The Cybersyn Project as a Paradigm for Managing and Learning in Complexity

By: Henry Mauricio Ortiz Osorio (University of León, Spain); José María Díaz Nafría (University of Santa Elena, Santa Elena, Ecuador; Universidad de León, Spain; Munich University of Applied Sciences, Germany)

Published in: Systema 4(2) : 10-19 (2016)

Abstract: During the government of Salvador Allende, Chile implemented a paradigmatic system of control and regulation of production, emerged from the need of controlling and knowing the Chilean nationalized industry concerning the needs to provide. Allende believed that the transformation pathway to socialism could be different to those that had existed, and he suggested a model of integration with the worker as the core of process management and decision making. In that sense the Cybersyn project was designed with the goal of having a decentralized state control of the industrial production able to attend real needs properly and timely. Starting on real-time information that would anticipate and correct potential incidents before they even occur. The project provided valuable information on the nationalized companies for coordination and operation, being a political tool of vital importance for Allende’s government for which decision-making issues reach the most proper level. Latin American current processes of social disruption allow us to analyze the historical perspective of this project to find parallelizing, similarities and common points that allow us to extend the analysis of industrial relevance of these cases. Furthermore, the current political, economic and social reality has evolve in such a way that the Cybersyn model requires an adaptation to new relevant complex features of the social system which challenge its practicality.

• Full article (PDF)

 

Ethics at the age of information

By: José María Díaz Nafría (Universidad de León, Spain; Munich University of Applied Sciences, Germany; Universidad Estatal Península de Santa Elena, Ecuador)

Published in: Systema: connecting Matter, Life, Culture and Technology, 2(1): 43-52, 2014

Abstract: Insofar the interactions developed between social, technical and natural agents have been now significantly modified by the new information and communication technologies (ICT), we can speak of a new social dynamic arisen therefrom. Moreover, the central role that information takes in social life has lead us to talk about the dawn of the information age. If we take this seriously, a consequent ethical thinking should start unravelling the tangled skein through rephrasing what information really is and how it can be understood throughout reality. Otherwise, how could we think our proper behaviour embedded in the complex realm of informational interactions of all kind? In any case, is it feasible puzzling out most appropriate behaviours from the outset –as a sort of optimized code? Or rather, are there fundamental constraints setting the optimum completely out of reach and our whole (cultural) history just the path of the exploration? The globalisation process, eveloped in strong connection to the deployment of information technologies in very unequal benefit to different groups of the global human system, settles a situation in which the management of the global system complexity is significantly apart from emocratic handling, despite the broad usage of democratic facades. Indeed participatory process –concerning relevant decision-making issues– are hard to be found behind these facades. Addressing the issue of inequality at the global scale is in our view a fundamental question of today’s information ethics for which an approach based on electronic-Subsidiarity is proposed.

• Full article (PDF)

 

Cybersyn project as a paradigm for managing and learning in complexity (EMCSR 2014)

By M. Ortiz Osorio (University of León, Spain) and J.M. Díaz Nafría (University of León, Spain; University of Santa Elena, Ecuador; Munich University of Applied Sciences, Germany)

Abstract: During the government of Salvador Allende, Chile implemented a paradigmatic system of control and regulation of production, emerged from the need of controlling and knowing the Chilean nationalized industry concerning the needs to provide.

Allende believed that the transformation pathway to socialism could be different to those that had existed, and he suggested a model of integration with the worker as the core of process management and decision making. In that sense the Cybersyn project was designed with the goal of having a decentralized state control of the industrial production able to attend real needs properly and timely. Starting on real-time information that would anticipate and correct potential incidents before they even occur.

The project provided valuable information on the nationalized companies for coordination and operation, being a political tool of vital importance for Allende’s government for which decision-making issues reach the most proper level. Latin American current processes of social disruption allow us to analyze the historical perspective of this project to find parallelizing, similarities and common points that allow us to extend the analysis of industrial relevance of these cases. Furthermore, the current political, economic and social reality has evolve in such a way that the Cybersyn model requires an adaptation to new relevant complex features of the social system which challenge its practicality.

• Paper presented in the European Meeting of Cybernetics and System Research-EMCSR, Vienna, April 2014 (included in the book of abstracts): EMCSR-14-Cybersin

 

Ethics at the age of information (EMCSR 2014)

By J.M. Díaz Nafría (University of León, Spain; University of Santa Elena, Ecuador; Munich University of Applied Sciences, Germany)

Abstract: Insofar the interactions developed between social, technical and natural agents have been now significantly modified by the new information and communication technologies (ICT), we can speak of a new social dynamic arisen therefrom. Moreover, the central role that information takes in social life has lead us to talk about the dawn of the information age. If we take this seriously, a consequent ethical thinking should start unravelling the tangled skein through rephrasing what information really is and how it can be understood throughout reality. Otherwise, how could we think our proper behaviour embedded in the complex realm of informational interactions of all kind?

In any case, is it feasible puzzling out most appropriate behaviours from the outset –as a sort of optimized code? Or rather, are there fundamental constraints setting the optimum completely out of reach and our whole (cultural) history just the path of the exploration? The globalisation process, developed in strong connection to the deployment of information technologies in very unequal benefit to different groups of the global human system, settles a situation in which the management of the global system complexity is significantly apart from democratic handling, despite the broad usage of democratic facades. Indeed participatory process –concerning relevant decision-making issues– are hard to be found behind these facades. Addressing the issue of inequality at the global scale is in our view a fundamental question of today’s information ethics for which an approach based on electronic-Subsidiarity is proposed.

• Paper presented in the European Meeting of Cybernetics and System Research-EMCSR, Vienna, April 2014 (included in the book of abstracts): EMCSR14-JMDN-Information ethics