ISSS Wiki - User contributions [en]

Mini Symposium 2026 Apr 1 - Charles Hall and Timothy McWhirter

2026-04-13T17:01:04Z

Laouris: edited title, photo and PDF

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Hall_McWhirter.png
| name=[[Charles Hall]] & [[Timothy McWhirter]]
| title= Energy and Evolution: A Systems Approach
| date=Apr 1, 2026
| presentation= Webinar_Hall_and_McWhirter_ISSS_Final.pdf
| link=https://vimeo.com/1179359909}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Energy and Evolution: A Systems Approach </span>

==Abstract==
Some scientists have argued that evolutionary biology is poised for a third major synthesis. In the first synthesis, Darwin conceptualized and presented evidence for his evolutionary theory. The second used genetic mechanisms to explain how evolution worked. The third is based on energy. In the wake of Boltzmann’s work, a thermodynamic school of evolutionary theory has emerged, offering a number of principles alleged to guide evolutionary development. These include the principle of maximum energy flux, the maximum power principle, the minimum entropy production principle, the maximum entropy production principle, the constructal law, the maximum efficiency principle, and the equal fitness paradigm. Collectively, these principles have sometimes been described as contradictory, disunited, local, and as referring to apples and oranges. So far, different scientists have championed their principle of choice and argued that it is more “accurate” or more “general” than the other principles. In some cases, scientists have used straw man arguments that portray the other principles inaccurately. This has undermined our ability to understand the relations among these principles. The thesis of this book project is that many of these principles are fundamentally related and interdependent, and we can develop a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the evolutionary process if we view this process from a systems perspective, as a property that emerges from the interaction of many different parts. Part of the reason for the different optimality principles scientists have developed is that they focus on different parts of the process: the maximization of power, the production of entropy, the persistence of biodiversity, the evolution of design, etc. These principles provide an ability to predict, and in some cases, explain phenomena in these different parts of the evolutionary process. This book seeks to bring the interaction among these parts of the process into clearer focus by accurately describing the relations among these optimality principles and how they can evolve over time. In the process, we hope to provide a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the role of energy in evolutionary development, which is like listening to only the cellos in Beethoven’s Hymn to Joy when focusing exclusively on one optimality principle. This systems theory of thermodynamic evolution should help to provide a fundamental component of the third major synthesis of evolutionary biology. (383 words)

{{#ev:vimeo| 1179359909 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Charles Hall]] received his Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina from the great systems ecologist Howard Odum. He has been a research scientist at Brookhaven and Oak Ridge National Laboratories and at the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, and professor at Cornell University, University of Montana, and the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. He is the author of 14 books and more than 340 peer-reviewed papers, many in our “best” journals. In his mid-career, he turned his main interests from systems analysis and modeling of the energetics of natural ecosystems to increasingly, human-dominated “economic” systems. He is especially well known within the scientific community for initiating and developing (with colleagues) the concepts of EROI (Energy Return on Investment) and BioPhysical Economics. He is the recipient of many academic awards including the Hubbert Award from the American Society for the Study of Peak Oil and the Lifetime Achievement award from the International Society of BioPhysical Economics. (159 words)

[[Timothy McWhirter]] received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Florida State University. While in graduate school, he published a paper that described the empirical evidence in the contemporary sciences that supported Nietzsche’s principle of the will to power. In 2012, he published a paper on Nietzsche’s critique of morality that described how the will to power appeared to be similar, in important respects, to the maximum power principle developed by H. T. Odum. This was the first published paper that discussed the relation between these two principles. A decade later, he received an email from the ecologist Charles A. S. Hall, who was astonished that he was quoted by a philosopher about the maximum power principle. Since then, they have worked together on a number of projects: the book Maximum Power and its Philosophical Roots, McWhirter as the author and Hall as the editor; they coauthored the paper Maximum Power in Evolution, Ecology, and Economics; and they worked together on a chapter entitled The Equal Fitness Paradigm: a thermodynamic synthesis in evolutionary biology. Their next project is ambitious. They intend to write a book that outlines a systems theory of thermodynamic evolution, which explains the relations between all the different optimality principles that have been described by scientists in the thermodynamic school of evolution. (217 words)

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Charles Hall]]
[[Category: Videos by Timothy McWhirter]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

File:Webinar Hall and McWhirter ISSS Final.pdf

2026-04-13T17:00:39Z

Laouris:

File:Hall McWhirter.png

2026-04-13T16:59:45Z

Laouris:

Mini Symposium 2026 Apr 1 - Charles Hall and Timothy McWhirter

2026-04-09T18:05:36Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Timothy_McWhirter.jpg
| photo= Charles_A_S_Hall.jpg
| name=[[Charles Hall]] & [[Timothy McWhirter]]
| title=The Evolution of Our Understanding of Thermodynamics: A Systems Approach
| date=Apr 1, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1179359909}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> The Evolution of Our Understanding of Thermodynamics: A Systems Approach"</span>

==Abstract==
Some scientists have argued that evolutionary biology is poised for a third major synthesis. In the first synthesis, Darwin conceptualized and presented evidence for his evolutionary theory. The second used genetic mechanisms to explain how evolution worked. The third is based on energy. In the wake of Boltzmann’s work, a thermodynamic school of evolutionary theory has emerged, offering a number of principles alleged to guide evolutionary development. These include the principle of maximum energy flux, the maximum power principle, the minimum entropy production principle, the maximum entropy production principle, the constructal law, the maximum efficiency principle, and the equal fitness paradigm. Collectively, these principles have sometimes been described as contradictory, disunited, local, and as referring to apples and oranges. So far, different scientists have championed their principle of choice and argued that it is more “accurate” or more “general” than the other principles. In some cases, scientists have used straw man arguments that portray the other principles inaccurately. This has undermined our ability to understand the relations among these principles. The thesis of this book project is that many of these principles are fundamentally related and interdependent, and we can develop a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the evolutionary process if we view this process from a systems perspective, as a property that emerges from the interaction of many different parts. Part of the reason for the different optimality principles scientists have developed is that they focus on different parts of the process: the maximization of power, the production of entropy, the persistence of biodiversity, the evolution of design, etc. These principles provide an ability to predict, and in some cases, explain phenomena in these different parts of the evolutionary process. This book seeks to bring the interaction among these parts of the process into clearer focus by accurately describing the relations among these optimality principles and how they can evolve over time. In the process, we hope to provide a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the role of energy in evolutionary development, which is like listening to only the cellos in Beethoven’s Hymn to Joy when focusing exclusively on one optimality principle. This systems theory of thermodynamic evolution should help to provide a fundamental component of the third major synthesis of evolutionary biology. (383 words)

{{#ev:vimeo| 1179359909 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Charles Hall]] received his Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina from the great systems ecologist Howard Odum. He has been a research scientist at Brookhaven and Oak Ridge National Laboratories and at the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, and professor at Cornell University, University of Montana, and the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. He is the author of 14 books and more than 340 peer-reviewed papers, many in our “best” journals. In his mid-career, he turned his main interests from systems analysis and modeling of the energetics of natural ecosystems to increasingly, human-dominated “economic” systems. He is especially well known within the scientific community for initiating and developing (with colleagues) the concepts of EROI (Energy Return on Investment) and BioPhysical Economics. He is the recipient of many academic awards including the Hubbert Award from the American Society for the Study of Peak Oil and the Lifetime Achievement award from the International Society of BioPhysical Economics. (159 words)

[[Timothy McWhirter]] received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Florida State University. While in graduate school, he published a paper that described the empirical evidence in the contemporary sciences that supported Nietzsche’s principle of the will to power. In 2012, he published a paper on Nietzsche’s critique of morality that described how the will to power appeared to be similar, in important respects, to the maximum power principle developed by H. T. Odum. This was the first published paper that discussed the relation between these two principles. A decade later, he received an email from the ecologist Charles A. S. Hall, who was astonished that he was quoted by a philosopher about the maximum power principle. Since then, they have worked together on a number of projects: the book Maximum Power and its Philosophical Roots, McWhirter as the author and Hall as the editor; they coauthored the paper Maximum Power in Evolution, Ecology, and Economics; and they worked together on a chapter entitled The Equal Fitness Paradigm: a thermodynamic synthesis in evolutionary biology. Their next project is ambitious. They intend to write a book that outlines a systems theory of thermodynamic evolution, which explains the relations between all the different optimality principles that have been described by scientists in the thermodynamic school of evolution. (217 words)

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Charles Hall]]
[[Category: Videos by Timothy McWhirter]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Apr 1 - Charles Hall and Timothy McWhirter

2026-04-09T18:04:56Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Timothy_McWhirter.jpg
| name=[[Charles Hall]] & [[Timothy McWhirter]]
| title=The Evolution of Our Understanding of Thermodynamics: A Systems Approach
| date=Apr 1, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1179359909}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> The Evolution of Our Understanding of Thermodynamics: A Systems Approach"</span>

==Abstract==
Some scientists have argued that evolutionary biology is poised for a third major synthesis. In the first synthesis, Darwin conceptualized and presented evidence for his evolutionary theory. The second used genetic mechanisms to explain how evolution worked. The third is based on energy. In the wake of Boltzmann’s work, a thermodynamic school of evolutionary theory has emerged, offering a number of principles alleged to guide evolutionary development. These include the principle of maximum energy flux, the maximum power principle, the minimum entropy production principle, the maximum entropy production principle, the constructal law, the maximum efficiency principle, and the equal fitness paradigm. Collectively, these principles have sometimes been described as contradictory, disunited, local, and as referring to apples and oranges. So far, different scientists have championed their principle of choice and argued that it is more “accurate” or more “general” than the other principles. In some cases, scientists have used straw man arguments that portray the other principles inaccurately. This has undermined our ability to understand the relations among these principles. The thesis of this book project is that many of these principles are fundamentally related and interdependent, and we can develop a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the evolutionary process if we view this process from a systems perspective, as a property that emerges from the interaction of many different parts. Part of the reason for the different optimality principles scientists have developed is that they focus on different parts of the process: the maximization of power, the production of entropy, the persistence of biodiversity, the evolution of design, etc. These principles provide an ability to predict, and in some cases, explain phenomena in these different parts of the evolutionary process. This book seeks to bring the interaction among these parts of the process into clearer focus by accurately describing the relations among these optimality principles and how they can evolve over time. In the process, we hope to provide a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the role of energy in evolutionary development, which is like listening to only the cellos in Beethoven’s Hymn to Joy when focusing exclusively on one optimality principle. This systems theory of thermodynamic evolution should help to provide a fundamental component of the third major synthesis of evolutionary biology. (383 words)

{{#ev:vimeo| 1179359909 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Charles Hall]] received his Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina from the great systems ecologist Howard Odum. He has been a research scientist at Brookhaven and Oak Ridge National Laboratories and at the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, and professor at Cornell University, University of Montana, and the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. He is the author of 14 books and more than 340 peer-reviewed papers, many in our “best” journals. In his mid-career, he turned his main interests from systems analysis and modeling of the energetics of natural ecosystems to increasingly, human-dominated “economic” systems. He is especially well known within the scientific community for initiating and developing (with colleagues) the concepts of EROI (Energy Return on Investment) and BioPhysical Economics. He is the recipient of many academic awards including the Hubbert Award from the American Society for the Study of Peak Oil and the Lifetime Achievement award from the International Society of BioPhysical Economics. (159 words)

[[Timothy McWhirter]] received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Florida State University. While in graduate school, he published a paper that described the empirical evidence in the contemporary sciences that supported Nietzsche’s principle of the will to power. In 2012, he published a paper on Nietzsche’s critique of morality that described how the will to power appeared to be similar, in important respects, to the maximum power principle developed by H. T. Odum. This was the first published paper that discussed the relation between these two principles. A decade later, he received an email from the ecologist Charles A. S. Hall, who was astonished that he was quoted by a philosopher about the maximum power principle. Since then, they have worked together on a number of projects: the book Maximum Power and its Philosophical Roots, McWhirter as the author and Hall as the editor; they coauthored the paper Maximum Power in Evolution, Ecology, and Economics; and they worked together on a chapter entitled The Equal Fitness Paradigm: a thermodynamic synthesis in evolutionary biology. Their next project is ambitious. They intend to write a book that outlines a systems theory of thermodynamic evolution, which explains the relations between all the different optimality principles that have been described by scientists in the thermodynamic school of evolution. (217 words)

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Charles Hall]]
[[Category: Videos by Timothy McWhirter]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Apr 1 - Charles Hall and Timothy McWhirter

2026-04-09T18:04:37Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Timothy_McWhirter.jpg Charles_A_S_Hall.jpg
| name=[[Charles Hall]] & [[Timothy McWhirter]]
| title=The Evolution of Our Understanding of Thermodynamics: A Systems Approach
| date=Apr 1, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1179359909}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> The Evolution of Our Understanding of Thermodynamics: A Systems Approach"</span>

