Dr Brian Levy is a Public Sector Governance Advisor at the World Bank, andused to head up the unit responsible implementing the Bank’s governance and anti-corruption strategy. In this guest post, cross-posted from here, he explores the relevance of complexity theory insights for South Africa. A fascinating read. The edge of chaos is the balance [...]
Archive for the ‘Resilience’ Category
South Africa’s democracy: Complexity theory in action
Posted in Accountability, Economics, Evolution, Innovation, Institutions, Leadership, Public Policy, Resilience, Strategy on December 16, 2011 | 4 Comments »
Climate change adaptation, resilience and complexity
Posted in Climate change, Innovation, Public Policy, Reports and Studies, Resilience, Strategy on December 1, 2011 | 2 Comments »
With the latest round of UN climate talks underway in Durban this week, many are rightly concerned about the agreements that will be reached (if any), and whether it will be a case of too little, too late (quite probably). The challenges of achieving global public policy consensus aside, new research is highlighting a range [...]
What Does The Atlas of Economic Complexity Mean for Development?
Posted in Climate change, Economics, Evolution, Financial crisis, Innovation, Networks, Public Policy, Reports and Studies, Resilience, Technology, Trade on November 3, 2011 | 9 Comments »
Ricardo Hausmann of Harvard and Cesar Hidalgo of MIT (whose work I have blogged about previously here) have just published the deeply impressive Atlas of Economic Complexity. It is built around an innovative, network-based methodology for understanding economies and their potential for growth. It represents perhaps the most systematic and in-depth application of the ideas [...]
Global Resilience Requires Novelty – A Speech by Buzz Holling
Posted in Meetings, Public Policy, Resilience on October 25, 2011 | 4 Comments »
One of the areas where complexity thinking has entered the mainstream of development policy and practice is in resilience thinking. Much of this work owes a debt to C.S. ‘Buzz’ Holling, whose work on resilience of ecologies in the 1970s provided the intellectual underpinning to much recent work. Holling was recently awarded an honorary doctorate [...]
Philippines turns to complexity science to strengthen disaster preparedness
Posted in Climate change, Innovation, Institutions, Knowledge and learning, Natural disasters, Networks, Public Policy, Reports and Studies, Resilience, Strategy on March 15, 2011 | 3 Comments »
Following the Japanese earthquake, the Philippines government have announced plans to explore the use of complexity science in better understanding disaster vulnerability and risk. The effort is to be taken forward by the Congressional Commission on Science Technology and Engineering, in collaboration with the Philippine Disaster Science Management Center. Senator Edgardo Angara, Chair of Congressional Commission [...]
A Q&A on Positive Deviance, Innovation and Complexity
Posted in Evaluation, Evolution, Facilitation, Innovation, Knowledge and learning, Leadership, Public Policy, Resilience, Self organisation, Strategy on February 8, 2011 | 12 Comments »
Positive deviance (PD) is a fascinating approach, a decade and a half old, and the focus of growing interest in health, education and numerous other sectors in domestic public policy. Interestingly, given PD saw first widespread application in an aid programme, it is still less well known than it should be across the international community. This post [...]
Complexity with a human face
Posted in Campaigns, Financial crisis, Leadership, Networks, Resilience, Self organisation on February 4, 2011 | 5 Comments »
A piece in yesterday’s New Scientist titled ‘Can Complexity Theory Explain Egypt’s Crisis?’ explores ideas of complexity in the context of the ongoing events in Egypt. It draws on the insights of two noted complexity thinkers – Yaneer Bar-Yam and Thomas Homer-Dixon. Excerpts are reproduced below with permission: Egyptians are the world’s biggest wheat importers and consumers, and [...]
The globalisation of vulnerability
Posted in Agriculture, Climate change, Conflict and peace building, Economics, Financial crisis, Innovation, Institutions, Knowledge and learning, Natural disasters, Organisations, Public Policy, Resilience on January 11, 2011 | 4 Comments »
Most analysts agree that globalisation has become more intensive and dramatic in recent decades because of advances in technology, communications, science and transportation. While it can be a catalyst for development and progress, globalisation also carries significant and increasing challenges for aid policy makers and practitioners alike. I: The new face of vulnerability? Recent years [...]
Alan Greenspan – Closet Complexity Scientist?
Posted in Economics, Financial crisis, Innovation, Leadership, Public Policy, Resilience on November 8, 2010 | 2 Comments »
In one of his many speeches, Alan Greenspan, former Chairman of the FRB, talked about “Monetary Policy under Uncertainty”. According to a rather mischievous article in the Post-Autistic Economics Review, he “expressed numerous ideas which could have come straight out of the mouth of a complexity economist.” The relevant quotes from the speech are highlighted below. First, [...]
Land is not Linear: Towards the Brown Revolution
Posted in Agriculture, Innovation, Institutions, Knowledge and learning, Leadership, Public Policy, Resilience, Self organisation, Strategy on October 22, 2010 | 1 Comment »
This year’s Buckminster Fuller Prize winner, Operation Hope, has seen the transformation of 6,500 acres of parched and degraded grasslands in Zimbabwe into healthy pastures despite extended periods of drought. The story behind Operation Hope is an inspiring one with real insights on how complexity science concepts can help transform development practices on the ground. First, the background to the [...]
