EPSRC- Mini-sandpitScarborough, Sept 10-12, 2007

A. Espinosa

Complexity Management and self-organisation in an evolutionary learning society

Research Context:

What is wrong in current approaches to sustainable development & regeneration programmes

Self-Organisation in Human Social Systems: Research aims & objectives

PhD studentship

Aims and objectives/ methodology

Exploration of field work’s possibilities

Case study: An evolving ELC. Current research

Conceptual background

Main research questions

Current research development and plans

Research Context

Why this research &

Research Background

The needs for a ‘strong approach’ to sustainability

We are close to an irreversible global socio-ecological breakdown, unless we dramatically change current trends (e.g. Stern Report, 2006).

For a route of ‘breakthrough’ towards more sustainable development paths, we require a paradigmatic change towards more sustainable eco-social interaction (Laszlo, 2006; Capra, 2003; Wackernagel, 1997; Meadows, 1972; Meadows et al, 2004)

Re-think development from a holistic, ‘strong’ sustainability approach

Re-think the ontology of development

Redesign the epistemology of program’s implementation

Structural problems in sustainability.

Sustainability requires a more holistic view of:environmental problems;the social and institutional structures responsible for solutions.

Failures to reverse current unhealthy trends:Related to ineffective hierarchical structures and traditional management practices

Mismatch in the relationship between:government and societiesdevelopment agencies and implementing bodies.

Need for new analytical toolsUnderlying logic of the available analytical tools is wrong: We need new tools that:

embody complexity management principles;

see power and control as emergent properties of a system, rather than as drivers of it

embrace notions such as co-existence of difference and self-organisation within the context of a ‘network’ world picture.

There are elements of these ‘more holistic’ tools for sustainability, none yet including all desirable elements. E.g:

Max Neef’s measuring systems based on measuring welfare e.g. Henderson’s design of sustainability indices (Henderson, 2002a).

Potocan & Mulej’s methods/tools for more sustainable development design

Checkland’s soft approaches for participatory program’s design

Beer’s viable system model and Team Syntegrity

(see Espinosa,2006)

A way forward

To re-think the fundamental meaning of development:

From the community’s needs -aligned with global/ regional priorities-

To re-think the Intervention Paradigm

Variety management: Community involvement; self-regulation developed

To re-think measurement systems

We need to find more appropriate ways to measure ‘sustainability’ of communities/ societies, including critical social, economical and ecological issues.

Research Context

Emergence and Complexity EPSRC Network

Self-organisation in (human) social systems. Research aims

To suggest transferable concepts that might be used in other domains (physics, biology and robotics) to explain principles of task allocation and self-regulation.

To describe informal networking patterns and their evolving identities in emerging social structures

To develop and test new methodologies and tools based on these ideas, to support design of complex social transformation, the success of which depends on the performance of self-organizing emergent networks (i.e in communities regeneration).

Organisations: A ComplexityPerspective

Organisations: Learning networks requiring access to knowledge resources to convert them into tangible products (Powell et al, 1996)

Basis of network cooperation: the need for resource pooling and the need to respond to threat (Axelrod, 1984).Learning: built as a social process; evolves when there is a community of collaboration Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995), Self-organization: distributed cooperation -emerges in the course of reciprocation strategies (Axelrod, 1997)

Heterarchies: enormously complex and effective adaptive systems, self-organised by a variety of non-hierarchical principles (Stark, 2000)

The main task for management attention in complex evolutionary (organisational) networks is to be the “cognitive gate-keeping” structure (Mandelli, 2004).

Evolutionary learning communities (& society)

Banathy developed the “Evolutionary Social Systems” - that has proved useful in supporting organizational forms that might contribute to a ‘self-guided evolutionary development process’ (Banathy, 2000).

Laszlo & Laszlo then suggest development of

“evolutionary learning communities” (ELC): communities that actively strive toward sustainable pathways for evolutionary development in synergistic interaction with their milieu, through both individual and collective processes of learning.

“evolutionary learning society’ resulting as a macro level as the co-evolution of ELC (Laszlo, 2003; Laszlo & Laszlo, 2003).

Here we argue, from a perspective of complexity management, that an additional requirement is enactment of the democratic structures that underpin societal evolutionary learning.

Cybernetic approaches

Organisational Cybernetics (Beer, 1979, 1981)sustainability - an ongoing process constituted through the dynamic relationships between viable organisations and the reality that these relationships lay down into their realisation –

Effective solutions massively increase the chances of success when they emerge from an understanding of the mechanism of structurally coupled autonomous (i.e. self-regulated) entities in their natural flow

Second order cybernetics (Maturana & Varela, 1980, 1988): views sustainability as a term that is constantly open to negotiation and local definition in dialogue, rather than being some what out-there in the world (Schlindwein & Ison, 2004).