==Abstract==
Some scientists have argued that evolutionary biology is poised for a third major synthesis. In the first synthesis, Darwin conceptualized and presented evidence for his evolutionary theory. The second used genetic mechanisms to explain how evolution worked. The third is based on energy. In the wake of Boltzmann’s work, a thermodynamic school of evolutionary theory has emerged, offering a number of principles alleged to guide evolutionary development. These include the principle of maximum energy flux, the maximum power principle, the minimum entropy production principle, the maximum entropy production principle, the constructal law, the maximum efficiency principle, and the equal fitness paradigm. Collectively, these principles have sometimes been described as contradictory, disunited, local, and as referring to apples and oranges. So far, different scientists have championed their principle of choice and argued that it is more “accurate” or more “general” than the other principles. In some cases, scientists have used straw man arguments that portray the other principles inaccurately. This has undermined our ability to understand the relations among these principles. The thesis of this book project is that many of these principles are fundamentally related and interdependent, and we can develop a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the evolutionary process if we view this process from a systems perspective, as a property that emerges from the interaction of many different parts. Part of the reason for the different optimality principles scientists have developed is that they focus on different parts of the process: the maximization of power, the production of entropy, the persistence of biodiversity, the evolution of design, etc. These principles provide an ability to predict, and in some cases, explain phenomena in these different parts of the evolutionary process. This book seeks to bring the interaction among these parts of the process into clearer focus by accurately describing the relations among these optimality principles and how they can evolve over time. In the process, we hope to provide a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the role of energy in evolutionary development, which is like listening to only the cellos in Beethoven’s Hymn to Joy when focusing exclusively on one optimality principle. This systems theory of thermodynamic evolution should help to provide a fundamental component of the third major synthesis of evolutionary biology. (383 words)

{{#ev:vimeo| 1179359909 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Charles Hall]] received his Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina from the great systems ecologist Howard Odum. He has been a research scientist at Brookhaven and Oak Ridge National Laboratories and at the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, and professor at Cornell University, University of Montana, and the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. He is the author of 14 books and more than 340 peer-reviewed papers, many in our “best” journals. In his mid-career, he turned his main interests from systems analysis and modeling of the energetics of natural ecosystems to increasingly, human-dominated “economic” systems. He is especially well known within the scientific community for initiating and developing (with colleagues) the concepts of EROI (Energy Return on Investment) and BioPhysical Economics. He is the recipient of many academic awards including the Hubbert Award from the American Society for the Study of Peak Oil and the Lifetime Achievement award from the International Society of BioPhysical Economics. (159 words)

[[Timothy McWhirter]] received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Florida State University. While in graduate school, he published a paper that described the empirical evidence in the contemporary sciences that supported Nietzsche’s principle of the will to power. In 2012, he published a paper on Nietzsche’s critique of morality that described how the will to power appeared to be similar, in important respects, to the maximum power principle developed by H. T. Odum. This was the first published paper that discussed the relation between these two principles. A decade later, he received an email from the ecologist Charles A. S. Hall, who was astonished that he was quoted by a philosopher about the maximum power principle. Since then, they have worked together on a number of projects: the book Maximum Power and its Philosophical Roots, McWhirter as the author and Hall as the editor; they coauthored the paper Maximum Power in Evolution, Ecology, and Economics; and they worked together on a chapter entitled The Equal Fitness Paradigm: a thermodynamic synthesis in evolutionary biology. Their next project is ambitious. They intend to write a book that outlines a systems theory of thermodynamic evolution, which explains the relations between all the different optimality principles that have been described by scientists in the thermodynamic school of evolution. (217 words)

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Charles Hall]]
[[Category: Videos by Timothy McWhirter]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

File:Timothy McWhirter.jpg

2026-04-09T18:04:21Z

Laouris:

File:Charles A S Hall.jpg

2026-04-09T18:04:03Z

Laouris:

Mini Symposium 2026 Apr 1 - Charles Hall and Timothy McWhirter

2026-04-09T18:00:52Z

Laouris: Created and populated page

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=
| name=[[Charles Hall]] & [[Timothy McWhirter]]
| title=The Evolution of Our Understanding of Thermodynamics: A Systems Approach
| date=Apr 1, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1179359909}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> The Evolution of Our Understanding of Thermodynamics: A Systems Approach"</span>

==Abstract==
Some scientists have argued that evolutionary biology is poised for a third major synthesis. In the first synthesis, Darwin conceptualized and presented evidence for his evolutionary theory. The second used genetic mechanisms to explain how evolution worked. The third is based on energy. In the wake of Boltzmann’s work, a thermodynamic school of evolutionary theory has emerged, offering a number of principles alleged to guide evolutionary development. These include the principle of maximum energy flux, the maximum power principle, the minimum entropy production principle, the maximum entropy production principle, the constructal law, the maximum efficiency principle, and the equal fitness paradigm. Collectively, these principles have sometimes been described as contradictory, disunited, local, and as referring to apples and oranges. So far, different scientists have championed their principle of choice and argued that it is more “accurate” or more “general” than the other principles. In some cases, scientists have used straw man arguments that portray the other principles inaccurately. This has undermined our ability to understand the relations among these principles. The thesis of this book project is that many of these principles are fundamentally related and interdependent, and we can develop a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the evolutionary process if we view this process from a systems perspective, as a property that emerges from the interaction of many different parts. Part of the reason for the different optimality principles scientists have developed is that they focus on different parts of the process: the maximization of power, the production of entropy, the persistence of biodiversity, the evolution of design, etc. These principles provide an ability to predict, and in some cases, explain phenomena in these different parts of the evolutionary process. This book seeks to bring the interaction among these parts of the process into clearer focus by accurately describing the relations among these optimality principles and how they can evolve over time. In the process, we hope to provide a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of the role of energy in evolutionary development, which is like listening to only the cellos in Beethoven’s Hymn to Joy when focusing exclusively on one optimality principle. This systems theory of thermodynamic evolution should help to provide a fundamental component of the third major synthesis of evolutionary biology. (383 words)

{{#ev:vimeo| 1179359909 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Charles Hall]] received his Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina from the great systems ecologist Howard Odum. He has been a research scientist at Brookhaven and Oak Ridge National Laboratories and at the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, and professor at Cornell University, University of Montana, and the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. He is the author of 14 books and more than 340 peer-reviewed papers, many in our “best” journals. In his mid-career, he turned his main interests from systems analysis and modeling of the energetics of natural ecosystems to increasingly, human-dominated “economic” systems. He is especially well known within the scientific community for initiating and developing (with colleagues) the concepts of EROI (Energy Return on Investment) and BioPhysical Economics. He is the recipient of many academic awards including the Hubbert Award from the American Society for the Study of Peak Oil and the Lifetime Achievement award from the International Society of BioPhysical Economics. (159 words)

[[Timothy McWhirter]] received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Florida State University. While in graduate school, he published a paper that described the empirical evidence in the contemporary sciences that supported Nietzsche’s principle of the will to power. In 2012, he published a paper on Nietzsche’s critique of morality that described how the will to power appeared to be similar, in important respects, to the maximum power principle developed by H. T. Odum. This was the first published paper that discussed the relation between these two principles. A decade later, he received an email from the ecologist Charles A. S. Hall, who was astonished that he was quoted by a philosopher about the maximum power principle. Since then, they have worked together on a number of projects: the book Maximum Power and its Philosophical Roots, McWhirter as the author and Hall as the editor; they coauthored the paper Maximum Power in Evolution, Ecology, and Economics; and they worked together on a chapter entitled The Equal Fitness Paradigm: a thermodynamic synthesis in evolutionary biology. Their next project is ambitious. They intend to write a book that outlines a systems theory of thermodynamic evolution, which explains the relations between all the different optimality principles that have been described by scientists in the thermodynamic school of evolution. (217 words)

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Charles Hall]]
[[Category: Videos by Timothy McWhirter]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 18 - Bruno Vaz

2026-04-09T17:57:26Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Bruno N Vaz.png
| name=[[Bruno Nunes Vaz]]
| title=Space Governance in the New Space Era: A Systems Sciences Perspective
| date=Mar 18, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1174909288}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Space Governance in the New Space Era: A Systems Sciences Perspective"</span>

==Abstract==
The space sector is undergoing a profound transformation. The transition from "Old Space" — characterised by state-led programmes and Cold War-era treaties — to "New Space" has introduced unprecedented complexity. Private actors now rival national agencies in capability, the global space economy exceeds $600 billion, and emerging domains such as space mining and in-orbit manufacturing are reshaping the sector's boundaries.
Yet governance structures have not kept pace. The 1967 Outer Space Treaty offers little guidance for an era of mega-constellations, 130 million pieces of orbital debris, space militarisation across multiple nations, and private companies pursuing lunar resource extraction. The recursion levels that once organised the sector — from the UN to governments, agencies, and contractors — are now blurred, whilst bilateral accords like the Artemis Accords compete with multilateral frameworks for legitimacy.
This presentation draws on systems sciences, particularly the Viable System Model, to diagnose these structural deficits in the New Space era.

{{#ev:vimeo| https://vimeo.com/1174909288 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Bruno Nunes Vaz is a PhD candidate at the Technological Institute of Aeronautics (ITA) and a visiting researcher at Politecnico di Milano, focusing on innovation within the New Space sector. With a background in mechanical engineering and orbital mechanics, he bridges the gap between academic research and industrial applications. He is a partner at N7 Ventures, a venture builder for deep-tech startups, and a shareholder at Orbital Engenharia, a Brazilian space and defense company.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Bruno Vaz]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 18 - Bruno Vaz

2026-04-09T17:56:41Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Bruno N Vaz.png
| name=[[Bruno Nunes Vaz]]
| title=Space Governance in the New Space Era: A Systems Sciences Perspective
| date=Mar 18, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1174909288}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Space Governance in the New Space Era: A Systems Sciences Perspective"</span>

==Abstract==
The space sector is undergoing a profound transformation. The transition from "Old Space" — characterised by state-led programmes and Cold War-era treaties — to "New Space" has introduced unprecedented complexity. Private actors now rival national agencies in capability, the global space economy exceeds $600 billion, and emerging domains such as space mining and in-orbit manufacturing are reshaping the sector's boundaries.
Yet governance structures have not kept pace. The 1967 Outer Space Treaty offers little guidance for an era of mega-constellations, 130 million pieces of orbital debris, space militarisation across multiple nations, and private companies pursuing lunar resource extraction. The recursion levels that once organised the sector — from the UN to governments, agencies, and contractors — are now blurred, whilst bilateral accords like the Artemis Accords compete with multilateral frameworks for legitimacy.
This presentation draws on systems sciences, particularly the Viable System Model, to diagnose these structural deficits in the New Space era.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1174909288 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Bruno Nunes Vaz is a PhD candidate at the Technological Institute of Aeronautics (ITA) and a visiting researcher at Politecnico di Milano, focusing on innovation within the New Space sector. With a background in mechanical engineering and orbital mechanics, he bridges the gap between academic research and industrial applications. He is a partner at N7 Ventures, a venture builder for deep-tech startups, and a shareholder at Orbital Engenharia, a Brazilian space and defense company.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Bruno Vaz]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 18 - Bruno Vaz

2026-04-09T17:54:52Z

Laouris: Created and populated page

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Bruno N Vaz.png
| name=[[Bruno Vaz]]
| title=Space Governance in the New Space Era: A Systems Sciences Perspective
| date=Mar 18, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1174909288}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Space Governance in the New Space Era: A Systems Sciences Perspective"</span>

==Abstract==
The space sector is undergoing a profound transformation. The transition from "Old Space" — characterised by state-led programmes and Cold War-era treaties — to "New Space" has introduced unprecedented complexity. Private actors now rival national agencies in capability, the global space economy exceeds $600 billion, and emerging domains such as space mining and in-orbit manufacturing are reshaping the sector's boundaries.
Yet governance structures have not kept pace. The 1967 Outer Space Treaty offers little guidance for an era of mega-constellations, 130 million pieces of orbital debris, space militarisation across multiple nations, and private companies pursuing lunar resource extraction. The recursion levels that once organised the sector — from the UN to governments, agencies, and contractors — are now blurred, whilst bilateral accords like the Artemis Accords compete with multilateral frameworks for legitimacy.
This presentation draws on systems sciences, particularly the Viable System Model, to diagnose these structural deficits in the New Space era.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1174909288 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Bruno Nunes Vaz is a PhD candidate at the Technological Institute of Aeronautics (ITA) and a visiting researcher at Politecnico di Milano, focusing on innovation within the New Space sector. With a background in mechanical engineering and orbital mechanics, he bridges the gap between academic research and industrial applications. He is a partner at N7 Ventures, a venture builder for deep-tech startups, and a shareholder at Orbital Engenharia, a Brazilian space and defense company.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Bruno Vaz]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

File:ZaidKhan.png

2026-04-09T17:50:49Z

Laouris:

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 25 - Zaid Khan

2026-04-09T17:50:32Z

Laouris: Created and populated page

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= ZaidKhan.png
| name=[[Zaid Khan]]
| title=A Humble Posture Towards Systems Change
| date=Mar 25, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1177081671}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> A Humble Posture Towards Systems Change"</span>

==Abstract==
When faced with complex, interconnected challenges, the traditional impulse is often to try and engineer top-down solutions. "A Humble Posture Towards Systems Change" challenges this instinct, advocating for a fundamental shift from a mindset of control to one of stewardship, deep listening, and adaptability.

