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Transforming nature-society relations
through innovations in research praxis.
A co-evolutionary systems approach
Ray Ison
Professor of Systems, Applied Systems Thinking in Practice Group (ASTiP) &
STiP Postgraduate Programme ,
The Open University, UK
Seminaire d’animation scientifique interdisciplinaire portee par l’antenne montpellieraine de NSS-Dialogues
Agropolis International 12 Juin, 15h00-17h30
Concluding statement in my chapter
• Systems thinking in practice (STiP) which attends to perspectives, multiple partial views, assumptions, framings, traps…and much more…still has much to contribute –
• I hope NSS, through this book, and its continuing activity can facilitate communications across the cultural and epistemological divides that characterize so much research praxis and which constrains reflexive innovation and transformation.
Why?
There is a real prospect of a dead, Dead Sea !!!
The Jordan River and the Dead Sea - the
cradle of Abrahamic-based civilisations
There are claims made that all Abrahamic religions are destroyers?
Global systemic processes or cycles
• Water cycle• Carbon cycle• Nitrogen cycle• Phosphorous cycle
Living in a photo-shopped world!
Global systemic processes or cycles
• Water cycle• Carbon cycle• Nitrogen cycle• Phosphorous cycle• Oxygen?
Systemic inquiring; modelling;
researching; evaluating; designing;
consulting; appreciating; learning
(re) framing
Systemic
governance
through
“social learning”
Inventing new practices and institutions to transform
towards systemic governance (or governing)?
…by which means quality, co-evolutionary futures, emerge?
How do systems scholars and others appreciate the systems domain? Where
do we draw boundaries? How institutionalised? What future trajectory?
Systemic
(epistemologies)
Systematic
(ontologies)
Ison, R.L. (2010) Systems Practice: How to Act in a
Climate-Change World. Springer, London and The
Open University.
(2017) Systems Practice: How to Act. In
situations of uncertainty and complexity in a climate-
change world. 2nd Edition Springer, London and The
Open University.
Clarifying some terminology: cyber-systemic
The late Garry Boyd, Professor of Education (educational
technology) at Concordia University Montreal, Canada
See: http://www.col.org/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=136
The lineage
and brand
conundrum!
What about
cyber-
systemics?
‘Framing’ situations is a choice we have…and one we always make
• “All thinking and talking involves ‘‘framing.’’ And since frames come in systems, a single word typically activates not only its defining frame, but also much of the system its defining frame is in” (Lakoff 2010 pp.71-72)
• Framing applies also to:– ‘the Anthropocene’ – governance/governing– practice/practicing – doing science, doing ‘systems’
• Framing choices create initial starting conditions that become conserved as lineages (pathway dependencies) and as institutions (norms, ‘rules of the human game’)
Being open to what ‘the Anthropocene’ as a ‘framing choice’
reveals and conceals• Malm, A. & Hornborg, A. (2014) The geology of mankind? A critique of the Anthropocene narrative, The
Anthropocene Review
• “We need to question the use of the species category in the Anthropocene narrative …because it is analytically flawed (i.e., only some, not all, humans have contributed) …and it is inimical to action”
• Too often intra-species inequalities are ignored• Other terms proposed: e.g. the econocene; capitalocene• Metaphor theory/practice can help – what does a framing
choice reveal or conceal? What are its theoretical entailments?
What do these issues have in common?
• Climate change • Obesity • Indigenous disadvantage • Land degradation• River catchment
managing• Transitioning towards
water sensitive cities
They exemplify consistent systemic failure of public policy: on-going framing failure
Framing failure….institutionalising failure, praxis failure…
Making framing choices that are ethically responsible ..by acting to increase our possibilities
Ison, R.L., Collins, K.B. & Wallis, P. (2014) Institutionalising social learning: Towards systemic and adaptive governance, Environmental Science & Policy 53 (B), 105–117.
When framing and reframing we need to follow Heinz von Foerster’s ethical imperative: ‘act always so as to increase the
number of choices’
Governance diamonds
are not forever!
The systemic failure of governance by
governments!Journalist Tingle
re., the Australian
Federal
Government
observes: “a
growing loss of
institutional
memory about
how things have
come about, and,
more importantly
perhaps, why they
did. Without
memory, there is
no context or
continuity for the
making of new
decisions.”
“For 500 years, the
West’s ability to
reinvent the state
has enabled it to
lead the world.
Today, ..the West
is weighed down
by dysfunctional
governments,
bloated budgets
and self-indulgent
publics; it risks
losing its edge to
more autocratic
Asian states.”
The systemic failure of governance by UK
government!…the
present
system as a
whole is
itself what
stands in the
way of
successful
government
…
a critique of
‘deliverology’,
target setting,
‘back office’
systemic
malfunction.
Seddon offers a
systemic
alternative based
on responding to
context-derived
design for
purpose
Reinventing a systemic
governance diamond fit for circumstance?
Towards systemic governance?
Towards systemic governance?
Improve transboundary management of the Olifants Catchment
Enhance the resilience of its people and ecosystems
(holistically with people)
Mozambique
South Africa
Water insecurity
• SA 5th largest global coal producer• 90% from Witbank coal fields
• 2nd largest irrigation scheme in SA• R1 billion export market
Sewage (WWTW)
Crocodile deaths
Floodplain estuary
Extreme events
Climate change
Conceptual clarity serves praxis and transformation e.g. social-
ecological (or social-biophysical) systems
Earth
System
1Social-
Ecological
System
2
Social
System
Ecological
System
3
Social
System
Ecological
System
4
Social
System
Ecological
System
5
Ecological
SystemSocial
System
6
8…. ?
