Framework Parent: Systematized Knowledge Commons
Applicative Context: Application Cases
Change Methodology
Change is one of the areas where the articulation of knowledge commons can bring enormous social savings. The Convention on Knowledge Commons is an institutional measure to enable us to achieve those savings. The Collective Regulative Bundle (CRB) methodology that we advocate is based on the Regulative Cycle.
Regulative Cycle
Originating in psychological practice, the regulative cycle [1] has been extensively applied as a methodology of (clinical) practice, geared towards the "interested" regulation of the behaviour of groups or organizations in the desired direction. The cycle includes the activities evaluation (of work system operations with respect to an instrument or via benchmarking), problem identification (selection from a problem mess), diagnosis (of the problem situation – analysis), plan of action (design), and intervention (implementation).
Collective Regulative Bundle (CRB)
The Collective Regulative Bundle merges the activities that individuals, groups, organizations and agencies perform to improve their being and doing. It is conceived as the bundling of the regulative cycles that individuals may perform.
A very simple case is included here to illustrate the basic terminology. For each italic term, there is a more detailed description that can be accessed at the wiki dedicated to the definition of the CRB Methodology. The case illustrates both the daily-life-embedded character of initiatives, and the key terms used in the CRB Methodology.
Introductory Case: My car has a flat tire
It will happen to you. You are bringing a friend and his family to the airport. After completing his phd in Belgium, with wife and two kids, your friend is leaving to return to his home country Sri Lanka. The ride is short, less than 30 minutes. You just got on the highway, and there you sense the problem. You can manage to get on the shoulder of the road, and now you must in no time replace the flat tire of your car, for the first time in your life.
The car is part of a worksystem which offers mobility to its driver and passengers. The lifecycle stages of System Operation and Maintenance (SOM) and System Development (SD) are present, with several foci in the activities [2]:
The driving of the car, in this case from the friend's apartment to the airport.
The unsafe/unstable driving due to the flat tire is observed by the driver and the passengers. This creates a performance alert. An intervention to the tire is urgently required. An Initiative in Initiative Management (IM) is launched so as to handle the observed problem.
Although a maintenance of the car may have been scheduled for the coming weeks, this won't help in this case. The car must be stopped and the tire replaced.
* There are a number of stakeholders: the driver and his passengers.
* The decision theatre: the busy highway, with a dysfunctional car on its shoulder, the driver and passengers of the car.
* A decision tree for each stakeholder:
* For a passenger: stay in the car, or leave it and hide behind the rail (the mother with her two children), or help the driver (the friend, also father)
* For the driver: (i) assist the passengers; next :
* calling of a road-service is one option, for which the driver must first walk to the roadside phone (there were no mobile phones yet in the mid 80's), next wait for the service man. This option might take more time, with a risk that the check-in will be missed.
* Another option is to try to replace the flat tire, in spite of the fact that one had never done it before.
* Participatively the second option is selected, and the decision is implemented immediately. It is recorded that the next visit to the garage should be made earlier, and that the flat tire will have to be repaired.
* In this case the alert is handled by on the one hand performing the tire replacement, and on the other hand by attaching an alert to the next service visit, and by planning the visit earlier, if it was planned for a distant future.
First put up the "danger sign", then bring passengers to a secure place, unload the trunk so that tools and spare wheel can be reached. Study the tools and the area around the flat tire, recall some stories, exchange opinions, and then start the work. When all is finished, load and board the car again and proceed with PPAM, at first with some extra attention for E&M as speed increases.
Change in Vulnerable Livelihoods
There is an excellent online tutorial on poverty and livelihood in development cooperation [3].
Knowledge management and governance issues that come into play in the dialogue between researchers and local knowledge systems have been illustrated in a paper on mutual learning and empowerment in rural India [4].
Bibliography
2. The drawing has been inspired by: J.L Whitten, L.D. Bentley, K.C. Dittman, Systems Analysis and Design Methods, 6th edition, McGraw Hill, Irwin, Boston (2004).
4. R. Baumgartner, G. S. Aurora, Gopal K. Karanth and V. Ramaswamy (2002) Researchers in Dialogue with Local Knowledge Systems – Reflections on Mutual Learning and Empowerment, in Flury, Manuel and Urs Geiser (Eds.) Local Environmental Management in a North-South Perspective: Issues of Participation and Knowledge Management. Zurich: v/d/f IOS Press. Pp. 225-274. Also available:
http://www.isec.ac.in/Feedback%20paper%20for%20Web.pdf
Comments