This session explores how practitioners can engage with complex systems with greater reverence for their inherent nature and pace. Drawing on a branch of ecological systems thinking, this talk translates these foundational theories through a practical design and strategy lens. Attendees will explore how systems approaches can emphasize a system's natural rhythms to find the right time to foster a shift

{{#ev:vimeo| 1177081671 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Zaid Khan is a strategist and systemic designer based in Toronto who helps organizations navigate complexity. As the co-founder of the systemic design studio Contexture and a co-organizer for Systems Thinking Ontario, his work consistently bridges academic theory and on-the-ground practice. Holding an MDes in Strategic Foresight and Innovation, his practice focuses on building adaptive capacity and guiding institutions through systemic shifts.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Zaid Khan]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Apr 8 Andreas Nicolaides

2026-04-09T17:42:08Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= AndreasNicolaides.jpg
| name=[[Andreas Nicolaides]]
| title=Speciation through Genomic Reorganisation: The Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis
| date=Apr 8, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1181357175}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Speciation through Genomic Reorganisation: The Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis</span>

==Abstract==
Darwin’s On the Origin of Species left unresolved the problem named in its title: how new species arise. The Modern Synthesis, though uniting Mendelian genetics with natural selection, has produced no coherent theory of speciation. Instead, evolutionary biology has accumulated a patchwork of mechanisms, often treating anomalies—such as long periods of evolutionary stasis, apparently sudden transformations, reticulated phylogenies (branching complicated by cross-lineage gene flow), and recurrent hybridisation (interbreeding between distinct lineages)—as exceptions rather than signals of a deeper order.

This presentation introduces the Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis: the claim that speciation is not the incidental by-product of auxiliary processes linked to natural selection, but is structured by higher-order regulatory systems, encoded in the germline, that govern the mode and tempo of evolution. These are not fixed typological essences but dynamic, multi-scale architectures intrinsic to life’s organisation. Framed within the broader perspective of Genomic Essentialism, the hypothesis advances the view that biological organisation is driven by genomic programmes that are constitutive of life itself, rather than by emergent properties alone.

Four systemic functions illustrate this architecture:

#Initiators: timers and triggers that delimit and precipitate transformation, including tandem-repeat turnover, germline resets, hybridisation, duplication, and viral invasion.
# Generators: mechanisms that expand and rewire genomic material, such as bursts of transposons, endogenous retroviruses, segmental duplications, retrocopying, and 3-D architectural change.
# Coordinators: processes that synchronise transformations across populations, including viral and symbiotic dynamics and germline programmes that align thresholds.
# Stabilisers: systems that preserve lineage coherence, such as centromeric divergence with drive suppression, piRNA surveillance, inversions, supergenes, imprinting, and incompatibility complexes.

These functions do not direct development itself but transform the regulatory logic that structures it. In this sense, the system constitutes a meta-programme: a higher-order genomic architecture that converts existing developmental programmes into novel ones, linking organisms across space and time. Crucially, they also resolve the anomalies: stasis reflects stability maintained by stabilisers, sudden transformations occur when initiators cross thresholds, reticulated histories arise from coordinating processes across lineages, and hybrid dysfunction stems from divergence in stabilising systems.

On this basis, the hypothesis yields distinctive predictions: genomic turnover should track clade-specific tempos of speciation; bursts of mobile elements and duplications should cluster around radiation events; shared viral or symbiotic agents should generate concordant genomic change; and hybrid dysfunction should correlate with divergence in coherence-preserving systems. Evolutionary anomalies, on this view, are not noise but signatures of a genomic meta-programme in action.

{{#ev:vimeo|1181357175 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Andreas Nicolaides studied Medicine at Manchester University (1982) and Philosophy at London University (2024). He is currently employed part-time at York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust as a Consultant Head and Neck Surgeon and is affiliated with Hull York Medical School as an Honorary Senior Lecturer.

He has had a lifelong interest in evolutionary theory, which he has pursued independently of his clinical work. This has led him to advance a systems biology approach to the anomalies of speciation at the molecular level. Through this, he has developed the idea of Genomic Essentialism, based on the Constitutive Genomic Programmes hypothesis: systems-level regulatory architectures encoded in all genomes that direct both the reliable unfolding of embryonic development and the patterned transformation of species.
This project has firm foundations in the naturalised teleology of Aristotle, which recognised the purposiveness of organisms but lacked a mechanism to parallel that of natural selection. By showing how genomic programmes act through well-recognised regulatory pathways, Genomic Essentialism supports an internalist explanation of life’s organisation that subsumes, rather than denies, the externalism of natural selection.

Dr Nicolaides draws on sources from classical philosophy, evolutionary theory, and molecular biology to argue that life’s anomalies — such as episodic bursts in the fossil record, synchrony in molecular evolution, and the peculiar molecular logic observed in the germline — only make sense when understood as parts of an integrated programme. His work aims to bring together systems science, genomics, and philosophy in order to offer a unifying account of life’s organisation.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Andreas Nicolaides]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Apr 8 Andreas Nicolaides

2026-04-09T17:41:47Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= AndreasNicolaides.jpg
| name=[[Andreas Nicolaides]]
| title=Speciation through Genomic Reorganisation: The Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis
| date=Apr 8, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1181357175}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Speciation through Genomic Reorganisation: The Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis"</span>

==Abstract==
Darwin’s On the Origin of Species left unresolved the problem named in its title: how new species arise. The Modern Synthesis, though uniting Mendelian genetics with natural selection, has produced no coherent theory of speciation. Instead, evolutionary biology has accumulated a patchwork of mechanisms, often treating anomalies—such as long periods of evolutionary stasis, apparently sudden transformations, reticulated phylogenies (branching complicated by cross-lineage gene flow), and recurrent hybridisation (interbreeding between distinct lineages)—as exceptions rather than signals of a deeper order.

This presentation introduces the Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis: the claim that speciation is not the incidental by-product of auxiliary processes linked to natural selection, but is structured by higher-order regulatory systems, encoded in the germline, that govern the mode and tempo of evolution. These are not fixed typological essences but dynamic, multi-scale architectures intrinsic to life’s organisation. Framed within the broader perspective of Genomic Essentialism, the hypothesis advances the view that biological organisation is driven by genomic programmes that are constitutive of life itself, rather than by emergent properties alone.

Four systemic functions illustrate this architecture:

#Initiators: timers and triggers that delimit and precipitate transformation, including tandem-repeat turnover, germline resets, hybridisation, duplication, and viral invasion.
# Generators: mechanisms that expand and rewire genomic material, such as bursts of transposons, endogenous retroviruses, segmental duplications, retrocopying, and 3-D architectural change.
# Coordinators: processes that synchronise transformations across populations, including viral and symbiotic dynamics and germline programmes that align thresholds.
# Stabilisers: systems that preserve lineage coherence, such as centromeric divergence with drive suppression, piRNA surveillance, inversions, supergenes, imprinting, and incompatibility complexes.

These functions do not direct development itself but transform the regulatory logic that structures it. In this sense, the system constitutes a meta-programme: a higher-order genomic architecture that converts existing developmental programmes into novel ones, linking organisms across space and time. Crucially, they also resolve the anomalies: stasis reflects stability maintained by stabilisers, sudden transformations occur when initiators cross thresholds, reticulated histories arise from coordinating processes across lineages, and hybrid dysfunction stems from divergence in stabilising systems.

On this basis, the hypothesis yields distinctive predictions: genomic turnover should track clade-specific tempos of speciation; bursts of mobile elements and duplications should cluster around radiation events; shared viral or symbiotic agents should generate concordant genomic change; and hybrid dysfunction should correlate with divergence in coherence-preserving systems. Evolutionary anomalies, on this view, are not noise but signatures of a genomic meta-programme in action.

{{#ev:vimeo|1181357175 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Andreas Nicolaides studied Medicine at Manchester University (1982) and Philosophy at London University (2024). He is currently employed part-time at York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust as a Consultant Head and Neck Surgeon and is affiliated with Hull York Medical School as an Honorary Senior Lecturer.

He has had a lifelong interest in evolutionary theory, which he has pursued independently of his clinical work. This has led him to advance a systems biology approach to the anomalies of speciation at the molecular level. Through this, he has developed the idea of Genomic Essentialism, based on the Constitutive Genomic Programmes hypothesis: systems-level regulatory architectures encoded in all genomes that direct both the reliable unfolding of embryonic development and the patterned transformation of species.
This project has firm foundations in the naturalised teleology of Aristotle, which recognised the purposiveness of organisms but lacked a mechanism to parallel that of natural selection. By showing how genomic programmes act through well-recognised regulatory pathways, Genomic Essentialism supports an internalist explanation of life’s organisation that subsumes, rather than denies, the externalism of natural selection.

Dr Nicolaides draws on sources from classical philosophy, evolutionary theory, and molecular biology to argue that life’s anomalies — such as episodic bursts in the fossil record, synchrony in molecular evolution, and the peculiar molecular logic observed in the germline — only make sense when understood as parts of an integrated programme. His work aims to bring together systems science, genomics, and philosophy in order to offer a unifying account of life’s organisation.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Andreas Nicolaides]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Apr 8 Andreas Nicolaides

2026-04-09T17:41:22Z

Laouris: created and polulated

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= AndreasNicolaides.jpg
| name=[[Andreas Nicolaides]]
| title=Speciation through Genomic Reorganisation: The Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis
| date=Apr 8, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1181357175}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Speciation through Genomic Reorganisation: The Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis"</span>

==Abstract==
Darwin’s On the Origin of Species left unresolved the problem named in its title: how new species arise. The Modern Synthesis, though uniting Mendelian genetics with natural selection, has produced no coherent theory of speciation. Instead, evolutionary biology has accumulated a patchwork of mechanisms, often treating anomalies—such as long periods of evolutionary stasis, apparently sudden transformations, reticulated phylogenies (branching complicated by cross-lineage gene flow), and recurrent hybridisation (interbreeding between distinct lineages)—as exceptions rather than signals of a deeper order.

This presentation introduces the Phylogenetic Meta-Programme Hypothesis: the claim that speciation is not the incidental by-product of auxiliary processes linked to natural selection, but is structured by higher-order regulatory systems, encoded in the germline, that govern the mode and tempo of evolution. These are not fixed typological essences but dynamic, multi-scale architectures intrinsic to life’s organisation. Framed within the broader perspective of Genomic Essentialism, the hypothesis advances the view that biological organisation is driven by genomic programmes that are constitutive of life itself, rather than by emergent properties alone.

Four systemic functions illustrate this architecture:

#Initiators: timers and triggers that delimit and precipitate transformation, including tandem-repeat turnover, germline resets, hybridisation, duplication, and viral invasion.
# Generators: mechanisms that expand and rewire genomic material, such as bursts of transposons, endogenous retroviruses, segmental duplications, retrocopying, and 3-D architectural change.
# Coordinators: processes that synchronise transformations across populations, including viral and symbiotic dynamics and germline programmes that align thresholds.
# Stabilisers: systems that preserve lineage coherence, such as centromeric divergence with drive suppression, piRNA surveillance, inversions, supergenes, imprinting, and incompatibility complexes.

These functions do not direct development itself but transform the regulatory logic that structures it. In this sense, the system constitutes a meta-programme: a higher-order genomic architecture that converts existing developmental programmes into novel ones, linking organisms across space and time. Crucially, they also resolve the anomalies: stasis reflects stability maintained by stabilisers, sudden transformations occur when initiators cross thresholds, reticulated histories arise from coordinating processes across lineages, and hybrid dysfunction stems from divergence in stabilising systems.

On this basis, the hypothesis yields distinctive predictions: genomic turnover should track clade-specific tempos of speciation; bursts of mobile elements and duplications should cluster around radiation events; shared viral or symbiotic agents should generate concordant genomic change; and hybrid dysfunction should correlate with divergence in coherence-preserving systems. Evolutionary anomalies, on this view, are not noise but signatures of a genomic meta-programme in action.

{{#ev:vimeo|1181357175 |600|left|}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Andreas Nicolaides studied Medicine at Manchester University (1982) and Philosophy at London University (2024). He is currently employed part-time at York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust as a Consultant Head and Neck Surgeon and is affiliated with Hull York Medical School as an Honorary Senior Lecturer.

