International Society for the Systems Sciences: Journals ISSS
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The Value of the Frame: Painting Complexity using Two Chronic Disease Models
No full textAs with all chronic diseases, it is now recognized that type 2 diabetes is a complex health issue, the etiology of which involves numerous risk factors operating at different ecological levels of analysis. However, this ecological complexity of the problem seldom manifests itself in the interventions for preventing the problem, which typically focus on changing behavior through universal health education, with the assumption of a homogeneous population. This paper examines the limitations of this way of framing the problem of type 2 diabetes, particularly its failure to capture the way in which this problem emerges because of dynamic interactions between individuals and their environments and how these interactions vary in fundamental ways depending upon the context within which they occur. Specifically, the paper examines how framing of type 2 diabetes in the Lower Rio Grande Valley (LRGV) affects which systems modeling method selects to understand the problem and to help guide policy-makers to ameliorate it. Each systems model has a paradigm characterizing it by a set of fundamental rules and underlying concepts. That is, each method bases on assumptions of how the model should be constructed and the knowledge obtainable from such assumptions. By assuming the model should be constructed in a certain way, the modeler (whether implicitly or explicitly) frames the problem by making assumptions about the phenomenon-of-interest. Choosing to develop any model asserts that the model proscribes to paradigmatic assumptions for how it would contribute something of value) in some capacity (for a purpose), which is ultimately affected by understanding, interpretation, and application of the problem. The paper describes how specific types of systems methods, those using agent-based models (ABMs) and system dynamics models (SDMs), can produce very different ways of understanding the problem of, and the leverage points for, type 2 diabetes in the LRGV. Additionally, it moves beyond simply outlining the general differences in the use and applications of ABM and SDM, to presenting models demonstrating how framing of the problem and model paradigmatic assumptions affect understanding of the problem of type 2 diabetes in the LGRV and its potential leverage points. While the examples are specific to a health problem in a specific community, the significance of such an approach is in its generalizability to how understanding social system behavior depends upon how framing the problem and the paradigmatic assumptions of the modeling method affect our understanding of social systems and public health problems
Practical Value of the Systems-based Evolutionary Learning Laboratory in Solving Complex Community Problems in Vietnam
No full textThis paper provides initial reflections on the practical value of the systems-based Evolutionary Learning Laboratory (ELLab) through a case study on improving the quality of life for women smallholder farmers in rural Haiphong, northern Vietnam. The first five steps were implemented during 2013-2014 providing valuable results that have made both practical and theoretical contributions with substantial implications to community development. The approach and framework helped to identify and engaged right stakeholders in problem analyses and decision making activities. Fuzzy problems within the complex web of life of the women and rural households were uncovered using relevant systems tools through a guided ELLab process. The ELLab helped to build capacity of local people for taking ownership of the process and outcomes to guarantee sustainability and long-term impacts. It also facilitated true participation and co-learning amongst stakeholders, making transformative learning occur. Contributions to action research are discussed
Anthropocene? Yes, but Stratified – Measuring Existing Societies with Civilization Level Index
No full textAbstract This paper extends the authors previous work discussed at 2014 ISSS Conference, “Civilization Level Index (CLI): A Systemic Instrument for Measuring the Level of Development, or How Human Are We Actually Becoming.” Since the theme of this year’s conference is Anthropocene, it is relevant that we recognize as clear as possible what humanity exactly is and how human we are at current time. The biological definition of humanity has been clear even it starts being challenged by frontier researches in artificial intelligence and genome engineering. But the consensus of sociological and anthropological definition of humanity in this planet has yet to be formed at the global level. Civilization Level Index is a candidate tool for clarifying this issue. However, a full scale implementation of CLI measurement is a huge project requiring institutional support that is yet to be found, the author as an independent researcher can only initialize the first step, i.e. to use limited data available from the internet to present a small subset of CLI here for discussion and for attracting interests of cooperation for further work. 
