A Study Of Metamodeling In The Area Of Information System Design
Eva Nero and Anders Malmsjö
University of Skövde
Department of Computer Science
P.O. Box 408
S-54128 Skövde
Sweden
anders.malmsjo@ida.his.se
eva.nero@ida.his.se
Van Gigch has introduced the concept of metamodeling. Metamodeling is the process of specifying the requirements to be met by the modeling process or establishing the specifications which the modeling process must fulfill. Reflections on epistemology and the prevailing paradigm take place on the metamodeling level. Van Gigch claims that most previous texts on system design have neglected to explicitly consider the issue of metamodeling. Applying metamodeling in the process of designing systems, metamodeling defines the design foundations. They consist of for instance reasoning processes, axioms of validity, and any other logic which underlies a methodology. Omitting metamodeling considerations may lead to faulty design.
The aim of this work is to study how the process of metamodeling is considered in the area of information system design and to evaluate how metamodeling processes in the area are applied. The focus of our study is to investigate the selection and use of methodologies for designing information systems. A literature study has been performed in the area of information system design to see how the process of metamodeling has been dealt with. Interviews were also made in order to identify how designers apply metamodeling issues and to capture their attitude to metamodeling.
In the literature study Method Engineering (ME) was found as one important example where metamodeling processes play a crucial part. The main purpose of ME is to support the process of developing a methodology for a specific design situation. The result of such a process is a 'situational methodology'. An evaluation of ME has been performed based on a more specific characterization of the process of metamodeling. The characterization is founded on a synthesis of works by van Gigch and Churchman, but also on works by Flood and Jackson when they address the metametodology Total System Intervention (TSI). The evaluation indicated that by applying ME, important metamodeling issues are considered, but they could be improved as to the encouragement of participation in the metamodeling process. The interviews confirm van Gigch's observation that metamodeling is not explicitly considered in the design process. Metamodeling thinking seems nevertheless to exist in the design process, but then in a more informal and implicit way.
[01-131]
Cyber Commons and Social Informatics
Toshizumi Ohta, Kazunari Ishida and Isamu Okada
1The Graduate School of Information Systems
The University of Electro-Communications
1-5-1 Choufugaoka, Choufushi
Tokyo 182-8585, Japan
E-mail: ohta@is.uec.ac.jp, ishida@ohta.is.uec.ac.jp, okada@is.uec.ac.jp
A cyber commons will be discussed with respect to a social
informatics. The social informatics can be characterized as an
interdisciplinary area that discusses human behavior and social
systems in an information rich environment. The environment may
be developed and supported by information systems according to
a certain vision of society. Such a society can be characterized
that information is commodity, time is currency, and that the
age prefers convenience.
The cyber commons may play an important role in the environment,
in that it must be a repository for a generation, an accumulation,
and a distribution of information and knowledge.
In order to successfully develop and maintain the cyber commons,
we have to consider the difference between the cyber commons and
a traditional commons, in that the commons have been observed
as a common pooled resources, mainly in relation to a human usage
of natural resources. One of the major differences between them
may depend on a generation of commons, namely whether to be able
to generate it or not, not just a manner of usage in case of the
cyber commons.
We will discuss the difference between them, observing the cyber
commons in the Internet and employing our results of simulation,
and develop a policy to proliferate the cyber commons in the Internet.
Keywords: Cyber Commons, Common Pooled Resources, Auto-Genesis
System, Operational Organization Model, Information Technology
[01-067]
Selfish managerial practices - a major obstacle to achieve global competitiveness
Eduardo Oliva-Lopez, Edith R. Silva-Mendoza
Jorge A. Rojas-Ramirez and Alla Kabatskaya-Ivanovna
Instituto Politecnico Nacional, Mexico
The objective of this work, is to report the progress of an ongoing research work looking into the causality, the manifestations and the impacts of selfish managerial practices in a variety of organizations and circumstances.
The outcome of a recent survey has shown that selfish managerial practices (SMP) are more the rule than the exception. Because of this, many organizations find it difficult to achieve global levels of competitiveness, and obtain a rather poor return out of their improvement efforts. Most executives do not formally acknowledge the deleterious impacts of such practices.
SMP tend to be systematically carried out by some individuals in the organization, i.e. their incidence is not usually spontaneous and isolated, but can be traced back to certain individuals and situations, were vested interests can be specifically identified.
The first stage of this research work already established that SMP constitute a real organizational disease pointing to an epidemic. Some analysts have already shown that SMP can be so harmful to an organization as to cause its collapse, as it has been the case of some well known airlines. An extensive literature search on the subject, has made it evident to us that SMP are known by different denominations and affect a wide variety of organizations, thus confirming our original findings.
