Perhaps the most powerful illustration of “Reasoning with Images” occurred in the administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman in the late 1930s and early 1940s. In this case, it was not so much their direct thinking as what these appointed executives set into motion.

“The Manhattan Project” was a great undertaking which, if successful, could set the world free of tyranny and totalitarianism. Stimulated by initiatives of Baruch and Einstein, the project was dedicated to beating the Axis Powers, initially Germany and ultimately Japan, in a race “to explode the atomic bomb.” All manner of explosives scientists and technologists were engaged. Indeed, all manner of experts were engaged—unsuccessfully, we must add!

It was not successful until Robert Oppenheimer, director of the project, was approached by a marginal junior scientist who suggested the following: “We must learn to implode the atomic bomb!” Because Oppenheimer was a Talmudic scholar, he was able to reconsider the methodology of the mission.

“The Manhattan Project” took a “U-Turn” in the road. The world was made safe for cultural relating, participative governance, and entrepreneurial enterprise. We are once again at such crossroads!

For thinking people, this means that the current model of American Enterprise must once again implement Generative Innovator positioning.

The march of civilization is the march of freedom. Free enterprise has brought us entrepreneurial capitalism and free markets. Participative governance has given us democratic governments and individual rights. Cultural relating has yielded human rights, meritocracy and social security. The human benefits are awesome to calculate.

And yet the march of civilization is not without costs to its promulgators. The treatment of the U.S. in the global marketplace is consistent with the adage, “No good deed goes unpunished!” Until the 21st century, America has been the source of more than 90% of the generative breakthroughs in science and the innovative variations in technologies. Still, its citizens are not the beneficiaries of their intellectual processing.

Take the case of Intel’s $2.5 billion semiconductor chip fabrication plant being built in China. “Innovated in America—Commercialized Elsewhere!” is the new trade paradigm. There are as many possible manipulations to ensure the benefits of creativity as there are criminal machinations to steal intellectual property. But there is only one enduring leadership paradigm: Generativity! This is the fuel for “The Roadmap to Freedom.”

American Enterprise leads in the GICCA Marketplace. In other terms, Generativity drives Free Enterprise Economics, requires Free Participative Governance, and is enabled by Interdependent Cultural Relating.

Figure 4. The American Enterprise Model in the Global Marketplace

If we generate entrepreneurially, we can drive markets commercially. This means that we are continuously changing the marketing paradigm and the playing field on which it is enacted. Remember, Generators are aligned with change! We can “Reverse any ‘U-Turn’.”

In order to continue to exercise Generative Leadership, we must follow the “Roadmap to the Freedom Functions—Peace, Participation, Prosperity.

• Interdependently-driven Cultural Relating to generate Peace;
• Electronically-driven Participative Governance to generate Participation;
• Entrepreneurial-driven Free Enterprise to generate Prosperity.

The cost of “The Roadmap to Freedom” is high: Continuous Generative Processing for Continuous Peace, Participation, and Prosperity requires “Skilled, Generative, Thinking People.”

Our “Voyage of Discovery” has yielded our roadmap.

Our “Human Brainpower” will implement it.

We can create our own “Changeable Destinies.”

Freedom is thinking—Generative Thinking!