Viability and complexity management

Viable System: responds or anticipates environmental changes, through effecting changes in its own dynamics that allow it to maintain an identity over time (Beer 1979, 1981, 1983, 1985). co-existent with the viability of the other organisations or systems to which it is structurally coupled

Viable System Model: Sufficient and necessary set of functions for the ‘viable’ organisation

What is a viable system?

Remains in touch with a continually changing world.

Composed of:a set of operations,

a meta-system

the environment within which it impacts and sustains itself.

Recursive: Contains and is contained within other viable systems

Diagnosis of interaction between viable systems: Ross Ashby’s Laws of Variety (Ashby, 1964).

Variety is a measure of perceived complexity, ascribed by the observer of it.

The laws of variety are developed into several laws and axioms of management.

Recursion - Complexity Levels

System

Sub system

Sub-Sub System

VSM-photo

Sustainable (Viable) Structures

Autonomy and CohesionThe Role of Higher managementStructural coupling with the EnvironmentVariables and Metrics for SustainabilityParticipation and Re-engagement

Viable vs. Evolutionary Learning Societies

Societal development: sustained viability (rather than ‘non stop growth)

Model a society as a viable system: focus on essencial variables for sustainability

Development of self-regulated learning communities (infosets- networks of shared knowledge and understanding on critical issues for sustainability)

Effective governance: Increase in:

the level of social awareness (access to relevant public knowledge) and

individual and institutional participation (engagement in public decisions and following up of public actions).

Criteria to design an ELC

Clarify organisational identityIdentify essential sustainability variablesUse systemic methodologies for enabling democratic participation (e.g. Open Dialogue, Team Syntegrity)Develop knowledge clusters as learning organisations with technical supportDesign variety amplifiers/ attenuators for knowledge sharing and structuringDesign accountability mechanisms for pub lic control on sustainability indexes (e.g. Management support systems)

Social (human) systems

PhD studentship

PhD studentship

Selection process: about 8 candidates

Finalists:Pedro Pablo Cardoso: Colombian, marine biologist, Msc Environmental Management

Wide experience in academic and consultancy work in issues of sustainability

Expected starting date: October 1st

Research aims and objectives

Project AimTo design an intervention model with functional basis in bottom-up mechanisms to develop social self-sustainable associative schemes.

Research objectives:To study the current body of knowledge explaining self regulation on biological, social and simulated systems to find out differences and similarities in basic concepts, models, and identification of generic rules.

To study success and failure in biological and social regeneration programs to find out structural patterns that characterizes successful practices and methods of intervention.

To develop and test to validate a model, intervention methodology and tools, inspired by generic rules of self organization, in an agreed real life situation.

Research Hypothesis

The intervention methodology and tools must have influence in:

the number of social interactions, number of involved individuals, number and kind of feedbacks and number of actions (facts) (As noticed in the work with ants of Deborah Gordon (1999) and Edward Wilson &Bert Holldobler (1996)).

Conceptual background

Sustainable Development: System of production and consumption, capable to generate and improve the equity, life quality, and environmental welfare of present and future generationsnew perspective of development that includes the rehabilitation of the existing infrastructures and re-incorporation of marginal communities to the economic system adopting the concept of regeneration as driver to develop practices to achieve sustainability

Methodology

Literature Review: Study the state of the art research on issues of self-organisation, sustainability and communities regeneration. Critical review comparing:

1) aims, objectives and conclusions of each document. 2) Conceptual frameworks. 3) Applied definition of self organization. 4) Documented experience of regeneration program. 5) Analytical tools used. 6) Results.

Analysis of success and failure in biological and social regeneration programs, using Eisenhardt (1989) and Yin (1989) methodology, as well as cladistics:

to explain, identify and understand laws and relationships that explain evolution, existence of establish and emerging (self-organization) configuration (bottom-up behavior).

Example: ‘Against poverty’ Eastern Yucatan -program

Previous efforts in a small community: 1998-2007)

5000 people

sponsor - W. K. Kellogg Foundation

Important achievements in quality of life for the involved communities (in production, health, micro-finances and self-steem/leadership).

Methodology:Based on holistic and complexity approaches to socio-economic development program, supported by internet and massive communication.

