Insights from complexity science: More trust in self-organization needed
Study ‘Systemic Risk: The Threat to Societal Diversity and Coherence’
INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED SUSTAINABILITY STUDIES E.V. (IASS)
Taking a Systems thinking approach is becoming ever more popular in our complex world. Working across traditional boundaries, forming networks, co-ordinating, collaborating and adapting to our changing environment can pose us with some significant challenges.
In this session you will learn what we mean by ‘Systems thinking’. Why it has emerged as a way of thinking to help us move forward and why it is applicable in our world of work. We will look at how Systems thinking helps us to create the conditions for positive change to emerge. You will also learn some tips about the application of Systems thinking ideas and approaches and the opportunities and challenges that application of the thinking might present us with.
Learning Goals
learn what we mean by ‘Systems thinking
understand what are differences between systems thinking and other forms of thinking
learn about some of the major approaches to systems thinking
learn some some tips about the application of Systems thinking ideas and approaches
develop an appreciation of some of the opportunities and challenges that application of the thinking might present us with
About the Facilitator
Pauline Roberts is a Systems Practitioner and independent consultant who has worked with a wide range of organisations, such as the NHS, Local Authorities, Ministry of Defence, pharmaceutical industry, charities and voluntary groups, applying systems thinking (in particular the VSM) to identify areas for improvements.
She is a Visiting Lecturer at City University Business School, London, in undergraduate Applied Systems Thinking and an Associate Lecturer with the Open University on the MSc Systems Thinking in Practice courses.
Format
Presentation with some opportunities to interact
Intended audience
Anyone can attend this session. No prior knowledge of System thinking is required. The only thing required is a willingness to engage with different ideas and explore the complexity around you.
What Attendees Get
List of useful references on systems thinking and its various approaches
10% discount on any Liquid Forest Lab course – valid for 6 months
Course Length
Online, 2h including 5-10 minutes break
Price
AUD $135 – one off introductory discount of 30% (AUD $195.00 – full price)
Additional discounts:
AUD $128 – early bird 5% until 1 week before first day of course
In today’s post, I am looking at the cybernetics of Ohno’s Production System. For this I will start with the ideas of ultrastability from one of the pioneers of Cybernetics, Ross Ashby. It should be noted that I am definitely inspired by Ashby’s ideas and thus may take some liberty with them.
Ashby defined a system as a collection of variables chosen by an observer. “Ultrastability” can be defined as the ability of a system to change its internal organization or structure in response to environmental conditions that threaten to disturb a desired behavior or value of an essential variable (Klaus Krippendorff). Ashby identified that when a system is in a state of stability (equilibrium), and when disturbed by the environment, it is able to get back to the state of equilibrium. This is the feature of an ultrastable system. Let’s look at the example of an organism and its…
Model (https://sites.uea.ac.uk/providingasecurebase/the-secure-base-model)
A Secure Base
What is a secure base and why is it important for children’s development?
A secure base is provided through a relationship with one or more sensitive and responsive attachment figures who meet the child’s needs and to whom the child can turn as a safe haven, when upset or anxious. When children develop trust in the availability and reliability of this relationship, their anxiety is reduced and they can therefore explore and enjoy their world, safe in the knowledge that they can return to their secure base for help if needed.
The concept of a secure base is important, because it links attachment and exploration, and provides the basis of a secure attachment. A securely attached child does not only seek comfort from an attachment figure, but through feeling safe to explore develops confidence, competence and resilience.
Do adults also need a secure base?
Yes. As we move through the lifespan, we form new attachment relationships with friends and partners. These relationships serve the same function for adults as for children; they provide a secure base which offers comfort and reassurance and at the same time, allows us to operate in the world with confidence. In the words of Bowlby:
All of us, from the cradle to the grave, are happiest when life is organised as a series of excursions, long or short, from the secure base provided by our attachment figures. (Bowlby 1988)
What happens when children do not have a secure base?
