#gell-mann

We continue from last weeks problematic linear, mechanical thought patterns. Recall that a mechanical view cannot appreciate nor capture the fluidity that is central to socio-economic systems, which brings us back to the obsession to control and predict dynamic systems. As a practical example, the typical mechanistic response to the global financial system, is more regulations, tighter controls, greater oversight, which are all good, but highly inefficient since it only considers one static portion of an entire fluid system (dynamics of our global financial system). A more important example is where governments throughout the world try to generate jobs & stimulate their economies by using mechanical thinking, like hoping “private sector & especially large corporations can be incentivised” to create the necessary jobs. These are classic mechanistic solution to systemic problems - in other words, corporations have a primary focus of profit to their shareholders, which is inherently linked to greater consumption (we must continue to buy their products and services at a premium), thus directly opposed to alleviating poverty and joblessness. Excessive profit priorities are the selfish, greedy orientation that have created joblessness in the first place, like for example “out-sourcing & off-shoring work” due to cheap labor, tax breaks, etc., thus increasing profits without increasing overhead (creating more local jobs).

 These counterintuitive results are what leaders and policy-makers are unable to understand since they operate though a mechanical paradigm, which cannot yield any understanding about mechanisms such as feedback dynamics, self-organisation & relationships between agents and agencies having different “fields-of-power”1. Until our leaders in both public and private sectors truly understand the dynamics and inter-connectedness of our global poverty, hunger, joblessness and equality, we will continue on a downward spiral of having a minority with concentrated wealth & a majority locked in extreme poverty1.

 References:

1.              Udemans, F., 2008, The golden thread: escaping socio-economic subjugation, an experiment in applied complexity science, Authorhouse UK; Arthur, W.B. et al, 2013, Economics and the Modern Theories of Cognitive Behavior, SFI working paper; Mantega, M., & Stanley, H., 2000, An introduction to Econo-physics: correlation and complexity in Finance, Cambridge University Press; Gell-Mann, M., 1994, The quark and the Jaguar: Adventures in the simple and the complex, New York: WH Freeman; Stacey, R.D., 1995, The science of complexity: an alternative perspective for strategic change processes, Strategic Management Journal, 16: 477-495; Stacey, R.D., 1996, Complexity and creativity in organizations, San Francisco: Berret-Koehler publishers; Sherman, H. and Schultz, R., 1998, Open Boundaries, New York: Perseus Books;

"It often takes a long time to overcome these rules that you mustn’t think in a certain way."