Issue Articles
PRACTITIONER
Collective case study method and fractal geometry: Instrumental and intrinsic cases in organizational research
In case study methods of organizations, researchers are often limited to the aggregation of individual cases within the context of the organizational case. Borrowing from Stake’s (1995) use of instrumental and intrinsic case studies, this paper... Read More
with DONALD GILSTRAP
ACADEMIC
Social entrepreneurship effects on the emergence of cooperation in networks
Even in simple contexts, the dynamical interaction between agents creates complex features. The presence of agents of change affects dramatically the underlying social structure. Some agents seem to be important in shaping the evolution of interactio... Read More
with ARIANNA FORNO UGO MERLONE
ACADEMIC
Networks, emergence, iteration and evolution
Recognition that the reductionist approach to science leaves great gaps in our understanding has led to the synthesis approach to further explain the world around us. The synthetic approach examines the inter-relationships of individual entities as t... Read More
ACADEMIC
Moving far from far-from-equilibrium: Opportunity tension as the catalyst of emergence*
Complexity scholars have identified two distinct catalysts of emergence: (1) Far-from-equilibrium dynamics that trigger order creation, and (2) adaptive tension (McKelvey, 2004) which can push a system toward instability, leading to the emergence of ... Read More
with BENYAMIN LICHTENSTEIN
PHILOSOPHY
The dark side of organizational knowing
Rigorous investigation of organizational epistemology, or what can an organization know and why, is a sadly underdeveloped field. Knowledge management as a field has suffered from naïve assumptions about what knowledge is and how it can(not) be ... Read More
ACADEMIC
Competitive scenarios, community responses and organizational implications
We analyze four scenarios commonly encountered in social processes undergoing competitive pressures: resource depletion by individuals acting greedily (‘tragedy of the commons’), wasted opportunity due to over protective players (‘t... Read More
with FABIO BOSCHETTI MARKUS BREDE
ACADEMIC
The complexity of complexity theory: An innovative analysis
As more scholars join the conversation around complexity theory (CT), it seems a useful time to ask ourselves if we are talking about the “same thing?” This concern is highlighted by the present survey, which finds more conflict than agre... Read More