the other two’. These are our referred to secondary and tertiary aspects/worldviews. In some people they can be marginal, in others, significant. The effect is most commonly felt/observed in situations of duress, aka ‘Wow, I’ve never seen you be so...’

There is no value to claim that one is possessed of all three predominant worldviews, to say, “I appear to be an exception in that I have all three worldviews, fully realized.” Actually, there is, as the person claiming this status is quite characteristic of one of three personality types in particular.

The Wakefield Doctrine, as a tool to aid understanding to understanding ourselves and the world around us is: gender neutral, culture neutral, age-irrelevant and…fun

ok. enough of the carefully chosen words and phrases to make sure you, the Reader, will ‘get’ this personality theory thing.

Try this:

Pretend there are three distinct realities available to us as new-born humans. These are the reality of the Outsider(clarks), the life of the Predator(scotts) and the world of the Herd Members(rogers). We settle into one at a very early age. And we grow up.

We learn to get by. We identify the people who are important in our lives and those critical to our survival. At this very early, (aka totally dependent), age we learn to get along with the world around us. Arguably the most critical challenge to the new human is to develop social strategies, ways of negotiating with those around us upon whom we depend. That’s pretty much everyone. But the process is one of learning and improving. The four-year-old’s strategy to satisfying their needs is different than that of the ten-year-old. A mature adult exhibits, (hopefully), more sophisticated methods. Obvious stuff.

It is the character of these three ‘personal realities’ that results in a person becoming one of the three personality types, i.e. a clark or a scott or a roger.

Further, the Wakefield Doctrine maintains that each of these three personality types are perfect. They are perfect, (to varying degrees, of course), given the nature of the world in which they grew up and developed.

Fast forward to interacting with ‘mature’ humans and reverse the view: when we want to know more about ‘the other person’, we start by determining the nature of their relationship with the world around them. Do they appear to be responding to a world in which they are Outsiders? Perhaps they are quick to act, (and slow to reflect), as might a Predator navigating a world of threat and risk. Or, does the other person we are interacting with seem to be predicating their responses on a confidence in understanding the rules of engagement?

Once that is determined, we are in a position to know more about the other person than they know about themselves.

In this blog there are sections/Pages devoted to the three personality types of the Wakefield Doctrine. There is, in this site, individual blogposts written down through the years since first published.

If you’ve made it this far, you are likely to glean as much about the benefits and risks of adopting the perspective of the Wakefield Doctrine from reading one (or any) of the posts. Not all of these posts are ‘how-to’ instructions, but each and every one will offer an insight into the use and enjoyment of the principles of the Wakefield Doctrine.

(For more detail on the three personality types:  clarks  or scotts  or rogers)