Learning from the Anthropocene: Adaptive Epistemology and Complexity in Strategic Managerial Thinking

Abstract

Turbulence experienced in the business and social realms resonates with turbulence unfolding throughout the biosphere, as a process of accelerating change at the stratigraphic scale termed the Anthropocene. The Anthropocene is understood as a multi-dimensional limit point, one dimension of which concerns the limits to the lineal epistemology prevalent since the Age of the Enlightenment. This paper argues that future conditions necessitate the updating of a lineal epistemology through a transition towards resilience thinking that is both adaptive and ecosystemic. A management paradigm informed by the recognition of multiple equilibria states distinguished by thresholds, and incorporating adaptive and resilience thinking is considered. This paradigm is thought to enhance flexibility and the capacity to absorb influences without crossing thresholds into alternate stable, but less desirable, states. One consequence is that evaluations of success may change, and these changes are considered and explored as likely on-going challenges businesses must grapple with into the future.

Steps toward a digital ecology: ecological principles for the study of digital ecosystems

“…Ultimately, there are promising opportunities for the IS field to develop a new narrative of responsible digital management in the digital economy; this includes big-tech superstar firms, as it is in their own interest not to destroy the digital information ecology by eroding the variety of ideas, goodwill of the public, and the attention of their users. This requires an appreciation of the importance of redundancies and smaller niches, which may not be profitable short-term but essential for long-term viability (Mitchell et al, 2020), as they counter the negative effects of too much homogenization.…”

“…Indeed, strategic thinking itself, be it businesses or organizations more broadly, is required to change its first principles derived from the modernistic ideologies of technological progressivism and infinite economic growth, as these ideologies have met their ecological limits. In this context, Mitchell et al (2020:7) call for organizational strategy to incorporate “into their planning the amplification and dampening effects of influences moving at different rates and across scales.” The prime strategic goal has to be to preserve the long-term health of the ecosystem one is a part of rather than just one’s own competitive advantage.…”

Twalk Your Talk: On the (Non)-Formative Influence of Corporate Social Responsibility Communication on Supply Chain Sustainability Measures

“…The aim was to investigate how and what can be realized in the perspective of the prevailing dominate logic of top management. A possible approach to follow up on this issue would be to focus on the role of sustainable leadership practices [58], and whether perhaps the top management's view could focus more on the holistic perspectives of SCM practices [59], incorporating the socio-economic and socio-ecological aspects [60].…”

The Business School in the Anthropocene: Parasite Logic and Pataphysical Reasoning for a Working Earth

“…This clearly requires substantive interdisciplinary work (Görg et al, 2019) accompanied by a wholesale rethinking of current forms of social and economic organizing (Wright et al, 2018). It is no longer possible to conceive of doing 'business as usual' in even the immediate future (Mitchell, Lemon & Lambrechts, 2020), although this is not challenged in management research (Nyberg & Wright, 2020). The coronavirus pandemic is an example of how the Earth System shows that there are multiple intersecting forms of value creation of human and non-human actors.…”