Challenges of Governance in Complex Adaptive Systems: A Case Study of U.S. Public Education

McGee, Sibel; Edson, Robert

doi:10.1016/j.procs.2014.09.049

Cited by 9 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 6 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Many structural properties imposed on this system go against complexity‐aware governance principles, harming its ability to learn and self‐regulate. In fact, as we argued elsewhere (McGee & Edson, ), key performance problems experienced in US public education can be traced back to traditional governance practices which seem to micromanage education processes, imposing order and uniformity where they are not needed. These practices avoid setting a system‐wide direction where they are needed.…”

mentioning

confidence: 79%

“…Traditional approaches that view the CAS as a simple, linear system produce unintended consequences, limiting its inherent learning ability and adaptive capacity. They ‘reduc[e], inadvertently, the flow of essential information, remov[e] key incentives and deterrents…and hinder dynamic feedback of interactions as well as the learning process that follows’ (McGee & Edson, , p.138). Moreover, as we continue to deny the complexity of these systems, we impede the holistic solutions they badly need.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Governing the Education Extended Enterprise as a Complex Adaptive System

Edson¹,

McGee²

2016

Euro J of Education

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

mentioning

confidence: 79%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Governing the Education Extended Enterprise as a Complex Adaptive System

Edson¹,

McGee²

2016

Euro J of Education

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

“…There is, however, no shortage of analyses describing schools as complex adaptive systems (Rigby et al, 2016;Keshavarz et al, 2010;McGee and Edson, 2014;Heinrich and Kupers, 2019;Horvath et al, 2015;Fidan and Balci, 2017;Hawkins and James, 2018;Seel, 2000). For Keshavarz et al (2010Keshavarz et al ( , p. 1468, a CAS comprises nested systems, continuous adaptation, distributed networks of control that enable emergence and acceptance of unpredictability.…”

Section: Organisational Change In Vt Schoolsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multi-age organisation, complexity theory and secondary school reform

Barnard

2021

IJEM

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

PurposeAt a time when many education systems are grappling with the issue of school reform, there is a concern that traditional UK secondary schools are organised in a way that makes them unable to respond to increasingly complex environmental demands. This research-based paper uses complexity theory to gauge the organisational differences between (1) the traditional model of schooling based on same-age organisation and (2) a form of organisation based on multi-age tutor groups, one that schools call a vertical tutoring (VT) system. The intention is to highlight the organisational changes made by schools that choose to transition from their same-age iteration to the VT system, and expose organisational assumptions in the dominant same-age structure that may account for the failure of reform.Design/methodology/approachThe author's consultancy and research work spans two decades, and includes around 200 UK secondary schools, and others in China, Japan, South Africa, Australia, Qatar, Germany and Colombia. This conceptual paper draws on the recorded discourse and critical reflections of leadership teams during programmes of transformative learning, the process involved in the transition from one system to another. Using descriptions of school organisation abstracted from the complexity literature, differences in the two models not otherwise apparent, come into sharp focus. These not only reveal a substantive connection between organisation, complexity, and individual and organisational learning, but offer insights into the challenge of school reform.FindingsSame-age organisations act in ways that regulate and restrict the agency of participating actors (staff, students and parents). The effect is to reduce a school’s learning capacity and ability to absorb the value demand on its system. Such a system is closed and non-complex. VT schools construct an open and fluid learning system from the base, deregulating agency. By unfreezing their structure, they intervene in processes of power, necessitating the distribution of leadership to the organisational edge, a process of complexification. The form of organisation chosen by a school explains the failure of reform.Originality/valueInsights from VT schools cast considerable doubt on the viability of traditional same-age structures to serve complex societies and communities, while highlighting the critical role played by complexity theory in organisational praxis. If correct, the current emphasis on teacher “will and skill”, curricular editing, pedagogy and the “what works agenda” will be insufficient to bring about reformational change and more likely to contribute to systemic stasis.

show abstract

“…Originating in the field of general systems theory from the 1930s, research on CAS has increased dramatically since the 1970s and has become a meaningful way in which to describe how many environments and organizations work (Rotmans & Loorbach, 2009). Originating in the scientific, specifically biologic, fields to describe environmental systems (Abumrad, 2007) and climate change, CAS has recently been adapted to describe the challenges with innovation and scale in business and social systems (Burgelman & Grove, 2007; Uhl‐Bien & Arena, 2018), including software development (Bäcklander, 2019) and education (Machado‐Taylor, 2011; Martin, 2019; McGee & Edson, 2014; Siemens et al., 2018). Organizations, public entities, corporations, and institutions all exhibit characteristics of CAS.…”

Section: Complex Adaptive Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While the cynical point of view might attribute this resistance to intentional actions taken by individual actors to prevent change, a nuanced look is likely more accurate and opens the door to a different set of tools that may be the key to guiding higher education toward a new and better normal. Indeed, when one recognizes that the resilience of the US higher education system is itself a self‐correcting and self‐sustaining function of a complex adaptive system (McGee & Edson, 2014; Rotmans & Loorbach, 2009), it becomes apparent that linear cause‐and‐effect based models of change are insufficient as guideposts on which to base direct and intentional change practices.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Equity at the edge of chaos: Applying complex adaptive systems theory to higher education

Ueland

Hinds²,

Floyd

2021

New Drctns for Instit Rsrch

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Complex adaptive systems (CASs) theory provides a framework for understanding how systems of multiple, independent, and intelligent agents interact with each other in a nested and overlapping set of environments to create both a whole that has an identity apart from any of its individual components as well as a setting in which simple cause‐and‐effect relationships are rarely linear or predictable. CASs are resilient and ever‐evolving, adapting both to internal and external stimuli according to both tacit and explicit rule structures to move continually toward the better realization of an ideal state as defined by those rules. Managing change within CAS requires capitalizing on moments of disruption, sometimes referred to as the edge of chaos, to guide the system toward a different, more desired state. Higher education institutions and systems can easily be described as meeting the criteria for CAS, containing multiple layers of both hierarchical and collegial networks that seem at times to stubbornly resist transformative change, while simultaneously adapting and evolving. This article will use Minnesota State's Equity 2030 strategic priority and efforts to implement a shared understanding of data democratization as examples to explain the application of CAS theory to higher education and discuss how applying transition management approaches from the CAS literature has the potential to lead to long‐term and sustainable structural change.

show abstract

Challenges of Governance in Complex Adaptive Systems: A Case Study of U.S. Public Education

Cited by 9 publications

References 6 publications

Governing the Education Extended Enterprise as a Complex Adaptive System

Governing the Education Extended Enterprise as a Complex Adaptive System

Multi-age organisation, complexity theory and secondary school reform

Equity at the edge of chaos: Applying complex adaptive systems theory to higher education

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About