Global adaptive governance
48
Global Networks and Planetary Boundaries Victor Galaz
-
Upload
victor-galaz -
Category
Documents
-
view
282 -
download
1
Transcript of Global adaptive governance
Global Networks and Planetary Boundaries
Victor Galaz
Three forces that are reshaping the
Planet
The AnthopocenePlanetary Boundaries
“The Great Acceleration
Political shifts towards networked forms of governance
Mass-Self Communication
Information Revolution
1995: 40 million Internet users2008: 1.4 billion Internet users
1991: 16 million access to cellphone2008: 3.4 billion (52-60%)
Twitter Updates “Good Morning!”by Jer Thorp (via Vimeo)
Information dynamics and adaptive governance
Monitoring
Coordination
Learning
Innovation dynamics
Scale of networks
“iPod Liberalism” by Evgeny Morozov
- the assumption that information tech innovation always promotes
freedom and democracy
“iPod Environmentalism” by Victor Galaz
- the assumption that tech innovation always promotes
sustainability
Hackers and CO2 emission trading (2010)250,000 carbon credits - 4 million USD
Hackers and illegal logging in the Amazon (2008)1.7 million cubic meters
“The `climate consensus’ may hold the establishment — the universities, the
media, big business, government — but it is losing the jungles of the web. After all, getting research grants, doing pieces to camera and advising boards takes time.”
Christopher Pearson, The Australian
Special Interest 3.0
What are the long term institutional and organizational implications of information
technology in the Anthropocene?
Mass Self-CommunicationDecreasing costs for information
Bubonic Plage, Surat (India)1994
In 1994 the spread of bubonic plaguein the city of Surat deaths of 57people, significant economiclosses, and social and politicaleffects. Over 300,000 peopledeserted the city (in two days!)
Late warnings, information overload and collapse
Development of web crawler GPHIN at Health Canada (1995)
ProMED - moderated e-mail list hosted by the International Society
for Infectious Diseases (1994).
“atypical pneumonia”, “unknown respiratory disease”
PNEUMONIA - CHINA (GUANGDONG): RFI**********************************Date: 10 Feb 2003From: Stephen O. Cunnion, MD, PhD, MPH<[email protected]>
This morning I received this e-mail and then searched yourarchivesand found nothing that pertained to it. Does anyone knowanythingabout this problem?
"Have you heard of an epidemic in Guangzhou? Anacquaintance of minefrom a teacher's chat room lives there and reports that thehospitals there have been closed and people are dying."
--Stephen O. Cunnion, MD, PhD, MPHInternational Consultants in Health, IncMember ASTM&H, ISTM<[email protected]>
“All of the sudden, we had a very powerful system that brought in much more information from more countries, and we where
able to go to countries confidentially and validate what was going on, and if they needed help, we provided help. And we provided help by bringing together many different institutions
from around the world that started to work with us.”
David Heymann, WHO
Breaking down of the information pyramid
9
time breaking through, because of the inertia of the incumbent sociotechnical regime. The
innovation may be under-developed, there may be a mis-match with other elements.
On the level of sociotechnical regime there are usually incremental processes ‘down
the design hierarchy’, resulting in trajectories. As a heuristic I have distinguished seven
dimensions in the sociotechnical regime: technology, user practices and application domains
(markets), symbolic meaning of technology, infrastructure, industry structure (networks of
suppliers, producers, distributors), policy and scientific knowledge. Although these
dimensions are linked and co-evolve, they also have internal dynamics. These internal
developments may result in ‘tensions’. There may be periods when linkages are weakening or
‘loosening up’. Such periods form windows of opportunity for innovations to break out of
their niches and be incorporated in the regime. Metaphorically, the sociotechnical regime is a
mosaic of heterogeneous elements and the niche-level as location where new elements are
generated (variation). Once the mosaic starts shifting, these new elements can be introduced.
The introduction of new elements may, in turn, trigger further shifts. Eventually such a
process can result in a complete reconfiguration of the sociotechnical regime.
Tensions in the sociotechnical regime can also emerge as a result of changes on the
landscape level. A cultural change such as increasing environmental awareness has put
pressure on regimes such as transportation and electricity generation. The broad political trend
towards liberalisation brought forward tremendous changes in the electricity sectors,
introducing new technologies (e.g. gas turbines), new actors (e.g. organisations for trade in
electricity) and new markets (e.g. green electricity).