Intangibles and Valuation in the Age of Knowledge
No full textHere we take an deductive approach rooted in the reason the firm exists Coase's (1937) then work on Williamson (1979), Hart and Grossman (1986), Tirole (1986) and Hernnart (1989) on the basis for that existence followed by most recently the role ICT plays in the process creating corporate boundaries (Holmstrom and Roberts, 1998, Antras 2011, Cantwell 2013). In the emerging knowledge age it is highly pertinent to explore how to articulate the role of the corporation, or more generally enterprise, where knowledge is evidentially key to an enterprise's success, form, distribution of power, both within and without, and its location. Corporate ownership seems highly correlated with all these. Knowledge generation, distribution and location are not prerequisite for corporate existence but necessary artefacts of enterprise defined beyond the boundaries of ownership by any single corporation
SUSTAINABILITY AS A DYNAMIC CAPACITY: EVIDENCE IN A BRAZILIAN SUGARCANE ENERGY COMPANY
No full textEnvironmental concerns have increased the awareness of the limitations of the modern conception of nature and its disastrous consequences. Corporate sustainability consists of ensuring long-term economic viability and, at the same time, contributing to the socio-economic development of communities, the health of the environment and the stability of society (Ethos, 2009). The concept of corporate sustainability involves sustainable economic growth that is aligned with social development and environmental conservation. Consequently, a new development strategy emerges embodying political, economic, social, technological, and environmental dimensions. This new paradigm of a sustainable development implies the need for profound changes in the current production systems, human society organisation, and utilisation of natural resources essential to human life and other living beings (Belico et. al, 2000). Therefore, the paradigm of sustainability implies the need for changes in the current production systems, including human society organization and utilization of natural resources essential to human life and other living beings (Liboni; Cezarino, 2014).The aim of this paper is to analyze the development of changes in operations management towards sustainability using the Soft System Methodology. The results show that Balbo company, Brazilian sugarcane industry, has developed new ways to change and adapt in a disturbing environment was able to built dynamics capabilities. SSM is a soft methodology, which was developed from the observation that not all problems and situations faced by corporations are of a precise nature (Martinelli and Ventura, 2006, p. 163). This systemic method was “designed to assist in the resolution of soft issues, which are of complex nature and involve many human elements” (Martinelli; Ventura, 2006, p.163). Native branch and all the changes demanded by the company’s new business were the source of development of dynamic capacities and adaptation of the company, which shifted from a stable commodity market to a dynamic, increasing market of organic food products. In order to seek a more sustainable management model, the company has developed dynamic capacities within the economic sphere focusing on efficacy, reduction and reuse of solid wastes, and cogeneration of energy; within the social sphere, the rural workers are assisted with security and quality of life programs; and within the environmental sphere, the company, through the Cana Verde project, has environmental certifications and preserves protected areas by conciliating the respect for the environment with the production processes of all areas. 
A Systems Science Framework for Understanding the Nature of Governance
No full textThe natural world of life is replete with examples of systemic governance subsystems that operate to sustain the continuance of those systems. Every cell, organism, population, and ecosystem demonstrates various self-regulation and environmental coordination mechanisms that have evolved to ensure the long-term viability of that system. A formal approach from systems science that is built on these natural governance subsystems may provide some guidance to our understanding of human social systems and their governance. The emergence of higher levels of organization in the origins and evolution of life can be seen to be the story of increasing sophistication in governance subsystems as disparate complex adaptive systems coalesce into “societies” of interacting entities (super-molecules to primitive protocells, prokaryotic cells to eukaryotic cells, those to multicellular organisms, those to communities, etc.). At each stage in this on-going emergence of higher levels of organization the one consistent aspect is how hierarchical cybernetic structures have contributed to the stabilization of functional relations among the component entities leading to sustainable super-entity structures. The progression is from simple cooperation of multiple entities to intentional coordination emerging to manage complexity. Information processing and decision subsystems (agents) that took responsibility for logistical coordination among components and others that managed tactical coordination of the whole system with external (environmental) entities, resources, and threats evolved to keep increasingly complex biological entities able to maintain their existence and reproduction. Now the governance of human social systems that seek to exist in some kind of harmony with the Earth’s ecology (what I call the Ecos) has emerged in the last 100k years or so and evolved over that time frame to produce the modern socio-economic systems in existence today. But it (characterized here as the neoliberal capitalistic democracy) is not as evolved as, say, the mechanisms of metabolic regulation. There are numerous reasons to believe that the modern governance subsystem is, in fact, moving human societies toward the opposite of sustainable existence. A systems examination of the theory of governance subsystems (hierarchical cybernetics) suggests pathways toward a more functional governance subsystem for human societies. The theory covers the regulation of economic flows as well as the legal superstructure and moral/ethical aspects of culture that collectively constitutes the governance subsystem of a human society embedded in a meta-system, the Ecos