Structure:Communal Council:

Production.HealthMicro-financesSelf-esteem and leadership

Yucatan project

‘Development Against Poverty as a Complex System in a Mayan Village’ - Heriberto Cuanalo de la Cerda- Eco-Summit 2007 - China (to be uploaded in our wiki)

The World Bank estimates that 2.8 billion—almost half of the world’s 6 billion people—live on less than U.S. $2 a day. Poverty is pervasive in many areas of the world. This paper introduces a complex model which is built from the ground up as an opportunity to understand poverty from the poor Mayan people’s perspective, to gain a better understanding of the development process. Education, health, production - productivity and level of investment (household’s basic needs) were identified as dynamic variables that condition poverty through their interactions in time loops. Poverty is a state of activity towards which the system settles. The interactions and loops of these variables require the adoption of a strategy of multiple goals and successive approximations to fight poverty. The results showed improvement in key variables of wellbeing: households’ level of investment, infant’s level of nourishment and the amount of monetary savings.

Meeting: 1st week September Exploring possibilities of collaboration

Welsh project: Sustainable Communities Network

Aims: Rebuilding Society NetworkIntegrating co-operative projects on sustainability in Mid Wales

Network:Farmers, Schools, Universities, Community Activists, Experts(Local/ national agencies/ industries)

Transition Towns (Schumacher College). Focus on developing projects on:

Sustainable Food, Energy, Housing, Local CurrencyReducing dramatically the footprint (evolutionary learning communities)

Regeneration projectGeneric research questions

Which values/ societal regulators each societal network exhibit?How those influence community/ institutions informal network structures?How does specialization affects learning in the community projects?Are there examples in these communities where ‘self-assembly involving self organization’ has happened?How can we measure performance of the regenerating community?Which network configurations happen between roles and individuals involved in a regeneration program?

Self-organisation & informal networking

An example in Communities’ Regeneration: A developing

Eco-Village

About The Eco-Village

’The Eco-Village’ - September 1999Company limited by guarantee without a share capital,Primary objective: create and manage a sustainable village on behalf of its members. Charitable purpose of education: ‘to create a model sustainable community from which others may learn (possibly from our mistakes as much as from our achievements!)’

Unique one-off project combining educational purposes and cooperative practices.

1999-2007

Members actions:Researched the concept of sustainable rural housing developmentlocated a suitable 67 acre site in Cloughjordan Co. Tipperary.

– The residential area comprises 23 acres. – Over 50 acres of land has been allocated for community use, divided

between agricultural land and a wildlife area.

Masterplan based on sustainable principles prepared for the estate.2005 detailed planning permission granted for 131 homes ( apartment, terrace, semi-detached and detached house types). Studied and chosen ecological specialised technologies, including reed bed waste water treatment, sustainable urban drainage and a district heating main.

Community’s organisation

Cooperative organisation:Based on consensus decision-making.

Strategy of shared-out responsibilities: About a dozen Self-organised working groups ( e.g. fundraising group, land use group).

Group coordinators meeting once a month

Members meetings:– Managed by the Process Group, a group formed to facilitate an

ongoing learning process concerned with their structures and processes.

Four staff employed, responsible for finance, the office, unsold sites, site sales administration and contractual and official relationships relating to the infrastructure.

VSM Workshop

Agreed organisational identity:Charitable company, founded on cooperative principles to:

Create a conscious new approach to a way of life which will benefit the individuals involved, and provide a viable example to plant the seeds for other similar projects, globallyTo build sustainable community by transforming a grienfield site into a model of sustainable community, using the best of environmental technology and providing sustainable good and services, education and ‘dream houses’

Primary Activities

Establishing Green Infrastructure

Building infrastructure

Selling

Building individual houses

Constructing community houses

Education/ dissemination/ networking

Community creation

System 2 System 3 System 3* System 4 System 5

Board Board Board Education G Board

E-mails Discussi Boards

Coordinators Group

Members meeting

External Commun. G

Members meeting

Process group

Meetings

Road Map Meetings

??? Fund Raising Memorand.

Monthly Coordin Meetngs

Finances, Administrat.

??? Site Sale Strt Eco-Charter

Newsletter

Group

Process group Lands use G Sust Comm Ethos

Timetabling Weekly Report

Strategy G

IT group Legal Issues Mobility G

Planning Group

Board

Preliminary diagnosis/ recommendations

Clear identity & ethos through highly motivated, autonomous membersNeed to distinguish between the ‘developing project’ and the Eco-VillageUnrecognised systems 1 in the development project (e.g. sales..)Lack of control in the development process! (risk of viability)Most roles concentrated in Systems 3/4/5 NOT enough on Systems 1!!!Need to ‘migrate’ from current sub-organisations, into more operationally based groupings able to respond to the complexity of current tasks (e.g. sales and infrastructure -monitoring developments-).Overloading variety on non-crucial issues (e-mails…).Non-operational System 4 for environmental monitoring (i.e. political and economical changes that may affect the Eco-Village), financial planning and organisational development.Urgent need to develop the 3/4 Homeostat. Urgent need for meta-systemic managementNeed to develop a proper System 3*

Current organisational challenges at the Village

Effective self-organisation, based on members’ skills & interest, but main organisational problems not properly attended (e.g. infrastructure monitoring, sales..)