Early experiences of separation or neglectful or abusive parenting will cause children to remain anxious and to distrust close relationships. Children adapt to the lack of a secure base by developing different patterns of behaviour. For instance, they may become wary and defended or especially needy and demanding of care and attention. Some children with unpredictable or frightening care may try to make their environment more predictable through role-reversing and controlling behaviour. All of these behaviours are characteristic of insecure attachment patterns.
What happens when children are removed from a harmful environment?
For many children, serious experiences of neglect and maltreatment will have had a profound effect. They will have developed negative expectations of adults as part of their internal working model of relationships. They will transfer these expectations into new environments (such as foster or adoptive families or in residential care), along with the patterns of defensive behaviour that have functioned as survival strategies in the past. In these circumstances, children will find it hard to let adults come close enough to establish trusting relationships and provide a secure base. The risk, then, is that feelings and behaviours might become fixed in destructive loops and the damage of the past will not be healed.
What can be done to help?
Attachment theory would suggest that exposure to warm, consistent and reliable caregiving can change children’s previous expectations both of close adults and of themselves and there is ample evidence from research and practice to support this (Howe 1996, Wilson et al 2003, Cairns 2003, Beek and Schofield 2004,).
The role of adults who can provide secure base caregiving, therefore, is of central importance. They must take on a parenting / caregiving role for the child, but they must also become a therapeutic caregiver in order to change the child’s most fundamental sense of self and others (internal working model). In order to achieve this, they must care for the child in ways that demonstrate, implicitly and explicitly to the child, that they are trustworthy and reliable, physically and emotionally available and sensitive to his or her needs. In addition, they must be mindful of the protective strategies that the child has learned in order to feel safe in the past and adjust their approaches so that their parenting feels comfortable and acceptable to the child rather than undermining or threatening. The ensuing relationships will provide a secure base, from which children can develop and be supported to explore and maximise their potential.
This outcome may be supported by the use of the secure base model across all services to vulnerable children.
Bowlby’s Secure Base Theory and the Social/Personality Psychology of Attachment Styles: Work(s) in Progress – Waters et al (2002) – https://dtreboux.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/waters-convergent-validity.pdf
Waters, E., Crowell, J., Elliott, M., Corcoran, D., & Treboux, D. (2002). Bowlby’s secure base theory and the social/personality psychology of attachment styles: Work(s) in progress. Attachment & Human Development, 4(2), 230–242. doi:10.1080/14616730210154216 – https://sci-hub.se/10.1080/14616730210154216
The Internal Family Systems Model (IFS) is an integrative approach to individual psychotherapy developed by Richard C. Schwartz in the 1980s.[1][2] It combines systems thinking with the view that the mind is made up of relatively discrete subpersonalities, each with its own unique viewpoint and qualities. IFS uses family systems theory to understand how these collections of subpersonalities are organized.[3]
Tasting the Pickle: Ten flavours of meta-crisis and the appetite for a new civilisation Jonathan Rowson Feb 9th, 2021 “There is a process of reckoning going on around the world, heightened by the conditions of the pandemic and the palpability of our fragility, inequality and interdependence. There is a climate emergency that requires urgent action, but the precise nature, cost, location and responsibility of that action is moot. There is a broader crisis of civilisational purpose that appears to necessitate political and economic transformation, and there are deeper socio-emotional, educational, epistemic and spiritual features of our predicament that manifest as many flavours of meta-crisis: the lack of a meaningful global ‘We’, widespread learning needs, self-subverting political logics and disenchanted worldviews. These different features of our world are obscured by their entanglement with each other. It is difficult to orient ourselves towards meaningful action that is commensurate with our understanding because we are generally unclear about the relationship between different kinds of challenge and what they mean for us. That’s what this essay is about. The world is in a pickle, and, daunting though it is, we need to learn how to taste it. Tasting the pickle well requires, in the spirit of Vivekananda, finding joy and releasing energy through the right kinds of discrimination.” – Jonathan Rowson
The balance between autonomy and cohesion is one of the three balances, essential for everything living and social. It’s fascinating to watch when there is a shift both in the balance itself and in the way it is achieved. The times of Coronavirus are exceptionally rich in new ways of maintaining social cohesion.
