Learning log 9 - coevolution

For this learning log I focused on two articles: (1) “Coevolutionary ecological economics” by Giorgos Kallis and Richard B. Norgaard, and (2) “Innovation Versus Environmental Protection Presumptions” by David L. Hawk.

In the previous learning log we were talking about resilience, about how a system continues existing after a disturbance, by adapting and overcoming difficulties without losing its function. This learning log is, for me, an addition to the previous one. In the first article, the authors present issues on how different systems evolve together; therefore, it is a broader view on what the previous learning log was focusing on (the evolution of one system).

Here the authors present the feedback concept. They say that systems coevolve according to the feedbacks that they receive from other systems. In this case, in order to keep coevolution, they argue that diversity is a key issue. Allowing diversity includes “having respect” for differences, which needs the non-selfish behavior that is also shown in the first article.

This took me to a reflection about our society today, where differences are not well accepted. I mean real differences. One may say that we have cultural differences, and so on, however, we all live in the same market centered model, pursuing the similar goals, with the same values. Therefore it is just a slight variance, not a diversity of models and values.

 If there was a respect for different values, different views on development, there would not be such a thing as “Globalization”.  And now we see that our economic model is starting to fail in the entire world, as it is the same model all around the globe, we are all “fighting” for the same set of resources to reach the same goal, and as it is cited in the second article: “(...) with a resource available to all, the greediest herdsmen would gain—for a while. But mutual ruin was just around the corner. ( op cit Hardin op cit Lloyd)”

So, could we state that the unsustainability of society (in cultural, economic and ecological levels) is due to lack of respect and selfish behavior, which, as a result does not allow the existence or real diversity and therefore, coevolution and resilience of the systems?

Learning log 8 - resilience

Learning log 8

For this learning log I focused on two articles: (1) Resilience: The emergence of a perspective for

social–ecological systems analyses by Carl Folke, and (2) Organizing Smart Networks and Humans into

augmented Teams by Martijn Neef et. al. The firs one describes the concept of resilience while the second one presents a practical way and experiments on creating augmented team (interaction of humans systems with other, such as technological devices, to increase the efficiency and reach of a group). I will focus more on the first one, since it presented detailed explanations about resilience and adaptability concepts.

The main idea in the first article was to present that resilience is not about constancy, but about variability. That resilience is the capacity of a system to continue existing after a disturbance. But beside these basic ideas, what really called my attention is about finding “multi stable behavior”, the author said that to find it, you have to consider the relations between the analyzed system and the related ones through the lens of the speed in which they act. This speed issue in the system analysis determines how many information to collect (period of time). And by knowing from which point in time to start and where to stop, you can draw the boundaries of your analysis.

For example, to analyze changes in a society system, if our focus is on political organization, our boundaries could be set according to the duration of a government, or, if we are to analyze food production, we could use seasons or other weather related issue to help us setting an initial boundary. And then the boundary can be changed according to what we discover from a system and its relations. For example, if we are analyzing a social system according to the duration of a specific politician’s government, we may discover that the reasons or results of changes and adaption (to keep resilience) of this system have roots on previous governments, and so we may have to increase the boundary of our analysis, which could grow to, for example, the duration of some specific political ideology in power.

Another issue the author talks about is about how the actors of a system get adapted to new schemes and overcome disturbance, he states that an actor know what to change according to the feedbacks it gets from the other actors. And in order to be able to adapt, this actor must have the possibility to do so, therefore, there must not be a centralized controlling power, what takes us back to Elionor Ostrom speech in the Nobel Prize conference. I am referring back to this issue because I believe it is a very important issue that I will have to consider when doing my final report, where I want to analyze the current situation of the Millennium Villages in Mozambique through a systemic way, and see how the government influences in its future, what has to be changed and how the MV community can find a way to be resilient and sustainable while other systems may be action opposite to their goals.

Learning log 7 - Looking back to look forward.

For this learning log I read two articles: (1) “ Sustainability of Complex Societies” by J. A. Tainter and, “Confronting Economic Profit With Hierarchy Theory” by Allen et. al.

Basically, both are touching the issue of “return on effort” but in different levels. While the second is more in a theoretical and conceptual level (though with some practical examples to support it), the first one focuses on placing the issue in a practical level so to explain the idea that history is important to sustainability. As the second one was more about explanations it did not raise me many questions, while the other, which is more reflective, did raise questions, and is on these questions that I want to focus now.

They present the idea that all societies follow the same evolutional pattern, which has the diminishing return of effort track. He states that we have to look back in history and to the collapse of ancient societies in order to understand in which point in time our society is. And about the lowering return on effort, he puts it as a bad issue.

But as the basic problems are solved, it is likely that we will always search for more challenging issues, therefore more complex, thus demanding higher effort. For this reason, I believe that if we try to avoid solving issues which demands high effort and brings low return compared with the effort level, our society would became stuck in many issues, many small problems that whit time would become enormous.

He states that complexity and therefore low return on effort is what brings a society to collapse and, as I mentioned before, he presents that, buy looking back into history we can understand in which level of complexity we are. So it is a way to predict the collapse day?

As Rita Mae Brown said "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results." Therefore, if the same model have been used in al societies and they all collapse, oposite to what Tainter suggested, I think we should look back into history to see how we can create a new model of society which can cope with always more complex issues, at the same time that it is adaptive in order to keep evolution and avoid collapse.