This work constitutes a observational, cross sectional research involving, so far, some 20 organizations that supplied sufficient data for examining their current managerial practices. To begin with, we have aimed at identifying and characterizing SMP, so that their causality and impacts can be properly established later on. The first stage was carried out through a series of brainstorming sessions, that enable us to identify 12 major manifestations of SMP. Recent findings have yielded 4 additional manifestations, as well as other behavioral aspects shown by some managers, that can be ascertained as deleterious for most organizations.
Keywords: selfish, management, competitiveness, problem solving.
[01 83]
Bangalore's Deprived Children: A Continuing Systemic Failure
R. Padmini
"Born into poverty, underweight, poorly nourished, racked by ill-health, an illiterate dropout, working in hazardous and/or exploitative conditions, in an unhealthy and unsafe environment....." ("Human Development in Karnataka 1999", p. 144).
This description of a deprived child in one of the most high profile and high-tech cities of India today was summarised from a 1997 draft study report. Some of the most crucial factors that seem to determine or influence deprived children's status are systemic - for example, poverty, lack of housing/tenure for slum dwellers, and of basic amenities/services such as safe water supply and sanitation, and, importantly, a denial of child rights. These rights are violated both due to the overwhelming influence of family and environmental factors on child welfare and development, and due to direct violations such as lack of access to basic health and educational services, lack of nutrition, and prevalence of child labour.
The study noted a paucity of firm statistics and comprehensive studies for the city, and, further, no disaggregation of data between low-income/slum and better-off areas within it. However, secondary information from sectoral studies, surveys and records were used and analysed. An attempt is being made now to obtain new information and arrive at a set of updated conclusions. It has been possible to identify only a few other recent studies. Still, enough has emerged to enable this paper to substantiate the dismal picture quoted above. To give just a few instances:
Over half of the slum population (about 15% of the city) is below the poverty line; many poor families also live in scattered locations (estimated around a third of the city's population). Most slums are "unauthorised" with the result that the "squatters" are denied tenure and most services; only about a tenth of the slum housing was?? "permanent". Many slums have only irregular piped water supply. Few homes have attached latrines and a community latrine may serve as many as 250 persons (even these are often not used due to poor maintenance). Official figures show major strides in children's immunisation levels but they are far below the city average in specific slums and most children suffer from various debilitating diseases. Many of the children drop out of primary school; and over half the children in two slums in one study were child labourers. Detailed studies of children below three in one slum revealed an alarming number of them were developmentally delayed, under-nourished and subject to repeated infections, indicating a need to focus more attention to their health, nutrition and stimulation.
This paper traces the main factors that have led to this sorry
state of affairs to continuing systemic failures - the negation
of constitutional rights of the poor, migrant labour and people
in low-income areas to a livelihood, housing/tenure, and/or basic
services; socio-economic and environmental factors. Despite avowals
of successive governments since India's Independence in 1947,
and various laws and programmes that have flowed from them, the
poor (both urban and rural) have not benefited in the main. The
paper does not delve into macro-level issues, but attempts to
link the specific situation among Bangalore's poor children to
such failures as evident in available data. Unless these systemic
drawbacks are addressed, existing programmes will only be palliative
and the development of many children will be compromised.
[01- 36]
The Five C Project: Holistic Care for the Young Child in an Indian Slum
R. Padmini
The Bangalore Children's Hospital launched the 5Cs project (care, compassion, comfort, creativity and communication) in an urban slum in the city limits of Bangalore, India in 1999. The objective of the project is to provide holistic care and development for children in the age group of 0 -3 years, in the areas of health, nutrition care, counselling and awareness raising for the caregivers, promotion of pre-school creativity, and screening of children to aid early detection and intervention of disabilities if any.
It also seeks to empower young girls with basic training on childcare and use them as service providers for growth monitoring, nutrition supplementation, surveillance for developmental disorders and early intervention
The immediate impact of the project has fallen short of expectation.
This is due to a combination of factors, such as:
1. The concept of disease is different in the community, certain
disease conditions such as diarrhoea during teething time for
children are considered normal.
2. Lack of health awareness, both preventive and curative, is
a common phenomenon.
3. There are obvious socio-economic reasons such as illiteracy,
environmental impact, social pressures, poverty and lack of adequate
public sanitation all make health unimportant compared to day-to-day
subsistence.
4. Consequent upon the socio-economic condition, fatalism seems
to be an accepted alternative.