He has had a lifelong interest in evolutionary theory, which he has pursued independently of his clinical work. This has led him to advance a systems biology approach to the anomalies of speciation at the molecular level. Through this, he has developed the idea of Genomic Essentialism, based on the Constitutive Genomic Programmes hypothesis: systems-level regulatory architectures encoded in all genomes that direct both the reliable unfolding of embryonic development and the patterned transformation of species.
This project has firm foundations in the naturalised teleology of Aristotle, which recognised the purposiveness of organisms but lacked a mechanism to parallel that of natural selection. By showing how genomic programmes act through well-recognised regulatory pathways, Genomic Essentialism supports an internalist explanation of life’s organisation that subsumes, rather than denies, the externalism of natural selection.

Dr Nicolaides draws on sources from classical philosophy, evolutionary theory, and molecular biology to argue that life’s anomalies — such as episodic bursts in the fossil record, synchrony in molecular evolution, and the peculiar molecular logic observed in the germline — only make sense when understood as parts of an integrated programme. His work aims to bring together systems science, genomics, and philosophy in order to offer a unifying account of life’s organisation.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Andreas Nicolaides]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

File:AndreasNicolaides.jpg

2026-04-09T17:41:04Z

Laouris:

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 11 - Peter Erdi

2026-04-09T17:34:51Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=Peter-Erdi-at_Kalamazoo.jpg
| name=[[Peter Erdi]]
| title=Students exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life
| date=Mar 11, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1172648251?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Students exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life"</span>

==Abstract==
In this project, students will explore agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life. You will have the opportunity to model complex systems without coding knowledge. Examples of models include population dynamics, social networks (e.g., voting), chemical kinetics, epidemics, economics (e.g., wealth distributions, cash flow), medicine (e.g., kidney health, disease spread, CRISPR), and animal collective behavior.
Six eight-minute-long presentations will be delivered, followed by a Q/A session.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1172648251|600|left|RStudents exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life: Peter Erdi}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Péter Érdi teaches a class INTRODUCTION TO COMPLEX SYSTEMS (25th time this year) at Kalamazoo College. During the minisymposium, the students will present their group project. While the exact projects are not known, the call will be given.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Peter Erdi]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 11 - Peter Erdi

2026-04-09T17:34:28Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=Peter-Erdi-at_Kalamazoo.jpg
| name=[[Peter Erdi]]
| title=Students exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life
| date=Mar 11, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1172648251?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Students exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life"</span>

==Abstract==https://wiki.isss.org/index.php/Mini_Symposium_2026_Mar_11_-_Peter_Erdi
In this project, students will explore agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life. You will have the opportunity to model complex systems without coding knowledge. Examples of models include population dynamics, social networks (e.g., voting), chemical kinetics, epidemics, economics (e.g., wealth distributions, cash flow), medicine (e.g., kidney health, disease spread, CRISPR), and animal collective behavior.
Six eight-minute-long presentations will be delivered, followed by a Q/A session.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1172648251|600|left|RStudents exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life: Peter Erdi}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Péter Érdi teaches a class INTRODUCTION TO COMPLEX SYSTEMS (25th time this year) at Kalamazoo College. During the minisymposium, the students will present their group project. While the exact projects are not known, the call will be given.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Peter Erdi]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 11 - Peter Erdi

2026-04-09T17:33:31Z

Laouris:

Yiannis Laouris

2026-03-23T08:35:09Z

Laouris: added videos

{{ISSS President
|name= Yiannis Laouris
|image= Laouris_Talking.jpeg
|period=2025-2026
|role=[[ISSS President]]
|previous_posts=
|current_post=SIG Chair: [[SIG: Systemic Dialogue]]
|fields= Neurophysiology<br>Systems Engineering<br>Information Technology<br>Peace and Conflict Resolution<br>Education
|universities=Leipzig University, Germany<br>University of Arizona, Tucson, USA
|specializations=[[Structured Democratic Dialogue]]<br>virtual dialogues<br>scaling-up deliberations
|socioacademic= Publishes on issues of peace, sustainability, reinventing education/democracy.
|achievements=Provost's Teaching Award<br>
Medical Innovation Award<br>
Silver Award, INPEX 95<br>
Award for Creativity<br>
Civil Society Award<br>
Silver Award Hellenic Society for Systemic Studies<br>
Global Education Innovation Award
|orcid= 0000-0002-9081-5849
|external_links= https://www.linkedin.com/in/laouris/<br>https://www.futureworlds.eu/wiki/Yiannis_Laouris
}}

'''Yiannis Laouris''' is the Lead Scientist and Chair of [[Future Worlds Center]] in Cyprus. He joined ISSS for the first time in 2004 during the Crete conference on the invitation of [[Kenneth Baush]] and [[Alexander Christakis]], where he presented [[Information technology in the service of peacebuilding: the case of Cyprus]]; peace and conflict work conducted in Cyprus between 1994 and 2004<ref>Laouris, Y. (2004). Information technology in the service of peacebuilding: the case of Cyprus. World Futures: The Journal of General Evolution, 60(1-2), 67-79.</ref>. He and [[Marios Michaelides]], along with several Turkish speaking Cypriots, played a key role, as Member of the Cyprus Conflict Resolution Trainers Group<ref>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyprus_Conflict_Resolution_Trainers_Group Cyprus Conflict Resolution Trainers</ref> in creating an embryonic peace movement using [[Interactive Management]] as introduced by [[Benjamin Broome]].

==Early life==
Laouris was born in Paphos, Cyprus, in 1958. He attended The English School, the Pancyprian Gymnasium, and the Acropolis Gymnasium. He served in the Cypriot National Guard as the first Cypriot senior cryptographer after the 1974 Cypriot coup d'état and the 1974 Turkish invasion of Cyprus. He graduated from the medical school of the Karl Marx University (today known as University of Leipzig), enjoying three parallel scholarships because of his top grades, and completed a PhD in Neurophysiology with summa cum laude with Prof. Peter Schwartze at the Carl Ludwig Institute of Physiology. Laouris and his wife Joulietta were the first students to be awarded a PhD before graduating from university, an achievement that received press coverage.<ref>Newspaper coverage of the Laouris' Doctorate, https://futureworlds.eu/wiki/Vitae/Yiannis_Laouris/Newspaper_coverage_of_the_Doctorate</ref> He continued his neurophysiology research at the Georg-August University Göttingen with cyberneticists and systems physiologists Professors Hans Diedrich Henatsch and Uwe Windhorst, studying the dynamic behavior of the motor axon-Renshaw cell, and muscle afferent subsystems. Laouris pioneered the application of digital signal processing in time/space and frequency domains. <ref>Laouris, Y., & Windhorst, U. (1989). The relationship between coherence and nonlinear characteristics in Renshaw cell responses to random motor axon stimulation. Neuroscience, 28(3), 625-633. https://doi.org/10.1016/0306-4522(89)90009-2.</ref>,<ref>Cleveland, S., Ross, H.G. Dynamic properties of Renshaw cells: Frequency response characteristics. Biol. Cybernetics 27, 175–184 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00365164</ref>,<ref>Gottlieb, G. L., Corcos, D. M., & Agarwal, G. C. (1989). Strategies for the control of voluntary movements with one mechanical degree of freedom. Behavioral and brain sciences, 12(2), 189-210. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X00048238.</ref>. He subsequently joined the Robotics, Prosthetics, Motor Control Group at the University of Arizona, where he collaborated with Douglas G. Stuart developing neuromuscular-strategies for counteracting muscle fatigue<ref>Laouris, Y., & Stuart, D. G. (1993). Multiple neuromuscular-strategies for counteracting muscle fatigue. Neuromuscular fatigue. North-Holland, Amsterdam, 181-183.</ref> such as the effect of the stimulation pattern <ref>Bevan, L., Laouris, Y., Reinking, R. M., & Stuart, D. G. (1992). The effect of the stimulation pattern on the fatigue of single motor units in adult cats. The Journal of physiology, 449(1), 85-108. https://doi.org/10.1113/jphysiol.1992.sp019076</ref>, motoneural adaptation<ref>Nordstrom, M. A., Gorman, R. B., Laouris, Y., Spielmann, J. M., & Stuart, D. G. (2007). Does motoneuron adaptation contribute to muscle fatigue?. Muscle & nerve, 35(2), 135-158. https://doi.org/10.1002/mus.20712</ref> etc. In the U.S., he also completed a Masters in Systems and Industrial Engineering. More recently, he completed a PhD in Systems Engineering at Portsmouth, UK<ref>https://researchportal.port.ac.uk/en/studentTheses/structured-dialogical-design-frameworks-for-addressing-complexity</ref>.

==Contributions in reforming education to the needs of the digital era==
In 1992, Laouris decided to devote a decade of his life to a vision he called CYBER KIDS.<ref>CYBER KIDS</ref> The project involved the development of a cybernetics-based innovative<ref>Laouris, Y. (2014). Teams construct knowledge during project-driven social interactions. Educating in Dialog: Constructing Meaning and Building Knowledge with Dialogic Technology, 24, 111-113.</ref>, team-, project based curriculum that was grounded on the concept of KnowledgePacket to construct lesson plans that required collaboration and comprised of multiple dimensions, including the value for real life, mental development, creativity, etc. By 1999, CYBER KIDS reached 15,000 children in Cyprus, i.e., 20% of the country’s youth population (ages 6–15) and contributed against brain drain by employing almost 200 young scientists. In 2005, Laouris founded the Cyprus Safer Internet Center<ref> Cyprus Safer Internet Center https://futureworlds.eu/wiki/Cyberethics:_Cyprus_Safer_Internet_Center</ref> to promote the safer use of internet across Europe. Yiannis is one of the twelve experts commissioned by the Digital Tasks Force of the EU to develop the ONLIFE Manifesto<ref>Floridi, L. (2015). The onlife manifesto: Being human in a hyperconnected era (p. 264). Springer Nature.</ref> <ref>Laouris presenting the ONLIFE Manifesto at the European parliament https://youtu.be/lWRW2sSqVGU</ref>.

==Contributions in Dialogic Design Science==
Yiannis promotes the application of broadband technologies and [[Structured Democratic Dialogue]] as tools to bridge the digital-, economic-, educational- and interpersonal divides on our planet. He is an international leader in the development of theory, methodology and tools to support the science of structured dialogic design. He formulated the dialogic design [[Law of Requisite Action]]<ref>Laouris Y, Laouri R, Christakis A (2008) Communication praxis for ethical accountability; The ethics of the tree of action. Syst Res Behav Sci 25(2):331–348. https://doi.org/10.1002/sres.890.</ref>,<ref>Bausch, K. C., & Flanagan, T. R. (2013). A Confluence of Third‐Phase Science and Dialogic Design Science. Systems Research and Behavioral Science, 30(4), 414-429, p 428. https://doi.org/10.1002/sres.2166.</ref>,<ref>Flanagan, T. R. (2021). Structured dialogic design for mobilizing collective action in highly complex systems. In Handbook of systems sciences (pp. 765-785). Singapore: Springer Singapore, p. 781. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-0370-8_59-1.</ref>, <ref>Jones, P. (2020). Systemic design: Design for complex, social, and sociotechnical systems. In Handbook of systems sciences (pp. 787-811). Singapore: Springer Singapore., p. 804. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-0720-5_60.</ref>, which asserts that action plans that are not founded on the authentic engagement of the stakeholders in dialogue and deliberation are unethical and are bound to fail. His current research focuses towards developing systems to enable scaling up participatory dialogic processes to engage thousands of people in meaningful, authentic dialogues asynchronously, thus accelerating institutional and societal change<ref>Laouris, Y., & Dye, K. (2024). Multi‐stakeholder structured dialogues: Five generations of evolution of dialogic design. Systems Research and Behavioral Science, 41(2), 368-389. https://doi.org/10.1002/sres.2971</ref>,<ref>Laouris, Y., & Metcalf, G. (2025). Assessing the viability of virtual structured democratic dialogue. Systems Research and Behavioral Science, 42(3), 587-606. https://doi.org/10.1002/sres.3006</ref>,<ref>Laouris, Y. (2023). Method to integrate asynchronously produced individual influence maps into an extrapolated population influence map following the face‐to‐face stage of a structured democratic dialogue. Systems Research and Behavioral Science, 40(3), 437-450. https://doi.org/10.1002/sres.2877</ref>. His team has developed IdeaPrism<ref>IdeaPrism https://futureworlds.eu/wiki/IdeaPrism</ref>, Concertina<ref> Concertina http://concertina.ekkotek.com/</ref>, Parallel ISM<ref> Parallel ISM https://futureworlds.eu/wiki/ISM_Parallel</ref>, Cogniscope v3<ref> Cogniscope Software https://futureworlds.eu/wiki/Cogniscope_Software </ref> and other tools. Laouris is also credited for establishing SDD as a [[Problem-Structuring Method]] within Community Operations research<ref>Laouris, Y., & Michaelides, M. (2018). Structured Democratic Dialogue: An application of a mathematical problem structuring method to facilitate reforms with local authorities in Cyprus. European Journal of Operational Research, 268(3), 918-931.</ref>,<ref>Midgley, G., Johnson, M. P., & Chichirau, G. (2018). What is community operational research?. European Journal of Operational Research, 268(3), 771-783, pg 772.</ref>,<ref>Johnson, M. P., Midgley, G., Wright, J., & Chichirau, G. (2018). Community Operational Research: Innovations, internationalization and agenda-setting applications. European Journal of Operational Research, 268(3), 761-770, pg 766, 771.</ref>,<ref>Júnior, A. D. A. G., & Schramm, V. B. (2021). Problem Structuring Methods: A Review of Advances Over the Last Decade. Systemic Practice and Action Research, 1-34, pgs 3,15</ref>.