The major point of this multi-level perspective is that technological transitions occur
as the outcome of linkages and interactions of developments at multiple levels. Processes on
the levels of regime and landscape create a ‘window of opportunity’ for innovations to break
out of niches. Metaphorically this dynamic is like a ‘peatmoor fire’. While innovations may
smoulder below the surface in niches, the fire only breaks through under particular
circumstances, when multiple processes link up and accumulate. I have schematically
represented this complex process in Figure 4.
Figure 4: A dynamic multi-level perspective on technological transitions
Technology
Infrastructure
Symbolicmeaning
Application domain
Industrial networks
Sectoral policy
Knowledge/
science
Technologicalniches
Landscapedevelopments
Socio-technicalregimes
Time
Failedinnovation
SupernetworksSmall World Networks
Collective IntelligenceThree new phenomena
Supernetworks“Networks of Networks” - interconnected at
multiple levels; information technology plays a key role; complex system
Global supply chain networks, financial networks, knowledge networks and power grids
(Nagurney et al 2006).
There is a bigger "networks of networks" […]. In GOARN you have CDC, MSF and Red Cross. Which you also have in the different coordination groups for meningitis vaccine and yellow fever vaccine. Or in global polio eradication. These are enormous, but some are very small and, you would
bring in the global influenza with laboratories and national influenza centers. But that is the “network of networks” which has no substance, no defined substance. It's there, the function, but in a highly chaotic, very undefined way.
Patrick Drury, GOARN/WHO.
Southern Cone EID Surveillance Network
Asian Rotavirus Surveillance Network
European Centre for Disease Control,
EpiNorth
US-CDC
Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN)over 120 actors and others!
Steering?
David wanted to take the GPHIN business and what WHO was doing, and develop a "network of networks". These would
be highly unformalized, highly unstructured, as chaotic as possible, because if we allowed it to coagulate or set down at any part of the WHO, the apparatus of the organization, […] would start to drag it down […]. All of these rules would just
slow down what was trying to be done.
Patrick Drury, GOARN/WHO
We have the international level, the WHO and the FAO. And at the national level we try to bring together agriculture and
human health ministries. […] group involves academics, and a few key people in the agencies, such as Stephan from the FAO, Pierre […] from the WHO, OIE […]. You have focal points in
the agencies, and you have focal points in NASA, and from 4 or 5 different universities.
Jan Slingerbergh EMPRES/FAO
That network is a little bit loosely defined, but flexible and effective, you know. When there is the need, everybody jumps
in to action. I think the way it works is highly commendable perhaps, because it’s not fringed or wrapped up in an
organizational structure. People just make it work because they know each other. And it’s not a larger group to get lost in, the flexibility is there. I believe this is key to the success.
Wouldn’t it be great if we actually could map these networks?
Hyperlink analysis of major players in EID early warning and response
NOTE: Illustration!
UN Agencies Cluster
US Gov Cluster
WHOFAO
ECDC
Red Cross
ECDC International Red Cross
What makes them work?
Small World Networks
Q: What if you are facing some uncertainty of the disease? How do you coordinate your networks?A: Each time we have a suspecting case of fever, or something very wrong, the first thing we do, is that we contact WHO. Immediately. […]. So there is immediate collaboration, so we call them and "send you the sample with the first plane”, or the first car or whatever. So, “please go on with your laboratory and tell us what's going on". That is systematic.
Q: So that is not formalized?No, no, but it's not personal. WHO knows that we will always call them if we are suspecting things or something is very bizarre.
Dan Sermand, MSF
Gulu
Ebola outbreak, Gulu (Uganda), Oct 2000- Jan 2001 (224 deaths)
Coordination through small-world networks. Is that it?
Collective Intelligence - large, distributed problem solving through
information and communication technology. Distributed activity is
emergent and collective, rather than orchestrated.
Monkeypox and the Internet
2003 (Maryland, USA)
”The results of that decision were extraordinary”
Adhoc Virtual Network for SARS Etiology
13 laboratories in 9 countriesDaily telephone conferences
“The good thing is that it isn’t flu. Then well, what is
it?”
ProMED
1994-2006 #25 054 postings (total)
#373 postings included ”Request for information”
How Decreasing Costs of Information Processing and Mass Self-
Communication Builds Resilience
Supernetworks! Small world phenomena! Collective intelligence!
They build on the combination btw ICT and social networks and polycentric coordination.
Can Information Technology Really Help Us Save the Planet?
Never Take it for Granted!
