Hello all, This is a fun discussion to be following. The use of technology to influence the emergence of socio-political processes & dynamics is something that I've become interested in as well. I've begun working with some USF Complexity Brownbag colleagues on developing a web platform of sorts to facilitate the "co-creation" of policy...we call it "WikiPolicy" for short. We plan to use the policies and issues relating to the institutional abuse of youth as the pilot issue / policy, as I am aware that there is already a lot of web-based discussion and community-organizing occurring in relation to this issue. As we've conceived of it so far, in WikiPolicy there will be a "room" for each perspective: let's say youth, parents, program operators, child-serving professionals, and legislators. New rooms may form as additional perspectives show up, such as educational consultants, transport services, and others involved in "the industry" of private residential treatment. Each room will include a mechanism for uploading & tagging stories (either using Dave Snowden's Cog Edge Sensemaker software or possibly Theodore Taptikis' Storymaker software), a wiki for a collective & continually re-worked "our perspective" statement, a wiki for the continual tweaking and editing of an actual policy relating to the issue(in this case, we'll go with George Miller's H.R. 1738 which died last year in committee but we hear will soon be revived) and a chat space for continual sense-making among participants. The idea is that policy makers could then tap into the WikiPolicy site to get a more detailed sense of how different folks feel about the issue and what more specifically people take issue with in terms of proposed legislation, rather than just flying in a few people to provide testimony to inform the crafting of a given piece of legislation. If it really took off, it might even change dynamics relating to lobbying. Also, we think it would be interesting to see what happens when individuals / sectors with different perspectives are able to become more familiar with the particulars of one another's perspectives, and then to see how this might influence self-organization in terms of decisions and actions regardless of what plays out with regard to policy.
If anybody's got suggestions for us, technology-wise or otherwise, I'd be glad to hear your thoughts & ideas. Allison Pinto -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Michael Agar Sent: Sunday, April 15, 2007 12:15 AM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Can you guess the source. "Reflexivity" is one of those terms... Nice and neat in set theory, a relation R is reflexive in set A iff for all a in A aRa is true. Then there's the ethnomethodology version, which means talk and situation dynamically co-constitute each other. Then there's the focused ethno version I learned, namely that the ethnographer is part of the data. Then there's the critical theory version, namely putting a project in broader historical context to evaluate interests it serves with a critical evaluation vis a vis a model of the good society. Almost as bad as trying to define "complexity" (: Mike On Apr 13, 2007, at 7:06 PM, Matthew Francisco wrote: > Dr. Daniels, > > I want to make sure I understand you. See below... > > On 4/13/07, Marcus G. Daniels <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> Mikhail Gorelkin wrote: >>> reflexivity is also a part of cybernetics (of second order), and >>> cybernetists think that complexity theory is a part of >>> cybernetics too... >>> >> For the social scientist, the approach raises two problems: >> >> 1) Too much reflection means too much attention to models of the >> world. >> To ask the right questions means having unbiased data on how >> people in >> some context of interest actually behave. > > I take it that when you say context of interest you are inferring that > this is a model of the world. I understand you as meaning that > context is unstable, always shifting, as a natural outcome of > reflection. The act of shifting contexts and perspectives and between > models of the world is reflexivity. That's a good way to think of it! > > Asking the right questions means settling on a few world models at the > most but one, a context of interest, is preferred. I'm, however, > unclear on the relationship of unbiased data to the framework you are > proposing. Does biased data arise from gathering data in one model of > the world, moving to another, gathering more data, moving to another > model of the world and so on? I believe that there is some other > criteria that you have for determining if data is biased or unbiased > that might not be related to one or many world models and the shifting > between them, but I'm unsure. I acknowledge that I may be asking the > wrong questions here. Please advise! > > >> >> 2) It's typically not possible to sufficiently influence or observe >> people to understand cause and effect across individuals or groups. >> The insights gained from reflexive participation will just be the >> kind >> of models we get living life (but with fancied-up language to >> sound more >> important than they are). Seems to me this kind of modeling is >> more the >> domain of the intelligence agencies than universities. >> > > I take it that when you say that there is an impossibility to > influence or observe then you are speaking from a particular model of > the world. I cannot understand what you mean by sufficiency until I > better understand where you are coming from. I think that it is most > appropriate here for me to take responsibility for my ignorance on > this because I don't think that I adequately explained the model of > the world that I'm living in when I speak of reflexivity much less > interpret how you think about it based on what I said or what you > already know. I really would like to share it with you if I can, but > I also don't want to bore FRIAM (I'm absolutely capable of that!). > > I think that if reflexive participation, as you put it, by an analyst > could get at the world you experience living your life then it would > be a highly successful approach. That's a pretty radical claim you're > making! I'd say that such analysis would give some insight into > another person's world but definitely not a replication of the same > model. > > I recently watched a whole slew of spy movies (The Conversation, > Syriana, The Good Shepard.) and I think that you're absolutely right > that the model of reflexivity your proposing, shifting between models > of the world, fits with the narratives portrayed in these films. You > defiantly gave me an entirely new way to think about reflexive > sociology! Does such an approach not belong in the University?!? I'm > intrigued. Thanks for this response, you really got me thinking! > > Have a good night > > Matt > > >> >> ============================================================ >> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College >> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org >> > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