==Awards==
Laouris has been rewarded for his scientific and societal contributions with several awards<ref>Honors and Awards of Yiannis Laouris https://futureworlds.eu/wiki/Vitae/Yiannis_Laouris/Honors_and_Awards</ref>. Selected distinctions include:
* 1990: Provost's Teaching Award, Arizona, USA; For development of computer-based undergraduate instruction in neuroscience<br>
* 1992: Medical Innovation Award, Arizona, USA; For development of computer-based undergraduate instruction in neuroscience<br>
* 1995: Silver Award, INPEX 95, Pittsburgh, USA; Innovation Competition Fair with thousands of participants from all over the world<br>
* 1998: Award for Creativity by the Cyprus Employers and Industrialists Federation; Awarded to CYBER KIDS<br>
* 2008: Civil Society Award, Cyprus; First Award to NGOs pioneering in social transformation<br>
* 2008: Silver Award Hellenic Society for Systemic Studies; Award to distinguished scientists<br>
* 2011: Honorable Mention of the Anna Lindh Award to Future Worlds Center for promoting intercultural dialogue freedom and citizenship
* 2017: Global Education Innovation Award; One of 12 awarded by GENE – Global Education Network Europe to Future Worlds Center for its innovative Map Your Meal project

==Books by Yiannis Laouris==
{{#categorytree: Books by Yiannis Laouris|mode="all" |hideroot=off|style=bold}}

==Video Presentations==
<table width="100%" style="padding:10px;">
<tr>
{{#ev:vimeo|1088519308|300|left|Advancing Together: An invitation for Systemic Collaboration - Yiannis Laouris}}
{{#ev:vimeo| 779092482 |300|left|Dialogic Design Science - Yiannis Laouris}}
{{#ev:vimeo| 836340108 |300|left|Complementarities between Syntegrity and SDD - Yiannis Laouris, Allenna Leonard, and Gary Metcalf}}
</tr>
</table>

==Selected Publications==
* Laouris, Y. (2004). Information technology in the service of peace building; the case of Cyprus. World Futures, 60, 67–79.
* Laouris, Y. (2012). The ABCs of the science of structured dialogic design. International Journal of Applied Systemic Studies, 4(4), 239–257.
* Laouris, Y. (2015). Reengineering and Reinventing both democracy and the concept of life in the digital era. In L. Floridi (Ed.), The onlife manifesto (pp. 125–142). Springer.
* Laouris, Y., & Christakis, A. N. (2007). Harnessing collective wisdom at a fraction of the time using structured dialogic design process in a virtual communication context. International Journal of Applied Systemic Studies, 1(2), 131–153.
* Laouris, Y., Emiliani, P. L., & Roe, P. (2017). Systemic evaluation of actions toward developing practical broadband applications for elderly and people with disabilities. Universal Access in the Information Society, 16(1), 247–255.
* Laouris, Y., Erel, A., Michaelides, M., Damdelen, M., Taraszow, T., Dagli, I., Laouri, R., & Christakis, A. (2009). Exploring options for enhancement of social dialogue between the Turkish and Greek communities in Cyprus using the structured dialogic design process. Systemic Practice and Action Research, 22(5), 361–381.
* Laouris, Y., & Laouri, R. (2008). Can information and mobile technologies serve to close the economic, educational, digital, and social gaps and accelerate development? World Futures, 64(4), 254–275.
* Laouris, Y., Laouri, R., & Christakis, A. N. (2008). Communication praxis for ethical accountability: The ethics of the tree of action: Dialogue and breaking down the wall in Cyprus. Systems Research and Behavioral Science, 25, 331–348.
* Laouris, Y., & Michaelides, M. (2018). Structured democratic dialogue: An application of a mathematical problem structuring method to facilitate reforms with local authorities in Cyprus. European Journal of Operational Research, 268(3), 918–931.
* Laouris, Y., Michaelides, M., Damdelen, M., Laouri, R., Beyatli, D., & Christakis, A. (2009). A systemic evaluation of the state of affairs following the negative outcome of the referendum in Cyprus using the structured dialogic design process. Systemic Practice and Action Research, 22(1), 45–75.
* Laouris, Y., & Romm, N. R. (2022). African youth's visioning for re-inventing democracy in the digital era: A case of use of structured dialogical design. World Futures, 1–44.
* Laouris,Y.,Taraszow,T.,Damdelen,M.,Da!glı,I.,Beyath,D., Karayiannis, A., Dye, K., & Christakis, A. N. (2015). Examining economic integration and free trade within Cyprus using structured dialogic design. Action Learning and Action Research Journal, 21(1), 11–52.
* Laouris, Y., Underwood, G., Laouri, R., & Christakis, A. (2010). Structured dialogue embedded within emerging technologies. In G. Veletsianos (Ed.), Emerging technologies in distance education (pp. 153–173). Athabasca University Press.
* Laouris, Y. (2022). Managing large-scale societal change. In Operations Management. (pp. 97–112), IntechOpen. https://doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.1000220
* Laouris, Y., & Romm, N. R. (2022a). Structured dialogical design as a problem structuring method illustrated in a Re-invent democracy project. European Journal of Operational Research, 301(3), 1072-1087. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2021.11.046
* Laouris, Y., & Romm, N. R. (2022b). African youth’s visioning for re-inventing democracy in the digital era: A case of use of structured dialogical design. World Futures, 78(1), 18-61. https://doi.org/10.1080/02604027.2021.2014112
* Laouris, Y. (2023). Structured Dialogical Design Frameworks for Addressing Complexity in Systems Engineering (Doctoral dissertation, University of Portsmouth).

==References==
<references />

[[Category: Members]]
[[Category:ISSS Presidents]]

Delia MacNamara

2026-03-23T08:07:32Z

Laouris: added video

{{
ISSS Member
|name=Delia MacNamara
|image= DeliaPembreyMacNamara.jpg
|period=To fill
|title=Member
|affiliation=To fill
|notable_works=To fill
|interests=To fill
|degrees=To fill
|fields=To fill
|universities=To fill
|specializations=Social systemics, Systems science, cybernetics, AI and robotics, humans
|orcid=To Fill
|achievements=To fill
|links=https://hull.academia.edu/DeliaPembreyMacNamara<br>https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=IEPoEyYAAAAJ&hl=en

}}

'''Delia MacNamara''' has joined ISSS in 19XX. He/She is .....
==Personal Life==

==Academia and Career==

==Special Interests==
Social systemics, Systems science, cybernetics, AI and robotics, humans

==Video Presentations==

<table width="100%" style="padding:10px;">
<tr>
{{#ev:vimeo| 1176106609 |300|}}
</tr>
</table>

==Selected Publications==
* Security in the future of systems engineering (FuSE), a roadmap of foundation concepts. R Dove, K Willett, T McDermott, H Dunlap, DP MacNamara, C Ocker, INCOSE International Symposium 31 (1), 175-194
* Cybernetic lenses for designing and living in a complex world, J Andres, A Zafiroglu, K Daniell, P Wong, M Henein, X Zhu, B Sweeting, Proceedings of the 34th Australian Conference on Human-Computer Interaction …
* The art and science of the impossible: The human experience, DP MacNamara, Journal of the International Society for the Systems Sciences 65 (1) * Leadership in a Networked world, DP MacNamara, University of Hull
* Hull–A Digital City?, DP MacNamara, University of Hull, United Kingdom

==Citations==

==Links to relevant pages==
* https://hull.academia.edu/DeliaPembreyMacNamara
* https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=IEPoEyYAAAAJ&hl=en

[[Category: Members]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 11 - Peter Erdi

2026-03-12T07:42:18Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=Peter-Erdi-at_Kalamazoo.jpg
| name=[[Peter Erdi]]
| title=Students exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life
| date=Mar 11, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1172648251?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci
}}

<span style="font-size:200%">Re-imagining our world, making friends and making a difference"</span>

==Abstract==
In this project, students will explore agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life. You will have the opportunity to model complex systems without coding knowledge. Examples of models include population dynamics, social networks (e.g., voting), chemical kinetics, epidemics, economics (e.g., wealth distributions, cash flow), medicine (e.g., kidney health, disease spread, CRISPR), and animal collective behavior.
Six eight-minute-long presentations will be delivered, followed by a Q/A session.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1172648251|600|left|RStudents exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life: Peter Erdi}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Péter Érdi teaches a class INTRODUCTION TO COMPLEX SYSTEMS (25th time this year) at Kalamazoo College. During the minisymposium, the students will present their group project. While the exact projects are not known, the call will be given.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Peter Erdi]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 11 - Peter Erdi

2026-03-12T07:42:02Z

Laouris:

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=Peter-Erdi-at_Kalamazoo.jpg
| name=[[Peter Erdi]]
| title=Students exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life
| date=Mar 1, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1172648251?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci
}}

<span style="font-size:200%">Re-imagining our world, making friends and making a difference"</span>

==Abstract==
In this project, students will explore agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life. You will have the opportunity to model complex systems without coding knowledge. Examples of models include population dynamics, social networks (e.g., voting), chemical kinetics, epidemics, economics (e.g., wealth distributions, cash flow), medicine (e.g., kidney health, disease spread, CRISPR), and animal collective behavior.
Six eight-minute-long presentations will be delivered, followed by a Q/A session.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1172648251|600|left|RStudents exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life: Peter Erdi}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Péter Érdi teaches a class INTRODUCTION TO COMPLEX SYSTEMS (25th time this year) at Kalamazoo College. During the minisymposium, the students will present their group project. While the exact projects are not known, the call will be given.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Peter Erdi]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 11 - Peter Erdi

2026-03-12T07:41:32Z

Laouris: Created and polulated

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=Mcintyre_janet.png
| name=[[Peter Erdi]]
| title=Students exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life
| date=Mar 1, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1172648251?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci
}}

<span style="font-size:200%">Re-imagining our world, making friends and making a difference"</span>

==Abstract==
In this project, students will explore agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life. You will have the opportunity to model complex systems without coding knowledge. Examples of models include population dynamics, social networks (e.g., voting), chemical kinetics, epidemics, economics (e.g., wealth distributions, cash flow), medicine (e.g., kidney health, disease spread, CRISPR), and animal collective behavior.
Six eight-minute-long presentations will be delivered, followed by a Q/A session.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1172648251|600|left|RStudents exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life: Peter Erdi}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Péter Érdi teaches a class INTRODUCTION TO COMPLEX SYSTEMS (25th time this year) at Kalamazoo College. During the minisymposium, the students will present their group project. While the exact projects are not known, the call will be given.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Peter Erdi]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Peter Erdi

2026-03-12T07:40:18Z

Laouris: populated partly

{{
ISSS Member
|name= Peter Erdi
|image=Peter-Erdi-at_Kalamazoo.jpg
|period=To fill
|title=Member of the Board
|affiliation=Kalamazoo College
|notable_works=To fill
|interests=To fill
|degrees=To fill
|fields=To fill
|universities=To fill
|specializations= Computational neuroscientist
|orcid=To Fill
|achievements=To fill
|links=To fill

}}

'''Peter Erdi''' has joined ISSS in 19XX.

Peter works at the Dept of Computational Sciences, Wigner Research Centre for Physics in Hungary, and also as a Henry R. Luce Professor at Kalamazoo College, Michigan, USA. He was born in Hungary but now lives in Michigan. Peter is a member of many organizations and has written several books and articles in the fields of chemical kinetics, computational neuroscience, and complex systems.