5. Cost of children does not seem to play any role in decision
regarding family size since care of children including their health
and education are not priority items.
6. While on the one hand, these families are not able to afford
the needed medical care, free medical care on the other hand is
not valued and given its rightful place.
7. Husband's illiteracy / joblessness / underemployment / alcoholic
consumption / gambling / violence towards wife and children, domineering
mother in-law, etc., coupled with poverty, crowding and unhygienic
premises all contribute to the home environment in which health
of women and children become least important.
8. Governmental programs for slums seem to concentrate on large
slums and the smaller ones like the present one hardly seem to
receive consideration.
9. Provision of services alone will only be a shortsighted objective.
Creating health awareness and empowering women with knowledge
as well as improving the status of women in general will go a
long way in raising the health status of women and children in
these slum areas.
10. Improving socio-economic conditions, environmental hygiene,
women and youth literacy/education and enforcing women and children's
rights should be undertaken on a war footing. The major moves
have to be taken by the Government; NGOs can only provide innovative
strategies and models.
[01- 62]
Women and Children in Tamil Nadu:: An Analysis of Failures of Inter-locking Systems
R. Padmini
rampad@vsnl.com ram_pad@yahoo.com
Tamil Nadu [TN] is one of the most progressive states in India, having some of the highest levels of social indicators. Yet the balance sheet of development brings out many shortfalls and gaps in its achievements.
This paper provides an overview of the main areas where the state lags behind in the development of women and children. It analyses the possible causal factors and suggests steps to remedy their situation. In this attempt, it underlines the systemic nature of the problems and the inter-relationships among the various systems, socio-cultural and economic, on the one hand, and governmental policies and programmes, on the other.
Among the most disturbing shortfalls in TN's record are stagnation in infant mortality reduction, persistent low-birth weight, and malnutrition of women and young children. Primary school dropout rates have increased in the last decade, implying a worrisome degree of child labour. There are both quantity and quality problems in drinking water provision. Access to proper sanitation is largely lacking. Slums have proliferated, and housing is woefully inadequate.
Gender bias is traditional in the state, with some districts noted for female infanticides. The incidence of female foeticide is also rising. Both are due to traditional son preference and the dowry system. Women and girls suffer also from early marriage, insufficient attention to their basic needs, and violence against them. The scheduled castes and tribes [SC/ST], traditionally at the bottom of the caste ladder, as also people living in remote habitations and urban slums are also disadvantaged. There is often a congruence of one type of disadvantage with another - thus, SC/STs are often the poorest, and live in the most remote locations; and their women and children are among the worst off in many respects.
Government's policies and programmes, while benign in intent, have not either been directed at the root, systemic causes, or have been palliative passive and paternalistic.
The study recommends that Government use a rights approach [implying entitlement, participation and empowerment] rather than this welfare approach, promote gender-sensitive and non-discriminatory social attitudes and practices, improve the quality and efficiency of its services, protect social sector allocations, make planning and evaluation more effective and improve decentralised decision-making. It also stresses that until crucial shifts in societal values and attitudes towards recognising the rights of children, women and the disadvantaged are realised, official actions alone cannot remedy the situation. However, Government has a duty to promote such changes through the media, support to NGOs who are making such efforts, and by its own policies and actions.
[01-037]
Estimating Sustainable Growth Paths: Preliminary Results From The Usgdsim Model Of The Great Depression
George W. Pasdirtz
University of Wisconsin - Madison
1210 W. Dayton Street
Madison, WI 53706
The concept of "sustainable growth" is typically applied to the analysis of renewable and nonrenewable resource use. Growth is sustainable if renewable resource usage rates do not exceed rates of regeneration and if nonrenewable resource usage rates do not exceed rates at which substitutes are discovered. This paper develops an estimation-simulation algorithm for calculating sustainable growth paths and extends it to cover any societal variables (not just resources) that can be explained by a generalized law of mass action. Examples are given from the USGDSIM Model of the U.S. Great Depression during the first half of the 20th Century.
There has been resistance to thinking about sustainable growth. The fear is that a stationary-state society would be one of despondency, high unemployment, bankruptcy of market systems, high levels of poverty, agricultural shortages, trade embargos, political centralization, monopoly power and stagnant technological change. These fears may derive from experience with worldwide depression during the 1930's. How we look at the Great Depression, however, depends on our implicit assumptions about the sustainable growth path. For example, if income levels in 1929 were on the sustainable growth path, then the Great Depression in the United States was a catastrophic 37% decline in GNP from 1929-1934. On the other hand, if income levels in 1934 were on the sustainable growth path, then the 1920's (and each of the two World Wars) can be viewed as "unsustainable" boom periods followed by a return to "Normalcy." The former view suggests that expansionary growth policies were required in the 1930's while the later view suggests slow-growth policies should have been applied in the 1920's (the sustainable growth path predicted by the USGDSIM model is somewhere between these two extremes).