There are various factors and forces for cohesion. They can be distinguished once in terms of origin and influence, and then for different system scales – individual, organization, society. This way, there are nine categories: individual factors for individual cohesion, individual factors for organizational cohesion, individual factors for the cohesion of society, then organizational factors for individual cohesion, organizational factors for organizational cohesion and so on for all nine combinations.
Some factors work in similar ways at different scales, others not. For example, the need for safety, the need to reduce uncertainty, and the need to increase self-esteem, are individual facts for both organizational and societal cohesion.
Most ways to increase cohesion reduce autonomy. This is the case, for example, when social cohesion is achieved through any form of centralization of decision-making power.
But there can be an increase in cohesion without reducing autonomy. In fact, it can even do the opposite, enable it…
Viable Systems Model: More Support Tools Needed Marite Kirikova Department of Artificial Intelligence and Systems Engineering, Riga Technical University, Riga, Latvia Marite.Kirikova@rtu.lv Abstract. Stafford Beer proposed a Viable Systems Model, which was supposed to support successful management of enterprises. Since then numerous research works have referred to that model in management, information systems, and computer sciences. However, in the area of enterprise modeling there is a shortage of tools that would give an opportunity to create detailed enterprise models that would adhere to the VSM and would also be applicable for advanced model visualization and analysis. If available, appropriate modeling tools could help to utilize such features of VSM as fractality, distributed control, and variety handling mechanisms; and provide the possibility of overall adherence to those principles of cybernetics that become increasingly important in modeling enterprises in a socio-cyber-physical context. Keywords: VSM, fractal systems, service systems, variety management, distributed control
Scientiae Mathematicae Japonicae Online, e-2006, 865-880
THE EVOLUTION OF ORGANIZATIONAL CYBERNETICS – MARKUS SCHWANINGER
Received April 24, 2006
ABSTRACT. The purpose of this contribution is to give an overview of the origins and further developments of Organizational Cybernetics, its transdisciplinary nature and its links to different areas of science, i.e., both natural sciences and the humanities.
CHANGING THE SYSTEM: BRIAN ENO AND JAMES THORNTON IN CONVERSATION
TOGGLE BUTTON TO PLAY OR PAUSE THE VIDEO
Join Brian Eno in conversation with James Thornton, CEO and founder of ClientEarth, a pioneering environmental organisation, and discuss how we can use the power of the law to protect the planet. This special event will be chaired by science, natural history and environmental broadcaster Liz Bonnin.
Discover how we can use the power of the law to fight against climate change, protect the environment and build a future in which people and the planet thrive together.
Liz Bonnin will lead the conversation with Brian Eno, who is a dedicated climate campaigner and Trustee of ClientEarth as well as a renowned musician, record producer and visual artist, and James Thornton as they talk about their pioneering work using the law to bring about systemic change that protects life on Earth.
ClientEarth’s team of lawyers, scientists and policy experts have used their environmental expertise to achieve powerful change, from winning court cases over illegal air pollution, to writing laws to ensure that there will still be fish in the sea in the future.
Hear more about the landmark changes in law and policy which have been made possible by their work and discuss their predictions for the future and ideas for what we can all do to play our part.
Please note: This virtual event will not be available to watch again, so book a ticket to make sure you don’t miss out.
This event is part of the Science Museum Group’s series of Climate Talks
Join Brian Eno in conversation with James Thornton, CEO and founder of ClientEarth, a pioneering environmental organisation, and discuss how we can use the power of the law to protect the planet. This special event will be chaired by science, natural history and environmental broadcaster Liz Bonnin.
Discover how we can use the power of the law to fight against climate change, protect the environment and build a future in which people and the planet thrive together.
Liz Bonnin will lead the conversation with Brian Eno, who is a dedicated climate campaigner and Trustee of ClientEarth as well as a renowned musician, record producer and visual artist, and James Thornton as they talk about their pioneering work using the law to bring about systemic change that protects life on Earth.
ClientEarth’s team of lawyers, scientists and policy experts have used their environmental expertise to achieve powerful change, from winning court cases over illegal air pollution, to writing laws to ensure that there will still be fish in the sea in the future.