==Personal Life==

==Academia and Career==

==Special Interests==

==Video Presentations==
{{#ev:vimeo| 1172648251|600|left|RStudents exploring agent-based modeling software, NetLogo, through its applications to complex systems in daily life: Peter Erdi}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Selected Publications==

==Citations==

==Links to relevant pages==

[[Category: Members]]

File:Peter-Erdi-at Kalamazoo.jpg

2026-03-12T07:31:24Z

Laouris:

Norma Romm

2026-03-07T09:03:49Z

Laouris: /* Video Presentations */ added mini symposium

{{ISSS Member
|name=Norma Romm
|image= NormaRomm.jpg
|period=1996-present
|title=Member
|affiliation= Professor Extraordinarius<br>affiliated to the University of South Africa
|notable_works=
|interests=[[Critical Systems Thinking]]<br>[[Transformative Research]]<br>[[Indigenous Relational Systemic Approach]]
|degrees=MA (University of Cape Town, 1982)<br>DLitt et Phil (University of South Africa, 1986)
|fields=Sociology; Education<br>Eco-systemic knowing-and-living
|universities=University of Cape Town<br>University of South Africa<br>University of Eswatini<br>University of Hull<br>European University of Cyprus
|specializations=Responsible research practice<br>Transformative research<br>An Indigenous systemic approach to knowing-and-being
|orcid=https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1722-9720
|achievements=

}}

'''Norma Romm''' joined ISSS in 1966. Norma is a South African [[Critical Systems Thinking| critical systems thinker]] interested in [[Transformative Research|Transformative Research and links with Indigenous onto-epistemology]]. She is a (retired) professor at the Department of Adult, Community, and Continuing Education at the University of South Africa. Norma was previously Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Swaziland<ref>https://www.socresonline.org.uk/2/3/romm.html</ref>; Deputy director of the Centre for Systems Studies, at the University of Hull<ref>https://www.socresonline.org.uk/2/3/romm.html</ref>; and Dean of Social Sciences and Humanities at the European University of Cyprus. (See her ORCID page for details.)

==Personal Life==
Norma has storied her personal life (as relevant to her concerns) in Chapter 2 of her [[Responsible Research Practice]], 2018 book.

==Academia and Career==
See ORCID site https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1722-9720

==Notable Awards==

* 2015: Award (plaque) by the University of South Africa in recognition of being rated by South Africa’s National Research Foundation for being an established researcher in the fields of researcher accountability, responsible research practice, and constructivist epistemology (2015-2020).

* 2016: Chancellor’s Prize for Excellence in Research (Award given by the University of South Africa).

* 2020: Re-rating (for the period 2021-2026) by the South African National Research Foundation: Category B2 in the specialization fields of responsible research practice, transformative research, and the Indigenous paradigm. (Definition of B2: All or the overriding majority of reviewers utilized to review the application are firmly convinced that the applicant enjoys considerable international recognition for the high quality and impact of his/her recent research outputs.)

* 2022: Awarded a prize from the University of South Africa: Women in Research Leadership Award for Excellence in Research (from Vice-Principal: Research, Postgraduate Studies, Innovation & Commercialization).
|links=https://www.taosinstitute.net/about-us/people/institute-associates/africa-north-africa-middle-east/norma-romm

==Notable Works==
====SOLE-AUTHORED BOOKS====
* [[The Methodologies of Positivism and Marxism]], 1991, Macmillan
* [[Accountability in Social Research: Issues and Debates]], 2001, Kluwer Academic/Plenum.<br>
This was the second top bestselling e-book of Kluwer publishers for more than a year.
* [[New Racism: Revisiting Researcher Accountabilities]], 2010, Springer
* [[Responsible Research Practice: Revisiting Transformative Paradigm in Social Research]], 2018, Springer
For extracts of reviews of this book, please see the following: https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783319743844#reviews. Donna Mertens provided an endorsement of the book (page v of the book). An extensive review by Avivit Cherrington in the journal Educational Research for Social Change can be found at http://ersc.nmmu.ac.za/articles/ERSC_Sept_2018_Vol_7_No_2_Book_Report_pp_146-149.pdf. Another extensive review by Susan Goff in the journal Systemic Practice and Action Research can be found at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11213-019-09497-6. Another detailed review was written by Vassilissa Carangio for the journal Ethnic and Racial Studies and published online in 2020 (DOI: 10.1080/01419870.2020.1831569). And yet another comprehensive review (by Dan Wulff) for the journal The Qualitative Report can be found at https://nsuworks.nova.edu/tqr/vol26/iss4/7/

====CO-AUTHORED BOOKS====
* 1996: ''Diversity Management: Triple Loop Learning'' (co-authored with Robert Flood). Wiley.
* 2008: ''Assessment of the Impact of HIV and AIDS in the Informal Economy in Zambia'' (co-authored with Veronica McKay). International Labor Organization.

====CO-EDITED BOOKS (reverse chronological order)====
* 2022 (Ed.): ''Covid-19: Perspectives Across Africa'' (co-edited with A. Fymat and J. Kapalanga). The compilation of this book emanated from the (virtual) annual conference of the Society for the Advancement of Science in Africa (SASA), 2020/2021. Tellwell.
* 2019 (Ed.): ''Mixed Methods and Cross-Disciplinary Research Towards Cultivating Eco-systemic Living'' (co-edited with Janet McIntyre-Mills). Springer.
* 2019 (Ed.): ''Democracy and Governance for Resourcing the Commons'' (co-edited with Janet McIntyre-Mills and Yvonne Corcoran-Nantes). Springer.
* 2017 (Ed.): ''Balancing Individualism and Collectivism: Social and Environmental Justice'' (co-edited with Janet McIntyre-Mills and Yvonne Corcoran-Nantes). Springer.
* 1996 (Ed.): ''Critical Systems Thinking: Current Research and Practice'' (co-edited with Robert Flood). Plenum.
* 1994 (Ed.): ''Social Theory'' (co-edited with Michael Sarakinsky). Heinemann.

'''SOME NOTABLE ARTICLES''' (in reverse chronological order; please see selected publications for selected additional works):
* 2025. Facilitation of focus groups towards conflict resolution among pastoralists and farmers in Northern Uganda: An Indigenous relational approach (co-authored with F.A. Adyanga and D. Toolit). ''The Qualitative Report". '''30, 8:''' 4078-4105. https://doi.org/10.46743/2160-3715/2025.7619
* 2023. Reflections on the value of mixed focus groups with adult learner research participants: Exploring gender disparities and gendered relationships (co-authored with X. Tawana). ''Participatory Educational Research'', '''10, 1:''' 290-309. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/366918940_Reflections_on_the_Value_of_Mixed_Focus_Groups_with_Adult_Learner_Research_Participants_Exploring_Gender_Disparities_and_Gendered_Relationships
*2023: Towards eco-systemic living: Learning with Indigenous leaders in Africa and Indonesia through a community of practice (co-authored with J. J. McIntyre-Mills, P. V. Lethole, M. Makaulule, R. Wirawan & I. Widianingsih). ''Systems Research and Behavioral Science'' '''40, 5''': 779-786. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/sres.2976?af=R
*2022: [[Jabsc/article/view/4930|Action research as a hopeful response to apocalypse: A review of Bradbury, H. (2022). How to do Action Research for Transformations at a Time of Eco-social Crisis. Edward Elgar.]] ''Journal of Awareness-Based Systems Change'', '''2, 2''': 141-148.
*2022: Reflections upon our way of invoking an indigenous paradigm to co-explore community mobilization against irresponsible practices of foreign-owned companies in Nwoya District, Uganda (co-authored with F. A. Adyanga). ''The Qualitative Report'', '''27, 7:''' Art. 13.
*2022: African Youth’s visioning for re-inventing democracy in the digital era: A case of use of Structured Dialogical Design (co-authored with Y. Laouris). ''World Futures'', '''78, 1:''' 18-61. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02604027.2021.2014112
*2022: Structured dialogical design as a problem structuring method illustrated in a Re-invent democracy project (co-authored with Y. Laouris). ''European Journal of Operational Research'', '''301, 3''': 1072-1087.
* 2020: Eliciting children’s/young people’s (group) engagement with scenarios as participatory research practice for exploring and extending responses to climate change. ''Participatory Educational Research'', 7, 1: i-xiv. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339609077_Eliciting_Children'sYoung_People's_Group_Engagement_with_Scenarios_as_Participatory_Research_Practice_for_Exploring_and_Extending_Responses_to_Climate_Change

==Video Presentations==
* https://cdpd.fisip.unpad.ac.id/webinar-series-metodologi-riset-seri-3-mixed-methods-research-from-a-transformative-poin-of-view/ (July 2020)
* 2023 (October). Invited by the Taos Institute to co-prepare a video for the 30th anniversary of the Institute (one of 30 videos for the celebration). The recording (in conversation with Francis Adyanga) is called “Indigenous views of relationality from Africa”.
* 2022 (November). Invited to speak in a panel discussion in a session entitled “research in multiple worlds” at a conference organised by the Taos Institute around the theme of Unfolding Dialogues: Relational Resources for Global Good (12-18 November 2022).

<table width="100%" style="padding:10px;">
<tr>
{{#ev:youtube| mMiiA9q9YMI |300|}}
{{#ev:youtube| irgoSfJ0U8E |300|}}
{{#ev:vimeo| 1168257341 |300|}}
</tr>
</table>

==Selected Publications==
*2025: Indigenous ways of worlding as systemic understanding of human and more-than-human influence in generating worlds in becoming. ''Journal of the International Society for the Systems Sciences'': Proceedings of the 68th Meeting of the International Society for the Systems Sciences (held in 2024). Article site: https://journals.isss.org/index.php/jisss/article/view/4192
*2025: Responsibility to heed the call through a community of practice: The influence of indigenous wisdom (co-authored with M. Makaulule, P. Lethole, V. Netshandama, B. Mabunda, E. Pitsoane and J. McIntyre-Mills). ''Journal of the International Society for the Systems Sciences'': Proceedings of the 68th Meeting of the International Society for the Systems Sciences (held in 2024). Article site: https://journals.isss.org/index.php/jisss/article/view/4202/1271
*2025: Harvesting Indigenous onto-epistemologies for contributing to a more balanced and sustainable future: Exploring options for performing better worlds, in H''arnessing Indigenous Epistemologies for Sustainable Progress'', 51-72, edited by P. Ngulube. IGI Global.
*2024: Metalogue on constructivism and why thinking matters (with J. J. McIntyre-Mills, A. Rayner, D. Finlayson, and R. Treviño-Cisneros), in A''ffirmative Intervention to Support Multispecies Relationships'', 371-386, edited by J. J. McIntyre-Mills. Springer.
*2024: Exploring lessons on re-generative living with a community of practice in South Africa and Indonesia (with J. J. McIntyre-Mills, P. V. Lethole, M. Makaulule, R. Wirawan, and I. Widianingsih, in ''Affirmative Intervention to Support Multispecies Relationships'', 441-474, edited by J. J. McIntyre-Mills. Springer.
*2024: Re-generating local, regional and international leadership through community engagement on earning, learning and growing a future (with J. J. McIntyre-Mills, M. Makaulule, Y. Laouris, P. V. Lethole, K. Dye, H. Mahareeq, F. Younis, T. Makhlouf, I. Solomou, G. Mabezere, V. Netshandama, R. Riswanda, and I. Widianingsih), in ''Affirmative Intervention to Support Multispecies Relationships'', 475-494, edited by J. J. McIntyre-Mills. Springer.
*2024: An Indigenous relational approach to systemic thinking and being: Focus on participatory onto-epistemology. ''Systemic Practice and Action Research''. https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s11213-024-09672-4.pdf
*2023: Indigenous interventions, sociological understandings of inequalities and Covid-19, in ''Critically Diverse Perspectives on Covid-19: Interviews with a Varied Range of South Africans'', 70-81, edited by S. Dey and S. Chattopadhyay. UNISA Press & National Institute for the Humanities & Social Sciences.
*2022: Redesigning education for regeneration and well-being: Exploring the potential of digital engagement in the COVID-19 context (co-authored with J. McIntyre-Mills, P.V. Lethole, M. Makaulule, and R. Wirawan), in ''Covid-19: Perspectives Across Africa'', 264-314, edited by A. Fymat, N.R.A. Romm and J. Kapalanga. Tellwell. (This book emanated from the virtual annual conference of the Society for the Advancement of Science in Africa (SASA), 2020/2021.)
*2022: Collective action for regeneration of the web of life in the face of disruptive injustice”(co-authored with F. Adyanga), in ''Transformative Education for Re-generation and Wellbeing'', 93-115, edited by J. J. McIntyre-Mills and Y. Corcoran-Nantes. Springer.
*2022: Rethinking professional researcher involvement in community-engaged evaluation research: A case of adult education in South Africa (co-authored with A. Arko-Achemfuor), in ''Reimagining Development Education in Africa'', 191-208, edited by D. Addae and O.A.T. Kwapong. Springer.
*2021: Responsibly and performatively researching multi-species relationships, in ''From Polarization to Multispecies Relationships'', 223-260, edited by J. McIntyre-Mills and Y. Corcoran-Nantes. Springer.
*2021: Prospects for sustainable living with focus on interrelatedness, interdependence and mutuality: Some African perspectives (co-authored with P. V. Lethole), in ''From Polarization to Multispecies Relationships'', 87-114, edited by J. McIntyre-Mills and Y. Corcoran-Nantes. Springer.
*2020: Reflections on a post-qualitative inquiry with children/young people: Exploring and furthering a performative research ethics. ''Forum: Qualitative Social Research,'' 21, 1: Art 6.
* 2020: Systemic research practices towards the development of an eco-community in Vietnam: Some joint post-facto reflections (co-authored with H.T.N. Hoang). ''Systemic Practice and Action Research'', 33, 6: 599-624.
* 2019: Academic-practitioner collaboration with communities towards social and ecological transformation (co-authored with A. Arko-Achemfuor & L. Serolong). ''International Journal of Transformative Research,'' 6, 1:1-9.
* 2018: Systemic thinking and practice toward facilitating inclusive education: Reflections on a case of co-generated knowledge and action in South Africa (co-authored with L.D.N. Tlale). ''Systemic Practice and Action Research'', 31: 105-120.
* 2018: A systemic approach to processes of power in learning organizations: Part I – literature, theory, and methodology of triple loop learning (co-authored with R.L. Flood). ''The Learning Organization'', 25, 4: 260-272.
* 2018: A systemic approach to processes of power in learning organizations: Part II – triple loop learning and a facilitative intervention in the “500 Schools Project” (co-authored with R.L. Flood). ''The Learning Organization'' 25, 5: 344-352.
* 2017: Researching Indigenous ways of knowing-and-being, in ''Handbook of Research on Theoretical Perspectives on Indigenous Knowledge Systems in Developing Countries''''',''' 22-48''',''' edited by P. Ngulube'''.''' IGI Global publications.
* 2017: Researching Indigenous science knowledge integration in formal education: Interpreting some perspectives from the field (co-authored with F.A. Adyanga). ''International Journal of Educational Development in Africa'', 3, 1 (doi:10.25159/2312-3540/2696).
* 2015: Ubuntu-inspired training of adult literacy teachers as a route to generating “community” enterprises (co-authored with K.P. Quan-Baffour), ''Journal of Literacy Research,'' 46, 4: 455-474. For a podcast presentation please visit: <nowiki>http://www.voiceofliteracy.org/posts/63144</nowiki>.
* 2015: Reviewing the transformative paradigm: A critical systemic and relational (indigenous) lens. ''Systemic Practice and Action Research'', 28: 411-427.
* 2014: Indigenous ways of knowing and possibilities for re-envisaging globalization: Implications for human ecology. ''Journal of Human Ecology'', 48, 1: 123-133.
* 2008: A systemic approach to addressing HIV/AIDS in the informal economy in Zambia: Methodological pluralism revisited (co-authored with V. McKay), ''International Journal of Applied Systemic Studies'' '''1, 4''': 375-397.
* 2002: Responsible knowing: A better basis for management science, ''Reason in Practice'' '''2, 1''': 59-77.
* 2002: A Trusting Constructivist approach to systemic inquiry: Exploring accountability, ''Systems Research and Behavioral Science'', '''19, 5''': 455-467.
* 2002: Reconsidering the exploration of power distance: an active case study approach (co-authored with C-Y. Hsu), ''Omega'' '''30, 6''': 403-414.
* 2001: Critical facilitation: Learning through intervention in group processes (co-authored with W. Gregory), ''Management Learning'' '''32, 4''': 453-467.
* 1996: Inquiry-and-intervention in systems planning: Probing methodological rationalities, ''World Futures'' '''47:''' 25-36.
* 1995: Knowing as intervention: Reflections on the application of systems ideas, ''Systems Practice'' '''8, 2''': 137-167.

