Complex adaptive systems are unpredictable and non-linear

Humans naturally understand predictable, linear systems that are causal and consistent. Complex adaptive systems are altogether different, in that they “do not change in a predictable, linear, incremental fashion. They have the potential to exist in more than one kind of regime (sometimes referred to as “alternate stable states”) in which their function, structure, and feedbacks are different. Shocks and disturbances to these systems (e.g., fires, floods, wars, market changes) can drive them across a threshold into a different regime, frequently with unwelcome surprises.”[1]

Complex adaptive systems are unpredictable, because they exhibit emergent behavior.

The complexity of the many linkages and feedbacks that make up a social-ecological system is such that we can never predict with certainty what the exact response will be to any intervention in the system. Complex adaptive systems have emergent behavior; that is, the emergent behavior of the system cannot be predicted by understanding the individual mechanics of its component parts or any pair of interactions.[2]

Resilience thinking provides a means of interpreting and interacting with complex adaptive systems in that it is “a framework for viewing a social-ecological system as one system operating over many linked scales of time and space. Its focus is on how the system changes and copes with disturbance. Resilience, a system’s capacity to absorb disturbances without a regime shift, is the key to sustainability.”[3]

#systems #resilience #emergence

See also:

  1. Resilience Thinking – Walker and Salt (2012), ch. 2, § “A System’s Mind Space.” ↩︎

  2. Ibid., ch.2, § “Concept 2: Appreciating That It Is a Complex Adaptive System.” ↩︎

  3. Ibid., ch. 2, § “Key Points on Resilience Thinking.” ↩︎