The USGDSIM model contains two sectors, demographic (population, labor force, organizations, and technology) and economic (wealth, income, production and prices). Equations in each sector are derived from a generalized law of mass action. The equation parameters are estimated iteratively using an OLS/simulation algorithm that produces not only sustainable growth paths but can also be used to model feedback loops that describe return to the steady state.
[01- 64]
Relativization Of The Conflict Space
Anatoly A. Piskoppel
Department of Psychology
Moscow State University, Mohovaya St. 8 crp. 5
Moscow, 103009 Russia
E-mail: piskoppel@mtu-net.ru
The "organizational-activity model" represents conflict as a type of social interaction, destructive counter-action, and opposes it to competition, a constructive counter-action. According to the model, the cause of a conflict should be found among the social paradigms that determine the process and structure of counter-actions. Compatibility of the opponents' paradigms permits them to play the same "game" in the shared interaction "space." This suggests that transformation of the paradigmatic basis of interaction can be used as a primary means for conflict management and resolution. Obviously, such transformation is possible only if both sides of a conflict perceive its basis as relative. Therefore, problem-solving relativization of the paradigmatic basis of a conflict is a prerequisite for application of the organizational-activity model and the first step in the strategy for conflict resolution. It is accepted that relativization of a conflict's basis is impossible if the opponents assign to it the meaning of fundamental beliefs. Usually such meaning is associated with theo-ethno-national values that are considered absolute and unquestionable. These conflicts become non-manageable and chronic. In such cases, the first step of relativizing the paradigm should be separation of the dimensions of the conflict space: a fundamental dimension (sacral or absolute) should be made orthogonal to all other relative (profane) dimensions. The idea is to narrow down the sacral space as much as possible and drive it out of the social counter-action, thus, opening the door for mutual relativization of the paradigms. A relevant methodology for mutual relativization of the paradigms could be a reversible constructive discourse, where each side of a conflict plays the role of a "co-editor" of the opponet's relative space paradigm.
Keywords: conflict, co-action, counter-action, competition, collaboration
[01- 55]
Inventral-Dorsality: Its Influence On Living Systems
RajaSekhar Poda
243 Forest Drive
Edison, NewJersey,08817
The paper puts forward a model of understanding living systems
in the context of the primary design of living systems in general
and vertebrate physiology in specific. .It builds a core hypotheses
that there exists a relationship between the head region and the
torsal regions (inclusive of both organs within the torso and
surfaces of the torso) .The head region includes all the sensory
organs housed in the head region and also the surfaces of the
head region along with the appendages(the external ear or pinnae
and the nasal passage/nose) .
The paper puts forward a case study "Viviparity and Pinnae,"the
connections" to demonstrate the relationship between the
head region and torso in vertebrate physiology". Giving birth
to live ones, viviparity, and the comparison with the other mode
of giving birth ,oviparity or giving birth through the process
of egg laying, has been a classification methodology in determining
the class to which a particular vertebrate has been assigned.
Exceptions to this in classical biology being the Duck billed
Platypus and others. It ,the paper, introduces a model to understand
this relationship by means of correlating the senses and torsal
organs dealing with the both energy forms and matter in our living
environments thus dispensing off with any exceptions.
It recognises the existing body of science which has in place
the relationship of the head and torso in the terms of the nervous
system with the circuitary of the nerves mapped to demonstrate
contra-laterality and its widespread influences there of. The
paper refers to some recent developments in other fields of study
addressing similar issues.
The paper relates to a multi-disciplinary approach to understand
the basic buildings blocks of the nature of "design"
of living systems and the likely influence on the various branches
of science.
Keywords: torsal and head regions, inventro-dorsality, oviparity and lack of pinnae, building blocks for understanding living systems.
Systems Theory In Service To Humanity: The Evolution Of Systems Thinking And Systems Learning In A Small Youth Organization
Lynn M. Rasmussen, M.A.
3191 Baldwin Avenue
Makawao, Hawaii 96768
Lynnras@maui.net
This paper is a summary of a Master's Thesis submitted and
accepted by Saybrook Graduate School in August, 2000.
Thesis committee: Dennis Jaffe, Ph.D., Bela H. Banathy, Sr., Ed.D.
