GENERAL RECOMMENDATION: Full Acceptance
Comments to the Authors:
Thank you for the opportunity to review this very interesting paper that asserts evolutionary theory has explanatory power to understand institutional change and provide reliable guidance on how to create an equitable, inclusive, and adaptable society. The authors present two case studies as empirical support for these claims.
Overall, the paper is well organized and flows logically by connecting theory, practice, processes, and data to arrive at and support the authors’ conclusions. The concepts and terms are explained in language understandable to TVOL readers. Contributions of the paper include demonstrating that institutional change requires individual change, e.g., willingness to be authentic, vulnerable, reflective; explaining the importance of a multilevel perspective for effective management, governance, and policymaking; and illuminating the importance of intentionality and target selection grounded in the CDPs; and providing evidence for the efficacy and past application of this approach which will give courage to people interested in transforming their organizations and societies by adopting prosocial practices and policies.
Strengths of the paper include:
· Its insights that prosocial behaviors operating at scale can produce social pathologies at large scales; that adaptations can be maladaptive; and that prosociality at scale requires four elements: evolution, multilevel, culture, and conscious approach, noting the evolutionary value of equity and inclusion.
· How conflict is worsened through rigid thinking about self, attention, emotion, cognition, behavior, and inconsistency with one’s values, and how personal short-term gains can take people away from their values and long-term desires.
· The empirical evidence from the Australian agency case, which was compelling, especially the survey results graphics.
· Focusing reader attention on two actionable elements, governance and adaptability.
Opportunities:
· On p. 7 in the Relational Frame Theory paragraph mid-page, provide an example of a symbotype, e.g., of inferring an arbitrary symbol to describe and alter relationships between events and objects.
· On p. 8’s discussion of symbolic niche, perhaps include analogy of niche construction in nature. This will help readers who are unfamiliar with that term.
Overall, I greatly enjoyed reading this paper. Thank you for your work on it.
