One of the articles from the BW special issue on American r&d repeated the oft-repeated belief that the American system of research thrives because it is "disorganized and "chaotic". While the article goes on to cite these as positive traits for the development of new ideas, and therefore innovation, the use of these words needs to be corrected.
Empirical research into the time of pre-ideas that comprise the earliest stage of innovation – the stage before the “idea” or the “team” exists – is still in its infancy. Existing research views the stage as an ad hoc period of indeterminate time, driven by intuition, and filled with ambiguity and uncertainty... primarily so that the researchers can then begin studying the later stages, wherein an idea, a team, an office, funding, and such formal matters are all existent. Studying this early period is clearly hard, so how about everyone just agree it is "chaotic" and move to the easier stuff?
We are now smart enough to move beyond the thinking inherent in viewing early innovation as chaotic. disorganized, ad hoc. Each of these terms brings with it issues of the unknown, or more precisely, unknowability. But this is far from the truth.
Research is a process of ideas and interactions co-evolving toward a possible innovation. It is a social process that begins with the introduction of a half-formed thought, leading to interactions around this thought, and ending with the possible self-organization of a team. And it is this recurring process (with lots of possible non-organization) that leads to the formalization of the innovation idea and team and the beginning of more traditional processes of innovation.
The process of early innovation - the time of idea and team formation - is emergent. It is a socio-ideational process rooted in complexity. And while emergent processes may look chaotic, they are anything buy.
I think you have misunderstood his point. It's the system of innovation rather than the process of innovation that is called disorganized since it is funded in a variety of ways for a number of reasons rather than controlled and coordinated by a bureaucracy. The author is drawing a contrast with top down approaches and uses the Japanese MITI as an example.
He says, referring to MITI failures:
Posted by: back40 | March 16, 2004 at 09:43 PM
Can you better explain the difference that they are trying to describe and how chaotic is a valid desciption?
Posted by: Bill | March 17, 2004 at 10:21 AM
One point I think I do need to clarify is that the author of this article did not seem to be making the argument that a chaotic complex = complexity. To me he is using the term in a much more general sense, "a condition or place of great disorder or confusion." This seems like the correct usage of the term in the context of the surrounding writing and overall article.
The characteristics of an emergent system are primarily the result of the aggregated processes. If you accept this thinking, then the system of research in America could be described as something other than chaotic based on the fact that the processes involved are themselves non-chaotic. If the system where to be comprised on processes that were understandable, even at an initial level, then the system itself should be describable as something other than "disordered and full of confusion."
Posted by: Bill | March 17, 2004 at 10:30 AM
He's using the word chaotic in the common sense of the word rather than as the neologism of chaos theory which imposes a more precise and specialized meaning on an old word. It is a disordered system in that everyday sense, it lacks order, is not planned or controlled.
His point is interesting and important, best not lost in quibbling about a neologism. When investment and funding decisions are made by diverse entities with diverse purposes more areas are researched and some areas are researched by multiple teams. The result, he argues, is superior. In hindsight one could plot a more direct path to discovery but we always lack the foresight to do so before discovery. It seems inefficient but efficiency isn't a useful objective, resilience and quality are the objectives.
He may be right and is voicing a view held by many rather than an original notion without rigorous support. In a sense it is an obviously correct idea since even if each nation had it's MITI equivalent the diverse nations would still have the same disorder, diversity and overlap in their efforts. When it is fractal, disordered within nations as well as between them, the method should be even more effective, especially for a large nation.
An unstated requirement for the effective functioning of such as system is shared results. If research is not published so that others can benefit from both the successes and the failures of others, if each effort is conducted in isolation, then progress is decreased. It can be seen an an aspect of the argument for open systems and open societies.
In my view there is still a place for directed efforts. Coordinated efforts for some objectives in an overall environment of diversity seems useful.
Posted by: back40 | March 17, 2004 at 01:37 PM