Schools within the Integral Movement
The following is taken from my
Integral Wiki page on this subject
Main Schools and traditions
Among those who might be reasonably included under the umbrella of Integral Movement would be (in alphabetical order and no particular preference)
- The Aurobindonian movement. This is the original, practical, Integral tradition, represented by Integral Yoga, which has as its goal the Supramental Transformation of the Earth. It includes Sri Aurobindo, Mirra Alfassa (The Mother) and their disciples, students, and others who try to carry on the Yoga, among them Indra Sen (Aurobindo disciple, the original Integral psychologist and Integral theorist, now little known), Haridas Chaudhuri, Michael Murphy, and myself. I can also be included with Frank Visser under the alternative category "Metaphysicians"
- The Humanists - They provide a vision of integral culture, integral art, integral commentary on life… People included here might be Jean Gebser, William Irwin Thompson, Matthew Dallman, and perhaps Ray Harris.
- The Integral Scientists includes a range of universalising synthesisers; Vladimir Ivanovich Vernadsky, Oliver Reiser, David Bohm, Arthur M. Young, Erich Jantsch and Ervin Laszlo are just a few luminaries whomight be mentioned here. Note that only Laszlo used the term "Integral".
- Mainstream Integral movement. By far the largest category. Based on Ken Wilber's teachings and ideas inspired by, and includes both Wilberian and Post-Wilberian thought. There is an emphasis on AQAL, Holons, Spiral Dynamics, Buddhism, Postmodernism, etc. Note that not everyone included under this category is a supporter or follower of Wilber, indeed there are many who are critics, but all have been strongly influenced by his teachings. As well as Wilber and his co-worker Don Beck some other important figures are Elliot Benjamin, Edward Berge, Allan Combs, Mark Edwards, Robert Kegan, Joe Perez, Andrew P. Smith, and many more. Also included here are some virtual communities like Zaadz and Integrative Spirituality. Controversial guru Andrew Cohen could probably also be included here; note that Cohen, who is strongly supported by Wilber and Beck, has been heavily criticised by some others both within and without the Integral movement.
- The Participatory movement - includes Participitary epistemology, Participitary spirituality, etc. They rejects orthodox Wilberian and Cohenist style authoritarianism. John Heron, Richard Tarnas, Jorge Ferrer, and Michel Bauwens (p2p) are representative.
Others who might be included under the Integral umbrella are
- Inventors such as Buckminster Fuller and other interdisciplinary proponents of appropriate technology.
- Teleologists - Teilhard de Chardin established a new way of looking at evolution, and the synthesis of science and religion. Some fascinating parallels with Sri Aurobindo, but the two never knew of each other’s work. There is a tradition of Teilhardism among scientists in the West, including palaeontologist Simon Conway Morris. They might also be included as a subset under Integral scientists
- Theosophical-Anthroposophical movement in general - the occult/esoteric version of integral. H. P. Blavatsky, Rudolf Steiner, the early David Spangler, much of the New Age movement. (Spangler later rejected the New Age movement for its crass commercialism, but he could still be considered, like Wilber, New Age sensu lato. Probably deserves his own category now)
- "Unified Science" of Edward Haskell and coworkers; constituted a theory of everything as universal as AQAL, embracing both sciences and humanities, but now almost totally forgotten
Others including Max Theon, Whitehead, Gurdjieff and Ouspensky, Koestler, Maslow, Grof, A. H. Almaas, etc. Nicolai Hartmann is another important person, now mostly forgotten.

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