Critical Complexity The difference that makes a difference

Transcription

1 Critical Complexity The difference that makes a difference Savanna Science Network Meeting March 4, 2013 Rika Preiser Centre for Studies in Complexity Stellenbosch University rika@sun.ac.za Tomás Saraceno

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4 COMPLEXITY THEORY No standard account of the development of a theory of complexity available Rather speak of theories of complexity Complexity theory is a scientific amalgam, an accretion of ideas, a rhetorical hybrid 4

5 DEFINING COMPLEXITY Working def: the interdisciplinary understanding of reality as composed of complex open systems with emergent properties and transformational potential. (David Byrne 2005) 5

6 COMMON DENOMINATORS 1. Origins linked to development of theory in various fields of study: General Systems Theory, Cybernetics and AI 1. Two distinct paradigms: restricted vs. general complexity 6

7 COMMON DENOMINATORS 3. Share some observable characteristics: complex systems are radically open, display non-linear causal relations, selforganisation, emergence 4. Accompanied by a recognisable vocabulary: dissipative structures, dynamic interaction, attractors, fractals, power laws, autopoiesis, uncertainty, tipping scales and bifurcation points.

8 COMMON DENOMINATORS 5. Discourses of complexity are affecting and cross-pollinating a variety of scientific fields of study. 6. Shift in focus of study: preference to organisation over static structures and favours relationships over entities

9 COMMON DENOMINATORS 8. General acknowledgement that complexity introduces a paradigm shift from classical scientific strategies

10 CRITICAL COMPLEXITY Reductionist dilemma: in order to have knowledge of complex phenomena, we have to embrace reductionist strategies to be able to say anything meaningful about complex systems at all Amounts to shift in attitude: Limitations, error and blind spots are acknowledged and not concealed

11 CRITICAL COMPLEXITY Allows for reductionist logic that becomes aware of itself = post-reductionism Self-reflexive kind of reductionism Post-reductionism is not as strong as antireductionism, not a radical kind of constructivism or relativism Forms middle ground between positivism and constructivism

12 CRITICAL COMPLEXITY Ontological complexity displayed in wicked problems (Jeff Conklin). Impossible to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements that are often difficult to recognise. Because of complex interdependencies, the effort to solve one aspect of a wicked problem may reveal or create other problems

13 CRITICAL COMPLEXITY These problems constitute not things to be solved, but a CONDITION to live with. conditions are not states to be cured; they are at best, to be accepted, understood, and wisely managed

14 CRITICAL COMPLEXITY Critical complexity marks a progression in the study of the problem of complexity; it acknowledges the CONDITION of complexity Which is displayed by the embeddedness of our lived experience of complexity. Complexity as condition is not something to be solved, but calls us to re-think what it means to be human.

15 CRITICAL COMPLEXITY Critical complexity suggests that two main issues are of utmost importance, namely 1) the normative aspect that is inscribed in our encounter with complexity and 2) the perpetual critical and reflective attitude that an encounter with the condition of complexity calls forth

16 CRITICAL COMPLEXITY How to deal with wicked problems? THE THREE IMPERATIVES: 1) Provisional imperative 2) Critical Reflexive Imperative 3) World-disclosing Imperative

17 Provisional Imperative 1. Justify your actions only in ways which do not preclude the possibility of revising that justification 2. Make only those choices which keep the possibility of choice open 3. Your actions should show a fundamental respect for difference, even as those actions reduce it 4. Act only in ways which will allow the constraining and enabling interactions between the components in the system to flourish. The double-bind all the way down

18 Critique all the way down Critical Reflexive Imperative 1. Distrust most strongly that which you believe most deeply. 2. Expose the limits of the grounding princinples on which theoretical assumptions are constructed. 3. Eschew the quest for solutions and foster possibilities that ensure continual learning.

19 World-disclosing Imperative 1. Act so that the effects of your actions break open new understandings of what it means to be human. 2. Resist all modes of thinking that could lead to dehumanising strategies. 3. Act in ways that allow for alternative and novel ways of understanding our situatedness in the world. Complexity all the way down

20 A call to proceed differently Critical complexity: An avenue of inquiry that re-establishes the importance of being concerned with the problem of how to recover nature as a source of meaning and orientation. Critical complexity suggests that our models reflect the reality of complexity and invite us to envision new future social, political and environmental constellations.

21 A critical position informed by complexity will have to be: 1. contextual all solutions are be provisional 2. transgressive transformation is a continual process.we need some bold alternatives 3. ironical A call to proceed differently self-critical position. We need a sense of humour if we are not to lose our humanity 21

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23 A call to proceed differently 4. the role for the imagination is indispensable. We cannot calculate what will or should happen, we have to make a creative leap in order to imagine what things could be like. 5. slowness less is more, quality not quantity slow food, slow practice, getting hands dirty 23

24 THANK YOU