Emerging scenarios of data infrastructure and novel concepts of digital libraries in intelligent infrastructure for human-centred communities: A qualitative research

2018 ◽  
Vol 45 (5) ◽  
pp. 691-704 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi Shen
Keyword(s):  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Digital Libraries ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Design Thinking ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Data Gathering ◽  
Digital Data ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Data Infrastructure

This research investigated the strategic development of a large-scale transdisciplinary area, named intelligent infrastructure for human-centred communities, at Virginia Tech. Within such development, this study explored the future vision and anticipated scenarios of data infrastructure and digital libraries for smart community development. It draws upon the mixed-methods approach combining ethnographic participant observation, document analysis and semi-structured interviews. Grounded in socio-technical framework and rooted in empirical methods, this research produces results that augment design thinking and visioning practice for digital data libraries beyond traditional boundaries. The findings reveal the emerging scenarios around complex adaptive systems, intelligent data infrastructure and future digital libraries all in the context of building infrastructure for human-centred communities. Situated in this advancing reality, the results further discuss the next-generation data and information user experience, smart infrastructure data environment and future library capabilities. The article concludes that a smart library system, whether in its conceptual form of a ‘digital octopus’ or a ‘smart village data hub’ or an ‘intelligent virtual assistant’, will provide intelligence in data gathering, processing, summarising, communication and recommendations. By delivering unified and personalised data solutions, it will offer an end-to-end seamless experience for users throughout their journey of knowledge pursuit.

scholarly journals Agile Innovation to transform healthcare: innovating in complex adaptive systems is an everyday process, not a light bulb event

2021 ◽  
pp. bmjinnov-2020-000574
Author(s):  
Richard J Holden ◽  
Malaz A Boustani ◽  
Jose Azar
Keyword(s):  
Project Management ◽  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Design Thinking ◽  
Healthcare Delivery ◽  
Light Bulb ◽  
Innovation Development ◽  
Agile Project Management ◽  
Complex Adaptive ◽  
Behavioural Sciences

Innovation is essential to transform healthcare delivery systems, but in complex adaptive systems innovation is more than ‘light bulb events’ of inspired creativity. To achieve true innovation, organisations must adopt a disciplined, customer-centred process. We developed the process of Agile Innovation as an approach any complex adaptive organisation can adopt to achieve rapid, systematic, customer-centred development and testing of innovative interventions. Agile Innovation incorporates insights from design thinking, Agile project management, and complexity and behavioural sciences. It was refined through experiments in diverse healthcare organisations. The eight steps of Agile Innovation are: (1) confirm demand; (2) study the problem; (3) scan for solutions; (4) plan for evaluation and termination; (5) ideate and select; (6) run innovation development sprints; (7) validate solutions; and (8) package for launch. In addition to describing each of these steps, we discuss examples of and challenges to using Agile Innovation. We contend that once Agile Innovation is mastered, healthcare delivery organisations can habituate it as the go-to approach to projects, thus incorporating innovation into how things are done, rather than treating innovation as a light bulb event.

scholarly journals A Clear Past and a Murky Future: Life in the Anthropocene on the Pampana River, Sierra Leone

Land ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 72 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Marcantonio ◽  
Agustin Fuentes
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Sierra Leone ◽  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Earth System ◽  
Sierra Leonean ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Complex Adaptive

The impacts of human activities on ecosystems are significantly increasing the rate of environmental change in the earth system, reshaping the global landscape. The rapid rate of environmental change is disrupting the ability of millions of people around the globe to live their everyday lives and maintain their human niche. Evidence suggests that we have entered (or created) a new epoch, the Anthropocene, which is defined as the period in which humans and human activities are the primary drivers of planetary change. The Anthropocene denotes a global shift, but it is the collective of local processes. This is our frame for investigating local accounts of human-caused disruptive environmental change in the Pampana River in Tonkolili District, Northern Province, Sierra Leone. Since the end of the Sierra Leonean civil war in 2002, the country has experienced a rapid increase in extractive industries, namely mining. We explored the effects of this development by working with communities along the Pampana River in Tonkolili, with a specific focus given to engaging local fishermen through ethnographic interviews (N = 21 fishermen and 33 non-fishermen), focus group discussions (N = 21 fishermen), and participant observation. We deployed theoretical and methodological frameworks from human niche construction theory, complex adaptive systems, and ethnography to track disruptive environmental change in and on the Pampana from upstream activities and the concomitant shifts in the local human niche. We highlight the value of integrating ethnographic methods with human evolutionary theory, produce important insights about local human coping processes with disruptive environmental change, and help to further account for and understand the ongoing global process of human modification of the earth system in the Anthropocene.

