Chris Corrigan Menu
  • Blog
  • Services
    • What I do
    • How I work
  • Resources
    • Books in my library
    • Facilitation Resources
    • Open Space Resources
      • Planning an Open Space Technology Meeting
  • Courses
  • About
    • Books and Papers
    • CV and Client list
    • Music
    • Who I am
  • Contact
  • Blog
  • Services
    • What I do
    • How I work
  • Resources
    • Books in my library
    • Facilitation Resources
    • Open Space Resources
      • Planning an Open Space Technology Meeting
  • Courses
  • About
    • Books and Papers
    • CV and Client list
    • Music
    • Who I am
  • Contact

How self-organization works: short form

September 1, 2015 By Chris Corrigan Complexity, Invitation, Open Space, Organization One Comment

A small elevator speech I shared on the OSLIST yesterday:

Self organization works by a combination of attractors and boundaries.  Attractors are things that draw components of a system towards themselves (gravity wells, a pile of money left on the ground, an invitation).  Boundaries (or constraints) are barriers that constrain the elements in a system (an atmosphere, the edges of an island, the number of syllables in a haiku)

Working together, attractors and boundaries define order where otherwise there is chaos. We can be intentional about some of these, but not all of them. Within complex systems, attractors and constraints create the conditions to enable emergence.  What emerges isn’t always desirable and is never predictable, but it has the property of being new and different from any of the individual elements within the system.

Self-organization is where we get new, previously unknown things from.

 

Share:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • More
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Telegram (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Skype (Opens in new window)

Related

Share
  • Tweet
Retrospective coherence and the road not taken
Returning to the Basics

One Comment

  1. Fabio says:
    September 1, 2015 at 11:10 am

    Two things recently on the blog I connect with Chris. First was a few posts back on Snowden’s theory of change. This idea of small probes that begin to plot an alternative narrative has proven very useful in my early psychotherapy experiences. Narrative therapy, as it’s called, is very similar to what you were describing. Second, is this post and the reading of Ken Wilber’s work over the last few weeks has really helped me understand emergence, evolution of complexity, and other crazy stuff. It’s incredibly confusing stuff at times but then you see some very simple patterns. I think both posts remind me that one of the major hurdles here is our desire to know the predetermined outcome before we set out on the creative process. It’s such a natural urge, but also so limiting. There is a fearlessness to creative and emergent work- or better a required faith- that seems essential and counter cultural in a world of predictive logic models and data projections….

Comments are closed.

Find Interesting Things
Events
  • Art of Hosting Fall 2023 with Caitlin Frost, Kelly Poirier and Kris Archie Vancouver or Bowen Island, BC Canada.
  • Complexity from the Inside Out with Caitlin Frost, April - June 2023
Resources
  • A list of books in my library
  • Facilitation Resources
  • Open Space Resources
  • Planning an Open Space Technology meeting
SIGN UP

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.
  

Find Interesting Things

© 2015 Chris Corrigan. All rights reserved. | Site by Square Wave Studio