Cowan is a theorist, educator, and writer. His current focus is on exploring the ontological questions human beings face and the relationship of these questions to issues of power and control, meaning, value, learning, and choices.

		Ari chairs The International Working Group on Compassionate Organizations. The Working Group is made up of people from all over the world dedicated to fostering cultures of compassion in government, business, schools, faith groups, healthcare systems, service agencies, colleges and universities, and other organizations.
		Ari's theoretical work centers the ontological questions human beings face and the relationship of these questions to issues of power and control, meaning,value, learning, and choices. He developed three models that incorporate new thinking about and language for describing challenging relationships, provide a new framework for responding to these challenges, and present an effective alternative to the commonly-used and ineffective traditional approaches.