scholarly journals Next Generation Data Infrastructures: Towards an Extendable Model of the Asset Management Data Infrastructure as Complex Adaptive System

Complexity ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 ◽  
pp. 1-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Brous ◽  
Marijn Janssen ◽  
Paulien Herder
Keyword(s):  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Asset Management ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Complex Adaptive System ◽  
Emergent Behavior ◽  
Data Infrastructure ◽  
Management Domain ◽  
Complex Adaptive ◽  
Data Infrastructures

Organizations are increasingly looking to adopt the Internet of Things (IoT) to collect the data required for data-driven decision-making. IoT might yield many benefits for asset management organizations engaged in infrastructure asset management, yet not all organizations are equipped to handle this data. IoT data is collected, stored, and analyzed within data infrastructures and there are many changes over time, resulting in the evolution of the data infrastructure and the need to view data infrastructures as complex adaptive systems (CAS). Such data infrastructures represent information about physical reality, in this case about the underlying physical infrastructure. Physical infrastructures are often described and analyzed in literature as CASs, but their underlying data infrastructures are not yet systematically analyzed, whereas they can also be viewed as CAS. Current asset management data models tend to view the system from a static perspective, posing constraints on the extensibility of the system, and making it difficult to adopt new data sources such as IoT. The objective of the research is therefore to develop an extensible model of asset management data infrastructures which helps organizations implement data infrastructures which are capable of evolution and aids the successful adoption of IoT. Systematic literature review and an IoT case study in the infrastructure management domain are used as research methods. By adopting a CAS lens in the design, the resulting data infrastructure is extendable to deal with evolution of asset management data infrastructures in the face of new technologies and new requirements and to steadily exhibit new forms of emergent behavior. This paper concludes that asset management data infrastructures are inherently multilevel, consisting of subsystems, links, and nodes, all of which are interdependent in several ways.

scholarly journals Evolution, Complex Systems and the Dialectic

1999 ◽  
pp. 74-103 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Knapp
Keyword(s):  
Complex Systems ◽  
Systems Theory ◽  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Dynamic Models ◽  
Dynamic Properties ◽  
World Systems ◽  
World Systems Theory ◽  
Systems Models

The status of large scale historical macro-theories is contested both in world-systems theory and in sociology as a whole. I distinguish three types of such dynamic models: evolutionary models, systems models and dialectical models. I define dialectical models as a family of complex systems models characterized by positive feedback (self-reinforcement or auto-catalysis). Such models lead to processes of accumulation and polarization, leading to system crisis. The games of Monopoly and Risk provide popular examples. This paper investigates the dynamic properties of three examples of such models: Myrdal's model of cumulative causation; Collins's models of Marxian transformations and geopolitics; and Chaso-Dunn and Hall's iterative model of world-systems transformations. A combination of evolutionary, complex systems and dialectical analyses has consideralble overlap with chaotic, far-from-equilibrium types of models and with analyses of complex adaptive systems. Such discontinuous, nonlinear dynamic models show great potential for solving problems of dynamic analysis both within world-systems theory and within sociology as a whole.

The Dynamics of Risk

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise K. Comfort
Keyword(s):  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Seismic Risk ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Complex Societies ◽  
Complex Adaptive ◽  
Shared Awareness ◽  
Response And Recovery ◽  
Global Threat ◽  
Post Disaster

Earthquakes are a huge global threat. In thirty-six countries, severe seismic risks threaten populations and their increasingly interdependent systems of transportation, communication, energy, and finance. This book provides an examination of how twelve communities in nine countries responded to destructive earthquakes between 1999 and 2015. And many of the book's lessons can also be applied to other large-scale risks. The book sets the global problem of seismic risk in the framework of complex adaptive systems to explore how the consequences of such events ripple across jurisdictions, communities, and organizations in complex societies, triggering unexpected alliances but also exposing social, economic, and legal gaps. It assesses how the networks of organizations involved in response and recovery adapted and acted collectively after the twelve earthquakes it examines. It describes how advances in information technology enabled some communities to anticipate seismic risk better and to manage response and recovery operations more effectively, decreasing losses. Finally, the book shows why investing substantively in global information infrastructure would create shared awareness of seismic risk and make post-disaster relief more effective and less expensive. The result is a landmark study of how to improve the way we prepare for and respond to earthquakes and other disasters in our ever-more-complex world.