==Citations==
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=MSRpVtEAAAAJ&hl=en

==Links to relevant pages==
https://www.taosinstitute.net/about-us/people/institute-associates/africa-north-africa-middle-east/norma-romm

[[Category: Members]]

<references />

Norma Romm

2026-03-07T09:01:49Z

Laouris: /* Video Presentations */

{{ISSS Member
|name=Norma Romm
|image= NormaRomm.jpg
|period=1996-present
|title=Member
|affiliation= Professor Extraordinarius<br>affiliated to the University of South Africa
|notable_works=
|interests=[[Critical Systems Thinking]]<br>[[Transformative Research]]<br>[[Indigenous Relational Systemic Approach]]
|degrees=MA (University of Cape Town, 1982)<br>DLitt et Phil (University of South Africa, 1986)
|fields=Sociology; Education<br>Eco-systemic knowing-and-living
|universities=University of Cape Town<br>University of South Africa<br>University of Eswatini<br>University of Hull<br>European University of Cyprus
|specializations=Responsible research practice<br>Transformative research<br>An Indigenous systemic approach to knowing-and-being
|orcid=https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1722-9720
|achievements=

}}

'''Norma Romm''' joined ISSS in 1966. Norma is a South African [[Critical Systems Thinking| critical systems thinker]] interested in [[Transformative Research|Transformative Research and links with Indigenous onto-epistemology]]. She is a (retired) professor at the Department of Adult, Community, and Continuing Education at the University of South Africa. Norma was previously Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Swaziland<ref>https://www.socresonline.org.uk/2/3/romm.html</ref>; Deputy director of the Centre for Systems Studies, at the University of Hull<ref>https://www.socresonline.org.uk/2/3/romm.html</ref>; and Dean of Social Sciences and Humanities at the European University of Cyprus. (See her ORCID page for details.)

==Personal Life==
Norma has storied her personal life (as relevant to her concerns) in Chapter 2 of her [[Responsible Research Practice]], 2018 book.

==Academia and Career==
See ORCID site https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1722-9720

==Notable Awards==

* 2015: Award (plaque) by the University of South Africa in recognition of being rated by South Africa’s National Research Foundation for being an established researcher in the fields of researcher accountability, responsible research practice, and constructivist epistemology (2015-2020).

* 2016: Chancellor’s Prize for Excellence in Research (Award given by the University of South Africa).

* 2020: Re-rating (for the period 2021-2026) by the South African National Research Foundation: Category B2 in the specialization fields of responsible research practice, transformative research, and the Indigenous paradigm. (Definition of B2: All or the overriding majority of reviewers utilized to review the application are firmly convinced that the applicant enjoys considerable international recognition for the high quality and impact of his/her recent research outputs.)

* 2022: Awarded a prize from the University of South Africa: Women in Research Leadership Award for Excellence in Research (from Vice-Principal: Research, Postgraduate Studies, Innovation & Commercialization).
|links=https://www.taosinstitute.net/about-us/people/institute-associates/africa-north-africa-middle-east/norma-romm

==Notable Works==
====SOLE-AUTHORED BOOKS====
* [[The Methodologies of Positivism and Marxism]], 1991, Macmillan
* [[Accountability in Social Research: Issues and Debates]], 2001, Kluwer Academic/Plenum.<br>
This was the second top bestselling e-book of Kluwer publishers for more than a year.
* [[New Racism: Revisiting Researcher Accountabilities]], 2010, Springer
* [[Responsible Research Practice: Revisiting Transformative Paradigm in Social Research]], 2018, Springer
For extracts of reviews of this book, please see the following: https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783319743844#reviews. Donna Mertens provided an endorsement of the book (page v of the book). An extensive review by Avivit Cherrington in the journal Educational Research for Social Change can be found at http://ersc.nmmu.ac.za/articles/ERSC_Sept_2018_Vol_7_No_2_Book_Report_pp_146-149.pdf. Another extensive review by Susan Goff in the journal Systemic Practice and Action Research can be found at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11213-019-09497-6. Another detailed review was written by Vassilissa Carangio for the journal Ethnic and Racial Studies and published online in 2020 (DOI: 10.1080/01419870.2020.1831569). And yet another comprehensive review (by Dan Wulff) for the journal The Qualitative Report can be found at https://nsuworks.nova.edu/tqr/vol26/iss4/7/

====CO-AUTHORED BOOKS====
* 1996: ''Diversity Management: Triple Loop Learning'' (co-authored with Robert Flood). Wiley.
* 2008: ''Assessment of the Impact of HIV and AIDS in the Informal Economy in Zambia'' (co-authored with Veronica McKay). International Labor Organization.

====CO-EDITED BOOKS (reverse chronological order)====
* 2022 (Ed.): ''Covid-19: Perspectives Across Africa'' (co-edited with A. Fymat and J. Kapalanga). The compilation of this book emanated from the (virtual) annual conference of the Society for the Advancement of Science in Africa (SASA), 2020/2021. Tellwell.
* 2019 (Ed.): ''Mixed Methods and Cross-Disciplinary Research Towards Cultivating Eco-systemic Living'' (co-edited with Janet McIntyre-Mills). Springer.
* 2019 (Ed.): ''Democracy and Governance for Resourcing the Commons'' (co-edited with Janet McIntyre-Mills and Yvonne Corcoran-Nantes). Springer.
* 2017 (Ed.): ''Balancing Individualism and Collectivism: Social and Environmental Justice'' (co-edited with Janet McIntyre-Mills and Yvonne Corcoran-Nantes). Springer.
* 1996 (Ed.): ''Critical Systems Thinking: Current Research and Practice'' (co-edited with Robert Flood). Plenum.
* 1994 (Ed.): ''Social Theory'' (co-edited with Michael Sarakinsky). Heinemann.

'''SOME NOTABLE ARTICLES''' (in reverse chronological order; please see selected publications for selected additional works):
* 2025. Facilitation of focus groups towards conflict resolution among pastoralists and farmers in Northern Uganda: An Indigenous relational approach (co-authored with F.A. Adyanga and D. Toolit). ''The Qualitative Report". '''30, 8:''' 4078-4105. https://doi.org/10.46743/2160-3715/2025.7619
* 2023. Reflections on the value of mixed focus groups with adult learner research participants: Exploring gender disparities and gendered relationships (co-authored with X. Tawana). ''Participatory Educational Research'', '''10, 1:''' 290-309. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/366918940_Reflections_on_the_Value_of_Mixed_Focus_Groups_with_Adult_Learner_Research_Participants_Exploring_Gender_Disparities_and_Gendered_Relationships
*2023: Towards eco-systemic living: Learning with Indigenous leaders in Africa and Indonesia through a community of practice (co-authored with J. J. McIntyre-Mills, P. V. Lethole, M. Makaulule, R. Wirawan & I. Widianingsih). ''Systems Research and Behavioral Science'' '''40, 5''': 779-786. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/sres.2976?af=R
*2022: [[Jabsc/article/view/4930|Action research as a hopeful response to apocalypse: A review of Bradbury, H. (2022). How to do Action Research for Transformations at a Time of Eco-social Crisis. Edward Elgar.]] ''Journal of Awareness-Based Systems Change'', '''2, 2''': 141-148.
*2022: Reflections upon our way of invoking an indigenous paradigm to co-explore community mobilization against irresponsible practices of foreign-owned companies in Nwoya District, Uganda (co-authored with F. A. Adyanga). ''The Qualitative Report'', '''27, 7:''' Art. 13.
*2022: African Youth’s visioning for re-inventing democracy in the digital era: A case of use of Structured Dialogical Design (co-authored with Y. Laouris). ''World Futures'', '''78, 1:''' 18-61. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02604027.2021.2014112
*2022: Structured dialogical design as a problem structuring method illustrated in a Re-invent democracy project (co-authored with Y. Laouris). ''European Journal of Operational Research'', '''301, 3''': 1072-1087.
* 2020: Eliciting children’s/young people’s (group) engagement with scenarios as participatory research practice for exploring and extending responses to climate change. ''Participatory Educational Research'', 7, 1: i-xiv. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339609077_Eliciting_Children'sYoung_People's_Group_Engagement_with_Scenarios_as_Participatory_Research_Practice_for_Exploring_and_Extending_Responses_to_Climate_Change

==Video Presentations==
* https://cdpd.fisip.unpad.ac.id/webinar-series-metodologi-riset-seri-3-mixed-methods-research-from-a-transformative-poin-of-view/ (July 2020)
* 2023 (October). Invited by the Taos Institute to co-prepare a video for the 30th anniversary of the Institute (one of 30 videos for the celebration). The recording (in conversation with Francis Adyanga) is called “Indigenous views of relationality from Africa”.
* 2022 (November). Invited to speak in a panel discussion in a session entitled “research in multiple worlds” at a conference organised by the Taos Institute around the theme of Unfolding Dialogues: Relational Resources for Global Good (12-18 November 2022).