Missing regulatory and strategic development mechanisms -disparate efforts & responsibilities in both levels-

Need for more cohesion & organisational performance in the development stage

see (Espinosa, 2006)

Summarising: The Viable Systems Model & Sustainable Development

Organisational and 2nd order cybernetics: A useful approach to design ELC’s and evolutionary learning societies

Re- design of development programs: To create structural conditions for improved self-regulation and for guaranteeing realisation of local potentials. Critical issue: the democratic involvement of stakeholders, at all levels of development, from design to implementation of development programs and related monitoring systems. Beer’s monitoring systems: a more systemic way of handling critical measures for sustainable development that gives the metrics for measuring long term rather than mainly short term development.

Strength: for diagnosing complex situations and of innovative sustainable design.

Research Outputs 2007-2008

Beyond Hierarchy: A Complexity Management PerspectiveInvited paper to Kybernetes, special issue on Management Sciences, Published March 2007

Complexity Management, Democracy and Social Consciousness: Challenges for an evolutionary learning society

Invited paper, Systemic Practice and Action Research. In press (August 2007)

A Complexity approach to Sustainability: revisiting S BeerIn press. European Journal of the Operational Research Society. Accepted March 2007.

Complexity Management and self-organisation in an evolutionary learning society.

A. Espinosa. Paper in progress.- ISSS Conference, Tokio, August 3-7, 2007.

Current Research plans

Theoretical papers -team proposal- Exploring the different/similar meanings and impact for understanding social systems in each realm (biological, artificial, societal)

Self-organisation, generic rules and performance:Modelling complexity:

– viewpoint of statistical mechanics to build up complexity models’, in each realm

– Viewpoint of social cybernetics and other holistic approaches in

Learning issues in a self-assembly process;first order (all) and second order (ants/humans)

Performance measurement and predictionUnderstanding of performance in complex adaptive systemsEarly Warning Systems

Book -Complexity and Sustainability (1)

Introduction: Sustainability and complexityWhy sustainability needs a holistic approachConceptual platform: complexity management, systems and cybernetics.Holistic and complexity approaches to sustainabilityRe-visiting the idea of sustainability from a complexity approach

The Viable System Model: a recursive model of viable organisations

Complexity and Variety ManagementThe Viable System Model – A Brief OverviewMethodologies and tools for organisational transformation

Viability and SustainabilitySocieties as Viable SystemsSelf-organization and societal development

– o Measuring systems– o Control and Governance

Democracy and participation Re-designing the interaction between individual and society

Book -Complexity and Sustainability (2)

Environmental Management Revisited Modeling the complexity of interactions in a regionRe-designing governmental agencies

– o An example from the National Environmental System in Colombia

Re-designing industries and institutions– o Example: Re-organisation of an eco-industry– o The Mondragon co-cooperative through cybernetic lens

Re-evaluation of socio-economic development programsDevelopment programs: What’s going wrong?What is still missing in Complexity approaches to Development?Managing complexity in development programs

– o Design of an educational development program – o Developing a national program against poverty

Bridging the gap: towards a more sustainable societySelf-organised virtual learning networksThe Global Village and democratic knowledge networksRe-thinking government

Conclusions

ReferencesCuanalo de la Cerda, H. (2007). Development Against Poverty as a Complex System in a Mayan Village. In: Proceedings of the - Eco-Summit 2007 - China.

Co-op (2003), “Coffee: What a difference a penny makes”, The Co-operative Group, available March 30th 2005 in http://www.co-op.co.ukDube, S.C. (1990), Modernization and Development: The Search for Alternative Paradigms, 2nd Ed, Zed\Books Ltd & The United Nations University, London, UK.Espinosa, A. (2006). A cybernetic re-evaluation of socio-economic development programs. Kybernetes 35 (1/2), pp. 30-44

Espinosa, A, Harnden, R. and J. Walker (2007).Beyond Hierarchy: A Complexity Management Perspective. Kybernetes, special issue on Management Sciences, 2007Henderson, H. (2002a), “A Systems Approach: Calvert – Henderson Quality of Life Indicators”, available March 18th 2005 in http://www.calvert-henderson.com. Potocan, V. and M. Mulej (2003), “On Requisitely Holistic Understanding of Sustainable Development from Business Viewpoints”, Systemic Practice and Action Research, Vol 16, No. 6.Max -Neef, M.A. (1991), Human Scale Development: Conception, Application and Further Reflections, Apex Press, New York.UNDP. (2005), “United Nations for international development cooperation: Effectiveness of the UN development system and its operational activities”, available March 15th 2005 in http://www.un.org/esa/coordination/ecosoc/CRP-capacities.