Teaching how to fish: strategic practices in an entrepreneurial non-profit organization

2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 137
Author(s):  
Alexandra Esperança Da Cunha Pimentel de Meira ◽  
Victor Meyer Jr., ◽  
Lucilaine Pascuci
Keyword(s):  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Nonprofit Organization ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Project Managers ◽  
Coupled Systems ◽  
Steady Increase ◽  
Bottom Of The Pyramid ◽  
Non Profit

The aim of this study is to analyze the strategic practices developed by a Brazilian nonprofit organization, which focuses on the promotion of social entrepreneurship at the bottom of the pyramid. The major goal of the study is to focus on the strategies of its project managers. The study is based on the concepts of Salamon (2003) and Moore (2000) and the role played by the nonprofit organization in the same manner that entrenches the theories of complex adaptive systems and the loosely coupled systems. It has also highlighted the use of strategy-as-practice as a theoretical basis to better understand the social actions. It is a case study of a qualitative nature. Data were collected from analysis of documents, non-participant observation and interviews. Data analysis revealed that project managers played a critical role as strategists. In their social practices they combine experience, sensemaking, interactions, decision making and knowledge together with neutrality and autonomy for action. The results revealed that the number of micro-entrepreneurs who benefited from the projects has grown significantly during the period of the study. Likewise, the income of these micro-entrepreneurs and that of their families has displayed a steady increase. The conclusion indicates that strategic practices carried out by project managers have brought social value to micro-entrepreneurs and contributed significantly to the achievement of the organization`s goals.

Integrated care communities: putting change theory into practice

2014 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 132-141 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Bradbury
Keyword(s):  
Integrated Care ◽  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Social Care ◽  
Content Type ◽  
North West ◽  
Health And Social Care ◽  
Capability Building ◽  
Complex Adaptive

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to reflect on the experience of the Advancing Quality Alliance's (AQuA) regional Integrated Care Discovery Community created to translate integrated care theory into practice at scale and to test ways to address the system enablers of integrated care. Design/methodology/approach – Principles of flexibility, agility, credibility and scale influenced Community design. The theoretical framework drew on relevant complexity, learning community and change management theories. Co-designed with stakeholders, the discovery-based Community model incorporated emergent learning from change in complex adaptive environments and focused bespoke support on leadership capability building. Findings – In total, 19 health and social care economies participated. Kotter's eight-step change model proved flexible in conjunction with large-scale change theories. The tension between programme management, learning communities and the emergent nature of change in complex adaptive systems can be harnessed to inject pace and urgency. Mental models and simple rules were helpful in managing participant's desire for a directive approach in the context of a discovery programme. Research limitations/implications – This is a viewpoint from a regional improvement organisation in North West England. Social implications – The Discovery Community was a useful construct through which to rapidly develop multiple integrated health and social care economies. Flexible design and bespoke delivery is crucial in a complex adaptive environment. Capability building needs to be agile enough to meet the emergent needs of a changing workforce. Collaborative leadership has emerged as an area requiring particular attention. Originality/value – Learning from AQuA's approach may assist others in structuring large-scale integrated care or complex change initiatives.

scholarly journals “He's a normal kid now”: an ethnographic study of challenges and possibilities in a new era of haemophilia care

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 150-157
Author(s):  
Thomas Hughes ◽  
Mikkel Brok-Kristensen ◽  
Yosha Gargeya ◽  
Anne Mette Worsøe Lottrup ◽  
Ask Bo Larsen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Health Care Professionals ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Full Potential ◽  
Theory Approach ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Patient Organisations

AbstractBackgroundRecent treatment option advances in haemophilia care have contributed to a discourse of ‘normality’ around the condition, in which people with haemophilia (PwH) are increasingly expected to live ‘normal’ lives unburdened by their condition.AimThe aim of this article is to explore notions of ‘normality’ in the experience of haemophilia across generations. This is one of the main themes identified in a large-scale ethnographic study of the everyday life of PwH, a broad qualitative investigation of beliefs and experiences related to condition, treatment, and personal ways of managing the condition.MethodsThe study used ethnographic research methods. Five haemophilia experts helped frame the research design by contributing historical and disease area context prior to the initiation of field research. PwH were recruited through patient organisations in five European countries (Italy, Germany, Spain, UK and Ireland). During field research, study researchers collected data through 8–12 hours of participant observation, semi-structured interviews, written exercises, facilitated group dialogues, and on-site observations of PwH interactions with friends, family, and health care professionals (HCPs). They also conducted on-site observation at haemophilia treatment centres (HTCs) and HCP interviews. The study employed a multi-tiered grounded theory approach and combined data were analysed using techniques such as inductive and deductive analysis, cross-case analysis, challenges mapping, and clustering exercises. This article explores findings related to the discourse of ‘normality’ and is thus focused on a subset of the data from the study.ResultsFifty-one PwH, aged 1.5 to 82 years, were interviewed and followed in their daily lives. Six treatment centres were visited, and 18 HCPs were interviewed. The study found that a discourse of present day ‘normality’, as compared to a difficult past, is ingrained in the haemophilia community. As a result, unlike most older PwH (40+), younger PwH (under 18) are not always taught to acknowledge the severity of their condition or how to sense bleeds (disease-related embodied knowledge), and risk unknowingly doing long-term damage to their bodies. Twenty-seven per cent (n=7/26) of younger PwH (children, teenagers) in the study were observed or described as engaging in high-risk behaviours in the short term indicating a lack understanding of long-term consequences.ConclusionsThese findings suggest that the discourse of ‘normality’ presents a number of challenges that need to be addressed, namely the potential for younger PwH to be unaware of bleeds and the general underreporting of haemophilia-related complications and limitations. One way forward in realising the full potential of advanced treatment could be to teach young PwH, through evidence-based initiatives, how to develop an embodied sense of their bleeds. Furthermore, if the current state of life with haemophilia is accepted as finally ‘normal’, then progress in further improving care may be stalled. It is important that remaining and new challenges are recognised in order for them to be acted upon.