Hear more about the landmark changes in law and policy which have been made possible by their work and discuss their predictions for the future and ideas for what we can all do to play our part.
Please note: This virtual event will not be available to watch again, so book a ticket to make sure you don’t miss out.
This event is part of the Science Museum Group’s series of Climate Talks.
INFORMATION
FREE FESTIVAL TALK
DATE: Monday 15 February 2021
TIME: 19.30
PRICE: Free (booking essential)
LOCATION: Online
AGE: Suitable for ages 14 and older
book at source: FREE FESTIVAL TALK DATE: Monday 15 February 2021 TIME: 19.30 PRICE: Free (booking essential) LOCATION: Online AGE: Suitable for ages 14 and older BOOK TICKETS NOW
Thanks to the participants of this online discussion group, I had the opportunity to reflect upon the role and the identity of a system thinker.
A systems thinker is not a person who thinks about systems, a systems thinker is a person who thinks in systems, first, and then, maybe, about systems. Or, even better, a systems thinker is a person who thinks in systems about systems.
Systems Thinking is an outcome. You get to it if you consider all components of a system defined by an arbitrary boundary. You are part of the system you are considering. The thinking is demanded of your brain, the systemic outcome depends on if and how you are considering the relationships and the interactions between all components of the observed system. And this is just a starting point. I see no religion, no dogma, no convictions if you go through the approach of Critical Thinking and mitigating biases when you are observing, pondering, and intervening. I see Systems Thinking as a huge amount of work, requiring discipline, focus, concentration, and collaboration much needed to be more effective and efficient in letting the thinking be of elevated quality. That’s also why I think the best Systems Thinking thinking can happen in the context of facilitating collective intelligence composed of diverse, integer, generous people (and machines).
Weednesdays 5-6:30pm uk time, fortnightly from February 24th-May 26th
Following the first webinar in 2021 from Prof. Mike Jackson, we are pleased to announce the next webinar series which will run until the end of May. You can find the recordings of previous webinars on our webpage.
For anyone interested in offering a webinar for the next series (Jun 2021 to Dec 2021), please contact us at Metaphorum.org@gmail.com, sending us the following information:
name, title, description of the webinar, brief cvs with your picture
dates on which you are NOT available (we run the webinar series on Wednesdays 5:00-6:30 pm UK)
We will review the proposals and will accept the most innovative and high- quality proposals (hopefully on new topics not presented before in other Metaphorum events). We shall let you know shortly after receipt of your proposal if it has been accepted and discuss your availability.
Best regards,
Angela, Allenna and Jon
METAPHORUM WEBINAR SERIES AGENDA FEBRUARY – MAY 2021
Date
Speaker
Title
February the 24th
Prof. Raul Espejo
“The Enterprise Complexity Model: An Extension of the Viable System Model for Emerging Organisational Forms”
March the 3rd
Dr. Martin Pfiffner
The third dimension of organizing
March 17th
Dr Igor Perko
Invoking AI technology in organisations – a systemic examination
March 31st,
Dr. Raghav Rajagopalan
Meta Rational Ways of Knowing
April the 14th
Dr Angela Espinosa
Sustainable Self Governance: Early alarms from the COVID19 Pandemic
April 28th
Dr. Alfredo del Valle
The Participatory Workspace (PWS): An online, complexity management and communications tool
May the 12th
Dr Allenna Leonard
A VSM reflection on US politics and democracy
May 26th
Dr. Bernhard Sterchi
Alignment and autonomy on the last mile of execution – in defense of the wriggly lines
View the world as a cybernetician. Tim Falkiner explores POSIWID, isomorphism, & variety balance rooted in town planning & law.
About this Event
The Insights Series is an eclectic and learned collection of monthly events on the 4th Tuesday of each month hosted by Cybernetics Society. There will be lectures, seminars, conversations, debates, participation, all advancing our knowledge of cybernetics and related disciplines and their applications to real world needs.
Cybernetics is the science of achievement, the great meta-discipline of our time.