9… ?
10…?Biophysical
SystemSocial
System
7
Co-evolutionary dynamicTime
A ‘real life’
experiment
with choice
Number 7
biodiverse areas
conserved
Framing the Olifants catchment as the structural coupling of a
social (S) and biophysical (B) system in a co-evolutionary dynamic
capacity to respond
to climate change
Issues
1. Boundaries in action for
the Olifants ss? Do they
need to be expanded? Is
the right baseline data
available/being used
2. Is there a need for more
investment in demand
pull initiatives to secure
the ongoing structural
coupling via the AWARD
approach?
3. As climate change hits
where are the greatest
vulnerabilities going to
emerge?
4. What can be said about
the current trajectory?
What are the best
trajectory altering levers?
Requires baseline
and emerging
narratives for M&E
+ RL (MERL)
Changing framings and institutions
• “For the first time in New Zealand's history, the country's lawmakers have
granted a river the legal rights of a human. The parliamentary vote
Wednesday, which caps more than 140 years of legal struggles, ensures
the roughly 90-mile Whanganui River will be represented by two guardians
in legal matters that concern the waterway. The legislation marks a
monumental victory for the local Māori people, who view the river as ‘an
indivisible and living whole…’” (http://n.pr/2qi1dbb ).
• Then, a month later: “The Ganges river, considered sacred by more than 1
billion Indians, has become the first non-human entity in India to be
granted the same legal rights as people.” “The judges cited the example of
the Whanganui river, revered by the indigenous Māori people, which was
declared a living entity with full legal rights by the New Zealand Govt.”
Geoff Lawtoon (http://bit.ly/2pKSkXC )
Relating this work to the NSS agenda
Seven transformational challenges to overcome systemic failure in doing what we do.1. widespread lack of epistemic awareness in domains of practice and policy
development;
2. a lack of awareness of the implications of living in language;
3. inappropriate measures of performance for systems of interest (e.g. GDP understood as measure of performance for nation states – see Buchanan, 2013);
4. little awareness of the implications of reification – the creation of ‘things’ such as the environment, resources, systems etc.;
5. lack of congruence between what is espoused and what others experience in individual and group practice;
6. failures to institutionalize systems understandings and practices in manners that create demand pull and sustain institutionalization; and
7. focus on scientism at the expense of design (Metcalf, 2014).
What does success look like……?
• Has to be considered in the context of governance
• As well as the extent of cyber-systemic literacy and
capability – in short supply
• Requires new organisational/institutional forms to
mediate between Vertical and Horizontal
governance, especially feedback processes
– practices that pay urgent attention to framing of
initial starting conditions
– inventing and enacting means to secure the
robust institutionalisation of systemic governance
ENCYCLICAL LETTER, LAUDATO SI’ OF THE HOLY
FATHER, FRANCIS 2015
Nothing in this world is indifferent to us
• “More than fifty years ago, with the world teetering on the brink of nuclear
crisis, Pope Saint John XXIII wrote an Encyclical which not only rejected
war but offered a proposal for peace.
• He addressed his message Pacem in Terris to the entire “Catholic world”
and indeed “to all men and women of good will”. Now, faced as we are with
global environmental deterioration, I wish to address every person living on
this planet.”
Nothing in this world is indifferent to us
• Given the scale of change, it is no longer possible to find a specific,
discrete answer for each part of the problem. It is essential to seek
comprehensive solutions which consider the interactions within natural
systems themselves and with social systems.
• We are faced not with two separate crises, one environmental and the
other social, but rather with one complex crisis which is both social and
environmental.
• ENCYCLICAL LETTER, LAUDATO SI’ OF THE HOLY FATHER, FRANCIS 2015
Nothing in this world is indifferent to us
• 139. When we speak of the “environment”, what we really mean is a
relationship existing between nature and the society which lives in it.
• Nature cannot be regarded as something separate from ourselves or as a
mere setting in which we live. We are part of nature, included in it and thus
in constant interaction with it. Recognizing the reasons why a given area is
polluted requires a study of the workings of society, its economy, its
behaviour patterns, and the ways it grasps reality.
• ENCYCLICAL LETTER, LAUDATO SI’ OF THE HOLY FATHER, FRANCIS 2015
Systems literacy
Workshop on Framing Systems Thinking in Practice (STiP) Competencies
London 10th June 2017
Systems thinking in
practice capability
Systemic sensibilities
(adapted from) Ison, R. and
Shelley, M., (2016). Governing in
the Anthropocene: Contributions
from Systems Thinking in
Practice? Systems Research and
Behavioral Science, 33(5),
pp.589-594.
“What is missing … are the contexts for a systemic sensibility to flourish, to be recovered and/or fostered. Investment in systems literacy [competency]
and then systems thinking in practice capability is missing in education as well as organizational life.” (p.589)
Systems thinking (in
practice) literacy
Framing Competencies
Developing Systems
thinking in practice
capabilities
Systemic sensibilities
Building Capacity
Draft Report from OECD to be released in June 2017.
There is an urgent need to build greater solidarity between cybersystemicpractitioners, researchers and organisations or professional societies.
The conditions for greater investment, and demand pull, for what cybersystemicshas to offer have to be created and sustained.