Technical facilitation of meeting dynamics and participant interaction

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Intervening to "Solve" National and World "Problems"

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Record of a 1976 Postal Symposium with observations and comments by Anthony Judge [AJ] and by David Horton Smith [DHS]

1. It would appear that many national and international programs are effectively "contained" such that every success in one area is counter-balanced by a failure in another - although the link amy not always be apparent. The success and the failure may not simply cancel one another out. The dynamic interaction between programs may introduce unpredictable systemic and synergic effects which propel the system into a progressively less stable condition. We are currently not equipped to detect these types of change (except through such initiatives as the Club of Rome's reported in Jay Forrester's World Dynamics). [AJ]

1.a. Don't always, or really ever, yet know which interventions will result in what degree of "formal progress". Linkages need to be studied. How does inquiry affect system? Social science equivalent of Heisenberg Constant. Complexity of system makes studying interactions difficult. Computer simulation? Some interventions may produce catastrophe; side or back effects. [DHS]

2. "Reformers, critics of institutions, consultants in innovation, people in short who " want to get something done", often fail to see this point. They cannot understand why their strictures, advice or demands do not result in effective change. They expect either to achieve a measure of success in their own terms or to be flung off the premises. But (a social institution) has no need to react in either of these ways. It specializes in equilibrial readjustment which is to the observer a secret form of change requiring no actual alteration in the macro- systemic characteristics that he is trying to do something about". (Stafford Beer. Chairman's Address to the International Cybernetic Congress, September 1969) [AJ]

2.a. Well taken. Le Chatelier's Principle and absorption of thrusts. Continually redefined system to include attacks. [DHS]

3. It may well be that the system functions entirely satisfactory and of its own accord in responding to disturbances to its dynamic evolving equilibrium conditions. As sub-systems within the system we would be unable to detect the manner and justification of the corrective measures. If the system is self correcting, then any "within-system" efforts to correct it are bound to give rise to counter-balancing responses. It therefore becomes questionable as to which changes should be proposed or implemented since every such intervention is counter-balanced in an unforeseeable manner (e.g. The Club of Rome study of World Dynamics concludes that industrialization is an important cause of world problems, whereas Picht in Germany casts doubt upon the significance of computer based studies and the American forecasting school of thought and considers industrialization to be the only solution). Each such effort causes system disturbances and counter-balancing responses acts as a lure for time, energy and organizational resources and creates its own school followers and opponents. These are within-system changes and not changes to the system. [AJ]

3.a. How could one know more about the ways in which actions/ interventions are counter- balanced in fact by dynamic systems? (U.S. poverty program and maximum feasible participation/manipulation; c.f. Moynihan). "Blind systemic affects" (flow of goods, services, information, people) vs. perception of niches by particular people who can turn a program to one's own use ("abuse"). Options chosen by actors for their own ends not ends of programs or public interest. [DHS]

4. It may be that world problems become apparent due to a systemic psycho-social ("sub-conscious") response to a need for tensions and inequalities on which the culture can "feed" (through a complex process of identification with opposing aspects of an issue - opposite poles of the inequality - and then interacting over the new territory thus created). This would generate social energy and provide new perceptual complexes to internalize. (e.g. it would be interesting to note the changing balance of concern over the last 30 years between "war" and "world problems" - they both provide a needed social tension and both may be systemic correctional measures.) The recognition by groups within society of real world conditions as "problems" may be somewhat similar to the presentation to an individual's consciousness of hallucinations and delusions as a response to conditions of sensory deprivation. [AJ]

4.a. Aggregation of need for tension at individual level. When is a problem really a problem? How much happiness/dissatisfaction is salutary or inevitable? Where should we draw the line between constraint and freedom for individuals or higher system levels? If all dynamic systems are in some equilibrium, when should changes of the "negative aspects" be sought, given the system context? Dead dog in a puddle here vs. in Africa. Expectation level theory in psychology is relevant here. Being troubled by lack of poverty in Dusseldorf. Why change things if people and groups/social systems adapt expectation levels accordingly anyway? Why force one perception of needed changes on others and their systems - e.g., LDCs?

• Identify problem in terms of definitions by some people/groups?
• Identify problems worth doing something about in our terms or in "real terms" (external model)? When is a problem worthy of intervention? Why? Why not?
• Identify possible intervention strategies and need of them, if any.
• Consider possible side effects and back effects as well as intended "forward effects". Do we know? Should we act in face of uncertainty?
• Decide whether to implement, when and how, if at all. [See World Problems and Human Potential: a data interlinkage and display processproblem project brochure; also Computer-aided Visualization of Psycho-social Structures Peace as an evolving balance of conceptual and organizational relationships, 1971].

Focus on roles, not individuals. Define species (of roles) in terms of possibly fruitful intercourse. Validity of voting inter-species? Antelopes' and lions' views of "problem" of their ecosystem. Depends on which is in greater number. Is present voting system equivalent to having pigeons vote on cow problems? Perhaps we should drop equality bit? Why pretend all are equal? Prevents getting a better system. Don't assume inequality is bad. Are pigeons better than cows? Aquarium model. Some fish bigger and take more territory. We, on outside, try to affect equality of territory of fish. Destroys interaction process. (Have to consider change from large to small fish, etc.) But could do this. Question of what state of total eco-system is really desirable and whether intervention to achieve this is needed. [DHS]

5. Concern with world problems may be "unnecessary" except as an educational and developmental experience - a sort of social "training game" in which our culture can be absorbed. Forrester remarks that his system analyses of corporations in trouble generally showed that whilst each person was acting as best he could, with the best intentions given the information at his disposal, it was the interaction of these "well conceived" departmental policies that kept the corporation in its difficulties. The same may be true of the world system - its problems may be created by the interactions of well-intentioned programs. [AJ]

5.a. Clearly, much concern with an intervention in world or social problems may be useless, unnecessary, or actually harmful in long run to people. At least it may be a waste of effort and resources better directed to enjoyment of experiences. But the experiential aspect - the "being in becoming" - may be crucial. Perhaps this is the key to why we need to try to deal with them. Tension and tension reduction as valuable. [DHS]

6. It is unwise to assume that people or organizations are attempting to improve the system as a whole. In the case of politicians, academics, and organizations in general it is not always the substantive question which is important. This is in many cases merely a symbol for the territory constituted by the issue.

• In the case of diplomacy or politics, issues are viewed as an opportunity for advancement of the nation or party and only incidentally, and as an unforeseen and occasional by-product, as a question which requires solution in its own right, independent of national interests or party politics.
• Organizations in general, including supra-national agencies, are locked into complex games. Again it is not program effectiveness which is the criterion but rather the territory constituted by the problem for which the program was created. Organizations become "learning environments" and role habitats and have a system maintenance, rather than a system change, function. "The organization is the message".
• In the academic environment, again it is territory which is the prime concern. A new hypothesis is

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