Systems Thinkingin sustainability, projects and communication

Sustainable Development: Project Management & Communication September 10, 2013

Systems Thinking

Systems thinking is the process of understanding how things influence one another within a whole. (Wikipedia)

Systems thinking is a way of understanding reality that emphasizes the relationships among a system's parts, rather than the parts themselves. (Pegasus Communications)

Intuition & Analysis

Right brain & Left brain

Complexity & Simplicity

Structure & Behavior

Aim

Using systems thinking to manage and communicate projects that contribute to a

sustainable development

Aim - rephrased

Causing organized whole bodies to appear to oneself, in order to handle, and make

common, something thrown forth that contributes to a bearable unfolding.

Exercise: Paper Tear

Sustainable Sweden?

Dialogue

• Listen more than you talk• Speak with Intention• Listen with Attention• Speak from Experience• Listen to yourself• Build on each others ideas• Around the campfire

Ways of explaining reality

Ways of explaining reality

Ways of explaining reality

Events

Patterns, Trends

Systemic Structures

Mental Models

What just happened?

What’s been happening?Have we been here or some place similar before?

What are the forces at play contributing to these patterns?

What about our thinking allows this situation to persist?

Ways of explaining Ways of explaining realityreality

Events

Patterns, Trends

Systemic Structures

Mental Models

Drought

Declining Water Table

IrrigatedLands

ExpectedProfitability

Profitabilityfrom Irrigated

Lands

WaterDemand

WaterExcess/ Shortage

Surface WaterAvailability

+

-+

Pumping

External WaterResources

+

+

+

++

Pressure formore Water

-

Water in LocalAquifers

-

+

Planned Increaseof Water Resources

+

DamsDivertions +

+

+

+

+

PiezometricLevels

+

SeawaterIntrusion

-

Salinization ofAquifers

+

Water SupplyUnit Cost

- ++-

Available Areafor New

Irrigated Lands

-

+

-

B1

B2

Expand ifWater Available

Expand ifLand Available

B3

Water from Pumping

B4

Water fromDivertions

B5

Water fromReservoirs

B6

Costs Escalation

R6

Water Supply ExpectationsDrive Irrigation Development

NaturalVegetation

+

””Without changing our patterns of Without changing our patterns of thought, we will not be able to solve thought, we will not be able to solve the problems we created with our the problems we created with our patterns of thought”patterns of thought”

Albert EinsteinAlbert Einstein

Mental Models – Patterns of Mental Models – Patterns of ThoughtThought

””Our life is what our thoughts make itOur life is what our thoughts make it””Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius,

MeditationsMeditations

ISIS

Ways of explaining Ways of explaining realityreality

Events

Patterns, Trends

Systemic Structures

Mental Models

Drought

Declining Water Table

IrrigatedLands

ExpectedProfitability

Profitabilityfrom Irrigated

Lands

WaterDemand

WaterExcess/ Shortage

Surface WaterAvailability

+

-+

Pumping

External WaterResources

+

+

+

++

Pressure formore Water

-

Water in LocalAquifers

-

+

Planned Increaseof Water Resources

+

DamsDivertions +

+

+

+

+

PiezometricLevels

+

SeawaterIntrusion

-

Salinization ofAquifers

+

Water SupplyUnit Cost

- ++-

Available Areafor New

Irrigated Lands

-

+

-

B1

B2

Expand ifWater Available

Expand ifLand Available

B3

Water from Pumping

B4

Water fromDivertions

B5

Water fromReservoirs

B6

Costs Escalation

R6

Water Supply ExpectationsDrive Irrigation Development

NaturalVegetation

+

System

a set of things – people, cells, molecules, or whatever – interconnected in such a way that they produce their own pattern or behavior over time. (Meadows, 2008)

a group of interacting, interrelated, and interdependent components that form a complex and unified whole. (Pegasus Communications)

an entity which maintains its existence through the mutual interaction of its parts. (www.systems-thinking.org)

Systems

• Sweden• Uppsala• Uppsala University• The Geosciences building• CEMUS• Sustainable Development: Project

management and Communication• You

The Sustainability Compass

Systems (S)•Sources, Stocks, Sinks and flows•Feedback•Delay•Non-linear effects•Thresholds•Positive and negative casual relationships

If A then B

A

B

C

D

Cause and EffectCause and EffectTypical approachTypical approach

Systems approachSystems approach

Positive and negative causation?

If A goes up, then B goes up

If A goes down then B goes down

If A goes up, then B goes down

If A goes down, then B goes up

Exercise: Living Loops

Casual Loop Diagrams

A causal loop diagram (CLD) is a diagram that helps you visualize and understand how the different key parts and elements in a complex system interact.

Causal Loop DiagramCausal Loop Diagram

Causal -Causal -

refers to cause-and-effect refers to cause-and-effect relationshiprelationship

Loop -Loop -

refers to refers to closed chainclosed chain of cause and of cause and effecteffect

Conceptual modell on a village & landscape scale

Tree Planting andCultivation

Tree Density

Soil Fertility

Wind Speed

Local Rainfall

Family FoodProduction

CropPlantingSuccess

FuelwoodAvailability

ForagingTime

HouseholdIncome

SoilMoisture

Crop Yield

++

+

-

+

+

+

++

-

Farmers' Sense of Crisis( Potential for Behavior

Shift)

-

+

+

-

+

Potential for Non-FarmIncome Generation

-

+

+

ET

+

Livestockvisiting

Farmers'Fields

+

ConflictsHerders/Farmers

LocalLivestockAccessDistant

Resources

HerderMonitoring

Time

+

-

HouseholdSubsistence

+

Drought Durationand Intensity

-

Foodpurchases

-

-

AdvancingDesert

FoodExport

+

+

Farmers'Livestock

++

+

FuelwoodSales

+

B1

- B2a-

B3a

B2b

B2c

B2d

B2e

B3b

B4a

B4b

B4c

R5

Tree Removal

-

+

Fodder infields

Forestry officersinterventions

+

Local Decisionand

EnforcementCapacity

+

-

-

+

-+

- -

HerderLivestock

EnvironmentalDegradation

+

+

+

Sahel Reforestation Process

1975 2003

Drawing casual loop diagrams

Draw a causal loop diagram (CLD) that portrays how your chosen indicators interact in a systematic way. Start with the indicators you have and add indicators that you think are important for the dynamics of the system.

LEVERAGE POINTS

Places within a complex system where a small shift in one thing can produce big changes in everything. Points of power.

Identified leverage points depend on

• What system we are looking at• How we are looking at it• How we have conceptualized it• Our mental models

And they are often counter-intuitive (J.W. Forrester)

Places to intervene in a system

12. Constants, parameters, numbers11. Sizes of the buffers and other stabilizing

stocks, relative to their flows10. The structure of material stocks and flows9. The length of delays, relative to the rate of

system change8. The strength of negative feedback loops,

relative to the impacts they are trying to correct against

7. The gain around driving positive feedback loops

Places to intervene in a system

6. The structure of information flows (who does and who does not have access to what kinds of information).

5. The rules of the system (such as incentives, punishments, constraints)

4. The power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system structure

3. The goals of the system2. The mindset or paradigm out of which the system –it’s

goals, structure, rules, delays, parameters – arises1. The power to transcend paradigms

LEVERAGE POINTS

Try to classify the levarage points that you have found by using Dana Meadows categories

CLOSING WORDS