The practice of evolutionary design developed a small community based, traditionally formed youth organization into a highly creative, effective, ethically based, continually learning system. A case study that involves action research and systems research methods illustrates how this occurred with no financial expenditure and very little systems training and professional assistance. An evolutionary guidance system was created from the highest aspirations of the people of the system in nine dimensions of purpose: social action, culture, economics, esthetics, governance, health, learning/human development, scientific knowledge/technology, and ethics. Evolutionary design occurred in the creative space that formed between the commonly held ideals and the perceived realities. Because the evolutionary guidance system is ethical in nature, the creative space encouraged the development of moral reasoning and ethical expertise. Diverse input and open discussion in the design process developed cognitive, interpersonal, and intrapersonal consciousness. The design process required and developed mindfulness and direct experience of the illusiveness of thought. Evolutionary design resulted in learning that is normally considered to be the deep and complex arena of higher orders of adult human development. This study demonstrates that it is possible and practical for a group of ordinary people to consciously and continually redesign their system in order to raise their own consciousness.
Keywords: systems thinking, evolutionary design, evolutionary guidance systems, systems learning, adult development
[01- 21]
Evolutionary Design As A Means For Developing The Psychological Capacity For Advanced Systems Thinking
Lynn M. Rasmussen, M.A.
3191 Baldwin Avenue
Makawao, Hawaii 96768
Rasfamly@maui.net
This paper emerged from a master's thesis accepted by
Saybrook Graduate School in August, 2000.
Thesis committee: Dennis Jaffe, Ph.D., Bela H. Banathy, Ph.D.
What systems thinking is, what it means, is determined by one's world view. Understanding of systems theory deepens with one's increasing capacity to organize and integrate complexity. Four emerging practices challenge the mechanistic world view and encourage the development of higher orders of thinking: Mindfulness as opposed to intelligence, constructivist education as opposed to traditional instruction, the Eastern development of ethical expertise as opposed to the Western view of ethical reasoning, and the practices of psychology of mind as opposed to the traditional cognitive practices of counselling psychology. A case study of a small nonprofit youth organization demonstrates how evolutionary design is a meta-practice that encompasses the above practices. An evolutionary guidance system is created by the people of the system that consists of ideal images of governance, social action, economics, esthetics, ethics, education, technology, scientific knowledge, and health. These ideals are used as both planning and assessment tools in daily operations of the system. A creative space forms between the ideal image of the system and the perceived reality of the system. In this creative space, mindfulness, constructivist learning, the development of ethical expertise and healthy psychological functioning are integrated into the daily life of the system. Ken Wilber has called for an "integrative transformative practice" that supports people within the stage of development they may be operating and that, at the same time, encourages and supports their development to higher stages. Evolutionary design is an integrative transformative practice that transcends the limitations of management. It is a meta-practice that allows people to consciously and continually redesign their own systems in order to raise their own consciousness, their own levels of adult psychological development.
Keywords: evolutionary design, systems thinking, integrative transformative practice, developmental psychology, management
[01- 89]
STRATEGY AND THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT:
EXPLORING THE MISMATCH IN COMPLEXITY PERSPECTIVE
Emmanuel Raufflet
Faculty of Management
McGill University, Montreal
Canada
Consuelo Garcia de la Torre
Faculty EGADE
Instituto Tecnológico Superior de Monterrey, Monterrey
México
In this paper, we use an epistemological perspective to explore why the natural environment has been represented in an inert and narrow way in strategy. The domination of the nomothetic theoretical discourse has induced specific research methodologies
A Trusting Constructivist Approach To Our Responsibilities As Systemic Thinkers
Dr. Norma Romm
University of Hull Business School - Centre for Systems Studies
Email: N.R.Romm@hubs.hull.ac.uk
This paper offers an indication of the manner in which what I call a "trusting constructivist" approach to our responsibilities as systemic thinkers can be defended. I work with the constructivist view that, as Banathy puts it: "what we know about the world becomes projected onto the world" (1998, Incoming Presidential Address for the ISSS). That is, our theoretical constructions and ways of thinking in relation to the world cannot be considered separately from the impacts that they might have on the unfolding of possibilities. Recognizing our involvement in the development of systems, means that we can reconsider - with others - the status of our own constructions as potentially generating self-fulfilling effects. A trusting constructivist view suggests that people cannot desist from offering their own constructions (that embody their particular concerns) in processes of inquiry (professional or otherwise). But they need to recognize the choices that they are making as they create constructions, so that they can account for these in relation to alternatives in social discourse, as a way of earning others' trust in their ways of seeing and acting.
Key words: accountability, constructivism, self-fulfillment, trust earning.
[01- 44]