06/09/2026
Community Vs Elitism
As a slowly draw closer to the end of my tenure as the HDKI Chief Technical Director, I think increasingly about the sustainable aspect of our great community. When I take a step back from this senior role in a few years, how can a pay forward the ideas I value so much. Of course, part of it is hardwired in the structure of the group. This is helped by the nature of our members, the HDKI having drawn to our ranks a cohort of karate-ka that have shared values and goals within our martial training. Another way is writing my ideas down and putting them out there, I hope it’s a way of provoking thoughts and discussions that act as memes, infiltrating the consciousness of our members like silent ninja, stealthily tiptoeing into our shared conscious.
To this end, recently I have been thinking about the elements of the HDKI (and any group worth their salt) that may create contradiction. Within any group, the community is the bedrock, without community, the group doesn’t exist. However, within that group, there must be an elite set, a group of individuals that lead from the front, pulling the community along with them. However, that dynamic is not without its risk.
The genius of the JKA was the invention of the instructors’ course. It was christened ‘The Hornet’s Nest’ by Stan Schmidt back in the ‘60’s and ‘70’s, the first of many great western instructors who went through that process in part or in its entirety. Deliberate or not, Nakayama Sensei put together a group of young men (women started to enter the course in very small numbers much later) who butted heads in a ritualistic manner that dates back to the start of time. Like buffalo on the great plains, young upstarts would vie for contention against the established hierarchy. Seniors would be challenged and juniors would be pushed. It is a scenario played out across cultures and continents, and in a few Hombu Dojo in Japan, it produced accelerated excellence and an elite instructors’ class. Competitions were dominated by these world-class athletes and graduates would travel the globe, imparting knowledge and wowing course attendees in equal amounts.
Back at the Hombu, instructors and trainees could benchmark their progress with each other. World Champions would replay great international finals on a daily basis, pushing at the edges of what was possible; the result – growth and development. Some would dominate for a short time, only for a new champion to emerge and take on pole position for a limited period, only for the cycle to be repeated and a new champion emerge. The results speak for themselves. The originator of this system, the JKA, now have generations of these elite instructors and still continue to churn out new graduates of the process. Each one becoming a foundational pillar of the group.
Community, on the other hand, is very different. As the traditional African proverb tells us, if we want to go fast, we go alone, is we want to go far, we go together. It is such a lovely sentiment that sums up community perfectly. Moving forward together, supportively, inclusively, is the bedrock of any great community. There is a shared narrative designed to move in a common direction. Within the HDKI, that shared objectives are that we teach good karate and be kind, we provide opportunity, we have karate adventures and we have the process of Shu-Ha-Ri at our core. Whilst striving towards these goals, we must have four guiding principles front and centre: Tradition, Innovation, Respect, Collaboration.
No rules, no long lists of by-laws, just a shared idea of where we want to go and a shared sense of which principles we are going to use to govern our decision-making on the journey. Simple is best.
However…
There is an obvious problem. Elitism and Community are mutually exclusive. The obviously danger is that the elite start to dominate every facet of the group and no longer pull the community with them, rather push and dictate the group to where the elite wish them to be. Being the best at the obvious thing, whilst ignoring the less obvious facets of a group can be very alluring. Smashing it in the dojo whilst alienating other less (karate) skilled members of the community can be a recipe for disaster. Not only that, excellence within the headline act of the group, doesn’t mean excellence elsewhere. To continue the metaphor, actors sometimes become directors, with limited success, but they never try to do everything, from make-up to lighting, from camera work to key grip. However, we can easily see examples of instructors who have a high level of karate expertise take on a much broader role that requires a skill set they don’t have. Leading a community requires logistical talent, emotional intelligence, logical foresight. Scoring high in physical intelligence, becoming physically elite doesn’t mean you possess the other skills, in fact quite often means the opposite. Elitism often gives one the confidence to believe one possesses everything necessary to run a successful group. Not only that, physical dominance adds to that belief in a way that sometimes becomes very absolute.
If this happens, the sense of community can rapidly be lost. In a world where the speed of one’s mae geri is valued far more than the skill to listen, once great communities can rapidly diminish.
What is the solution?
I think believing in one’s own hype is a recipe for disaster. Kicking and punching well is a life skill as much as riding a horse is. There are modern, mechanically superior alternatives. Believing that one superior skill set automatically gives you others is ludicrous. Doing a kata well doesn’t endow you with empathy or the ability to balance a budget or organise an event. No, the only way forward is to value the community above the elite. The elite will be given value, in the sense that they will be paid well for traveling, teaching and examining the community. That is tangible value. However, underappreciate the value and power of community and the elite who exist because of the community will find themselves alone, without foundation and with increasingly fewer people to benchmark their skill against. Ultimately, the elite must evolve. They peak fast and then slowly decline, eventually returning to the community from where they came. They will become elders, giving advice and making the occasional well-timed, impactful comment. However, they get out of the way, give space for the younger generation of elite, whilst adding greater value and real power to the more important community.