The CybSights Insights series is normally curated and hosted by the Secretary, Angus Jenkinson, FCybS. Attendance is free. Non-members are invited to make an optional donation or to Join.
In this session we welcome an Australian.
We are particularly delighted to be able to welcome Tim Falkiner with his experience in town planning, law, and legilstion with ‘homeskooled’ cybernetics.
Putting on our CyBeer Goggles
The underlying object of this discussion is to have the participants exercise their ability to think in cybernetic terms. To put on “cybeer” goggles and view the world as a cyberneticist. Cybernetics is a large field, but Tim has selected three cybernetic topics to explore. In three 25 minute segments, Tim will (i) explain what he understands of each topic; (ii) give some applications of that law or technique and (iii) invite the participants to give examples of how they apply the laws and techniques in their own professions or lives.
POSIWID The purpose of a system is what it does. Our purpose often defines the extent of the system or systems. It is helpful, in considering the purpose of a system from an objective, scientific, cybernetic viewpoint; to use Stafford Beer’s concept of POSIWID.
Isomorphism – The control system is isomorphic with the system under control. The town planner, J. Brian McLoughlin, writing about urban and regional planning systems, makes the point that control systems must have the same form and operation as the systems which they control —an application of the Conant-Ashby theorem:
“… the control devices for any system have to be isomorphic with the system to be controlled, that is, they have to be of similar form. This enables us to say that the planning process must have a similar ‘shape’ to the human ecosystem.”
Balancing variety – Given the control system must be isomorphic with the system under control, and given the infinite variety involved in real-world systems, a regulator must balance the resources available to it with the system to be controlled. Problems of increasing, decreasing, and balancing variety in time are considered.
Tim Falkiner – Crown solicitor, town planner, barrister, legislator
Tim lives in Melbourne, Australia with a career blending law and town planning. This gives experience in law as a regulator, system design and the science of cybernetics. As town planner, legal officer in the Victorian Ministry for Planning and Environment and the Crown Solicitor’s Office of Victoria in the Constitution, Legislation and Advisings section, he gained wide experience of land use planning and environmental legislation. He wrote the specification for the first computerised tribunal registry system in Victoria. Tim has practised as a barrister and is a life member of the Victorian Planning and Environmental Law Association. He learned cybernetic controls systems theory in 1976 and found other parallels (e.g. between Garth Thornton’s book “Legislative Drafting” and Frederick Brook’s book on the development of the IBM System 360 and OS/360, its operating system). He is the author (1982) of “Scientific Legislation – The Use of Cybernetics and Software Engineering Knowledge to Explain What Legislation Is, How it Behaves and How It should be Designed, Maintained and Replaced” influenced by Stafford Beer’s cybernetics. He is now revisiting it to reconcile Beer’s definition of planning as a continuous process of making and discarding plans, with the difficulties, so clearly outlined by software engineers of maintaining legislation in the face of continuous change towards a future more dynamically adaptive legislative style based on cybernetic principles.
Join us, and engage in the dynamics of these key concepts
The sessions are designed for audience participation!
Science is headed for a turn, waking up to another level of logic that recognises the observer’s in both the world and the making of science
Cybernetics is the science of achievement, the great meta-discipline of our time.
The CybSights Insights series is normally curated and hosted by the Secretary, Angus Jenkinson, FCybS. Attendance is free. Non-members are invited to make an optional donation or to Join. Follow us for news of future events.
We are particularly delighted to be able to welcome an eminent member of the cybernetic discipline discussing the very future of science.
The initial generation of cybernetics was keen to develop smart technology and to show the parallels between machine and human, after all people implanted human designs into their machine organization. Later cybernetics was more concerned about the processes of the living, as well as the ways in which the ‘observation process’ (whether done by a robot, frog, or person of some cultural background) shaped knowledge and behaviour. This was also part of an evolving shift in the understanding of the world . A next step is a shift in the understanding of science itself. Dr Stuart Umpleby is a leading thinker in this movement and this session should be a treat.” — Angus Jenkinson, Secretary of CybSoc
Second Order Science: Logic, Strategies, Methods —Colloquy
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