TOWARDS AN AUTOPOIETIC MANAGEMENT OF HUMAN ACTIVITY SYSTEMS IN MEXICAN TUORISM SECTOR SMES
No full textThis paper aims to contextualize the management of human activity systems (HAS) in lodging Mexican SMEs in the tourism environment, given that the management has been constrained in its ability to respond and adapt, this affects the operational dimension as well as the service provided to customers. Complementarity between methodologies and models of systems science allows to set the tourism SMEs concept through the of Warfield’s domain science model. Due to complex interactions derived from the interrelationships among actors engaged in tourism services, it seeks to unify different views about problems faced by human activity system management and establish guidelines between the being and the should of it (Soft Systems Methodology), it is proposed that the adoption of the principles of autopoietic systems can lead management to a state of order and self-organization in the human activity system to influence the efficiency of the total system. Professors and actors with decision-making power within these organizations would benefit from a new perspective in the issues treatment of the human dimension of these companies
The design of inquiry for Business Growth
No full textThis paper is concerned with the design of ‘business growth programmes’, i.e. specifically designed learning programmes with explicitly stated goals of promoting and impacting on business growth. This paper is based on research into the design considerations of growth programmes in 3 European countries. It is the result of a two year European research study funded from the European Commission. With this as context, using Systems Thinking we re-theorise the role of design itself as it applies to business growth programmes. This is achieved by re-tracing some of the most fundamental systems ideas back to Kant’s critique of practical reason. The paper draws out several implications, (i) to demonstrate the application of a new set of principles which are designed to simultaneously help to develop and evaluate future business growth programmes; (ii) these principles also can help explain the tendency towards sub-optimal growth programmes in current practice; and (iii) to re-consider the policy priorities and assumptions for supporting business growth programmes in future
Context Trumps Causality
No full textMany of the successes of our modern world have been the result of a focus on defined meaning and direct causality. Given these foci narrative heuristics can be transformed into efficient algorithms. But, efficiency comes at a price. Efficiency has little tolerance for ambiguity and even less tolerance for indirect forms of causality. Efficiency demands that context be treated as if it was a variable in a look up table. Our advances in material living standards and in live expectancy are due to efficiency's stubborn form of Ohkam's Razor. Yet, the anthropocene has its own demands -- for context sensitivity, for the tolerance of ambiguity, and for the cultivation of resilience. Our challenge over the coming decades is to relax efficiency's iron grip so as to allow the resilience required for future generations.  
The Limits of Bioenergy: A Complex Systems Approach to Land Use Dynamics and Constraints
No full textThis paper summarises a PhD thesis recently defended by the author at Imperial College London. The aim is to present a novel methodology to obtain an understanding of the potential limits of bioenergy by using a complex systems approach for assessing land use dynamics and constraints. Although bioenergy is classified as a renewable energy source, land is a finite resource and its expansion limited. The anthropogenic demands on land result from a combination of multiple provisioning services. These include global food consumption, dietary preference, crop and livestock yields, land use integration, wastes and residues, and bioenergy yields and forms, as well as the allocation of surplus land for forestry and energy crops, and the potential role of negative emission technologies. Thus, bioenergy is just one part of a complex land-use system. The general hypothesis is that there are fundamental limits to the overall scale and rate of the sustainable expansion of bioenergy, which can be assessed by means of combinations of empirical data, mapping tools and complex systems models. To this end, a novel methodological approach is proposed, which is based on two original integrated models. The first one is termed the Global Calculator Land Use Change Model (GCLUC), developed as part of the Global Calculator initiative, in which land is freely allocated worldwide and food security is assumed a priority. The second considers land for dedicated energy crops as a delimited reserve, by integrating Hubbert’s curve principles (originally proposed for peak oil assessments) in agro-ecological zoning schemes (as recently done for sugarcane ethanol in Brazil), resulting in a new model here termed green-Hubbert. The results show ranges of bioenergy potentials and expansion rates in the context of different land use futures. The potential public policies necessary to support sustainable bioenergy are also discussed. Finally, the conclusions show that, indeed, there are fundamental limits to bioenergy, and these limits are dynamic over time