scholarly journals Navigating uncertainty: an examination of how people with haemophilia understand and cope with uncertainty in protection in an ethnographic study

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 158-164
Author(s):  
Thomas Hughes ◽  
Mikkel Brok-Kristensen ◽  
Yosha Gargeya ◽  
Anne Mette Worsøe Lottrup ◽  
Ask Bo Larsen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Mental Models ◽  
Health Care Professionals ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Theory Approach ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Daily Lives

AbstractBackgroundWith the major advances in treatment of haemophilia in recent decades, people with haemophilia (PwH) are more protected in their daily lives than ever before. However, recent studies point to persisting or increasing patient experience of uncertainty.AimsThe aim of this article is to further investigate findings related to how PwH understand and cope with uncertainty around their protection in their everyday life, one of the main themes identified in a large-scale ethnographic study of the everyday life of PwH, including beliefs and experiences related to their condition, their treatment, and their personal ways of managing the condition.MethodsThe study used ethnographic research methods. Five haemophilia experts provided historical and disease area context prior to the initiation of field research. During field research, study researchers collected data through 8–12 hours of participant observation, semi-structured interviews, written exercises, facilitated group dialogues, and on-site observations of the interactions of PwH with friends, family, and health care professionals (HCPs). Study researchers also conducted on-site observation at haemophilia treatment centres (HTCs) and interviewed HCPs. The study employed a multi-tiered grounded theory approach and combined data were analysed using techniques such as inductive and deductive analysis, cross-case analysis, challenge mapping, and clustering exercises. This article explores findings related to uncertainty and thus focuses on a subset of the data from the study.ResultsFifty-one PwH in Italy, Germany, Spain, UK, and Ireland were interviewed and followed in their daily lives, and 18 HCPs were interviewed. Fifty-two per cent (n=26/50) of PwH in the study experience difficulties translating clinical understanding of protection into specific activities in everyday life. Many have developed their own mental models and care adaptations to navigate treatment uncertainy: these seldom match the medical community's view. These mental models of protection among PwH can cause distress and influence behaviour in a way that can limit possibilities, and/or increase risk. There is also a prevalent tension in the strategies PwH have for managing their protection in terms of day-to-day vs. long-term ambitions.ConclusionsThese findings on PwH's experience of treatment uncertainty suggest a need to develop tools and communication materials to help PwH better understand the protection provided by their treatment regimen and what that means practically for everyday life.

Digital Swarms

2017 ◽  
pp. 44-59
Author(s):  
Carlos M. Fernandes ◽  
Ivo Dias de Sousa
Keyword(s):  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
Personal Communications ◽  
Network Nodes ◽  
Eusocial Insects ◽  
Complex Adaptive ◽  
The Individual ◽  
New Generation

By converting a fixed network into a mobile system, personal communications technology radically transformed the way we interact with each other and with the environment. Recently, new generation mobile phones (known as smartphones) increased the capacity of the network nodes and added new properties to mobility, converting a once ordered system into a complex and perhaps adaptive network. In this paper, we argue that contemporary mobile phone networks are large-scale complex adaptive systems—with niches, hierarchy, recirculation of information, coevolutionary interactions, and sophisticated collective behavior—that display remarkable similarities with eusocial insects (ants, bees, wasps and termites). Under this framework, we will discuss the impact of personal communications networks in the urban life, without losing sight of the effects—either positive or negative—of the system's emergent patterns on the network itself and on the individual nodes (personal devices and users).

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