<table width="100%" style="padding:10px;">
<tr>
{{#ev:youtube| mMiiA9q9YMI |350|left}}
{{#ev:youtube| irgoSfJ0U8E |350|center}}
{{#ev:youtube| 1168257341 |350|right}}
</tr>
</table>

==Selected Publications==
*2025: Indigenous ways of worlding as systemic understanding of human and more-than-human influence in generating worlds in becoming. ''Journal of the International Society for the Systems Sciences'': Proceedings of the 68th Meeting of the International Society for the Systems Sciences (held in 2024). Article site: https://journals.isss.org/index.php/jisss/article/view/4192
*2025: Responsibility to heed the call through a community of practice: The influence of indigenous wisdom (co-authored with M. Makaulule, P. Lethole, V. Netshandama, B. Mabunda, E. Pitsoane and J. McIntyre-Mills). ''Journal of the International Society for the Systems Sciences'': Proceedings of the 68th Meeting of the International Society for the Systems Sciences (held in 2024). Article site: https://journals.isss.org/index.php/jisss/article/view/4202/1271
*2025: Harvesting Indigenous onto-epistemologies for contributing to a more balanced and sustainable future: Exploring options for performing better worlds, in H''arnessing Indigenous Epistemologies for Sustainable Progress'', 51-72, edited by P. Ngulube. IGI Global.
*2024: Metalogue on constructivism and why thinking matters (with J. J. McIntyre-Mills, A. Rayner, D. Finlayson, and R. Treviño-Cisneros), in A''ffirmative Intervention to Support Multispecies Relationships'', 371-386, edited by J. J. McIntyre-Mills. Springer.
*2024: Exploring lessons on re-generative living with a community of practice in South Africa and Indonesia (with J. J. McIntyre-Mills, P. V. Lethole, M. Makaulule, R. Wirawan, and I. Widianingsih, in ''Affirmative Intervention to Support Multispecies Relationships'', 441-474, edited by J. J. McIntyre-Mills. Springer.
*2024: Re-generating local, regional and international leadership through community engagement on earning, learning and growing a future (with J. J. McIntyre-Mills, M. Makaulule, Y. Laouris, P. V. Lethole, K. Dye, H. Mahareeq, F. Younis, T. Makhlouf, I. Solomou, G. Mabezere, V. Netshandama, R. Riswanda, and I. Widianingsih), in ''Affirmative Intervention to Support Multispecies Relationships'', 475-494, edited by J. J. McIntyre-Mills. Springer.
*2024: An Indigenous relational approach to systemic thinking and being: Focus on participatory onto-epistemology. ''Systemic Practice and Action Research''. https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s11213-024-09672-4.pdf
*2023: Indigenous interventions, sociological understandings of inequalities and Covid-19, in ''Critically Diverse Perspectives on Covid-19: Interviews with a Varied Range of South Africans'', 70-81, edited by S. Dey and S. Chattopadhyay. UNISA Press & National Institute for the Humanities & Social Sciences.
*2022: Redesigning education for regeneration and well-being: Exploring the potential of digital engagement in the COVID-19 context (co-authored with J. McIntyre-Mills, P.V. Lethole, M. Makaulule, and R. Wirawan), in ''Covid-19: Perspectives Across Africa'', 264-314, edited by A. Fymat, N.R.A. Romm and J. Kapalanga. Tellwell. (This book emanated from the virtual annual conference of the Society for the Advancement of Science in Africa (SASA), 2020/2021.)
*2022: Collective action for regeneration of the web of life in the face of disruptive injustice”(co-authored with F. Adyanga), in ''Transformative Education for Re-generation and Wellbeing'', 93-115, edited by J. J. McIntyre-Mills and Y. Corcoran-Nantes. Springer.
*2022: Rethinking professional researcher involvement in community-engaged evaluation research: A case of adult education in South Africa (co-authored with A. Arko-Achemfuor), in ''Reimagining Development Education in Africa'', 191-208, edited by D. Addae and O.A.T. Kwapong. Springer.
*2021: Responsibly and performatively researching multi-species relationships, in ''From Polarization to Multispecies Relationships'', 223-260, edited by J. McIntyre-Mills and Y. Corcoran-Nantes. Springer.
*2021: Prospects for sustainable living with focus on interrelatedness, interdependence and mutuality: Some African perspectives (co-authored with P. V. Lethole), in ''From Polarization to Multispecies Relationships'', 87-114, edited by J. McIntyre-Mills and Y. Corcoran-Nantes. Springer.
*2020: Reflections on a post-qualitative inquiry with children/young people: Exploring and furthering a performative research ethics. ''Forum: Qualitative Social Research,'' 21, 1: Art 6.
* 2020: Systemic research practices towards the development of an eco-community in Vietnam: Some joint post-facto reflections (co-authored with H.T.N. Hoang). ''Systemic Practice and Action Research'', 33, 6: 599-624.
* 2019: Academic-practitioner collaboration with communities towards social and ecological transformation (co-authored with A. Arko-Achemfuor & L. Serolong). ''International Journal of Transformative Research,'' 6, 1:1-9.
* 2018: Systemic thinking and practice toward facilitating inclusive education: Reflections on a case of co-generated knowledge and action in South Africa (co-authored with L.D.N. Tlale). ''Systemic Practice and Action Research'', 31: 105-120.
* 2018: A systemic approach to processes of power in learning organizations: Part I – literature, theory, and methodology of triple loop learning (co-authored with R.L. Flood). ''The Learning Organization'', 25, 4: 260-272.
* 2018: A systemic approach to processes of power in learning organizations: Part II – triple loop learning and a facilitative intervention in the “500 Schools Project” (co-authored with R.L. Flood). ''The Learning Organization'' 25, 5: 344-352.
* 2017: Researching Indigenous ways of knowing-and-being, in ''Handbook of Research on Theoretical Perspectives on Indigenous Knowledge Systems in Developing Countries''''',''' 22-48''',''' edited by P. Ngulube'''.''' IGI Global publications.
* 2017: Researching Indigenous science knowledge integration in formal education: Interpreting some perspectives from the field (co-authored with F.A. Adyanga). ''International Journal of Educational Development in Africa'', 3, 1 (doi:10.25159/2312-3540/2696).
* 2015: Ubuntu-inspired training of adult literacy teachers as a route to generating “community” enterprises (co-authored with K.P. Quan-Baffour), ''Journal of Literacy Research,'' 46, 4: 455-474. For a podcast presentation please visit: <nowiki>http://www.voiceofliteracy.org/posts/63144</nowiki>.
* 2015: Reviewing the transformative paradigm: A critical systemic and relational (indigenous) lens. ''Systemic Practice and Action Research'', 28: 411-427.
* 2014: Indigenous ways of knowing and possibilities for re-envisaging globalization: Implications for human ecology. ''Journal of Human Ecology'', 48, 1: 123-133.
* 2008: A systemic approach to addressing HIV/AIDS in the informal economy in Zambia: Methodological pluralism revisited (co-authored with V. McKay), ''International Journal of Applied Systemic Studies'' '''1, 4''': 375-397.
* 2002: Responsible knowing: A better basis for management science, ''Reason in Practice'' '''2, 1''': 59-77.
* 2002: A Trusting Constructivist approach to systemic inquiry: Exploring accountability, ''Systems Research and Behavioral Science'', '''19, 5''': 455-467.
* 2002: Reconsidering the exploration of power distance: an active case study approach (co-authored with C-Y. Hsu), ''Omega'' '''30, 6''': 403-414.
* 2001: Critical facilitation: Learning through intervention in group processes (co-authored with W. Gregory), ''Management Learning'' '''32, 4''': 453-467.
* 1996: Inquiry-and-intervention in systems planning: Probing methodological rationalities, ''World Futures'' '''47:''' 25-36.
* 1995: Knowing as intervention: Reflections on the application of systems ideas, ''Systems Practice'' '''8, 2''': 137-167.

==Citations==
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=MSRpVtEAAAAJ&hl=en

==Links to relevant pages==
https://www.taosinstitute.net/about-us/people/institute-associates/africa-north-africa-middle-east/norma-romm

[[Category: Members]]

<references />

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 6 - Janet McIntyre

2026-03-07T08:44:28Z

Laouris: added video

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=Mcintyre_janet.png
| name=[[Janet McIntyre]]
| title=Re-imagining our world, making friends and making a difference
| date=Mar 6, 2026
| presentation=ISSS_MiniSymposium_JanetMcIntyre_20260306.pdf
| link=https://vimeo.com/1170997055?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci#t=231
}}

<span style="font-size:200%">Re-imagining our world, making friends and making a difference"</span>

==Abstract==
The short presentation by [[Janet McIntyre]] is aimed at inspiring conversation. As members of ISSS and members of the community of practice are scattered in many different time zones, a short presentation will be recorded on sources of practical inspiration, intergenerational leadership, and case studies that have made a difference to people’s lives. We will also reflect on our own efforts to do community engagement and what we learn together as a community of practice. We will pose some questions for a conversation and invite responses as part of a synchronous conversation, and an asynchronous metalogue.
If we do not develop equanimity and solidarity, what are the implications for social and environmental justice? What will it mean for the future of life ( as we know it) on this planet?

{{#ev:vimeo|1170997055|600|left|Re-imagining our world, making friends and making a difference: Janet McIntyre}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Janet McIntyre]] publishes as Janet J. McIntyre-Mills (D.Litt. et Phil., Sociology). She is Adjunct Professor Extraordinarius at the University of South Africa in the College of Education and Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Adelaide Business School) since 2019. She also holds affiliations with universities in Indonesia, such as Universitas Padjadjaran where she is linked with the Centre for Decentralization and Participatory Development Research and chairs Balancing Individualism and Collectivism , a Special Integration Group of the International Systems Sciences . Her research focuses on systemic representation, accountability and re-generation applied to social and environmental justice concerns and includes several articles in accredited journals as well as edited and sole-authored volumes such as ‘Affirmative Intervention to support Multispecies Relationships’(2024), ‘From Polarisation to Multispecies Relationships’, Springer (2021); ‘Planetary Passport: Re-presentation, Accountability and Regeneration’ (2017); and ‘Systemic Ethics and Non-anthropocentric Stewardship’ (2014), Springer, New York. She has supervised 35 Ph.D. students to successful completion and continues to mentor and facilitate research with colleagues. She facilitates a community of practice spanning academics, practitioners and community members.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Janet McIntyre]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 6 - Janet McIntyre

2026-03-06T11:03:39Z

Laouris: pdf

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=Mcintyre_janet.png
| name=[[Janet McIntyre]]
| title=Re-imagining our world , making friends and making a difference
| date=Mar 6, 2026
| presentation=ISSS_MiniSymposium_JanetMcIntyre_20260306.pdf
| link=https://vimeo.com/1129991205
}}

<span style="font-size:200%">Re-imagining our world , making friends and making a difference"</span>

==Abstract==
The short presentation by [[Janet McIntyre]] is aimed at inspiring conversation. As members of ISSS and members of the community of practice are scattered in many different time zones a short presentation will be recorded on sources of practical inspiration, intergenerational leadership and case studies that have made a difference to people’s lives. We will also reflect on our own efforts to do community engagement and what we learn together as a community of practice. We will pose some questions for a conversation and invite responses as part of a synchronous conversation and an asynchronous metalogue.
If we do not develop equanimity and solidarity – what are the implications for social and environmental justice ? What will it mean for the future of life ( as we know it ) on this planet?

{{#ev:vimeo| 1129991205 |600|left|Re-imagining our world, making friends and making a difference: Janet McIntyre}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Janet McIntyre]] publishes as Janet J. McIntyre-Mills (D.Litt. et Phil., Sociology). She is Adjunct Professor Extraordinarius at the University of South Africa in the College of Education and Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Adelaide Business School) since 2019. She also holds affiliations with universities in Indonesia, such as Universitas Padjadjaran where she is linked with the Centre for Decentralization and Participatory Development Research and chairs Balancing Individualism and Collectivism , a Special Integration Group of the International Systems Sciences . Her research focuses on systemic representation, accountability and re-generation applied to social and environmental justice concerns and includes several articles in accredited journals as well as edited and sole-authored volumes such as ‘Affirmative Intervention to support Multispecies Relationships’(2024), ‘From Polarisation to Multispecies Relationships’, Springer (2021); ‘Planetary Passport: Re-presentation, Accountability and Regeneration’ (2017); and ‘Systemic Ethics and Non-anthropocentric Stewardship’ (2014), Springer, New York. She has supervised 35 Ph.D. students to successful completion and continues to mentor and facilitate research with colleagues. She facilitates a community of practice spanning academics, practitioners and community members.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Janet McIntyre]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

File:ISSS MiniSymposium JanetMcIntyre 20260306.pdf

2026-03-06T11:02:42Z

Laouris:

Mini Symposium 2026 Mar 6 - Janet McIntyre

2026-03-06T10:43:42Z

Laouris: created

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=Mcintyre_janet.png
| name=[[Janet McIntyre]]
| title=Re-imagining our world , making friends and making a difference
| date=Mar 6, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1129991205
}}

<span style="font-size:200%">Re-imagining our world , making friends and making a difference"</span>

==Abstract==
The short presentation by [[Janet McIntyre]] is aimed at inspiring conversation. As members of ISSS and members of the community of practice are scattered in many different time zones a short presentation will be recorded on sources of practical inspiration, intergenerational leadership and case studies that have made a difference to people’s lives. We will also reflect on our own efforts to do community engagement and what we learn together as a community of practice. We will pose some questions for a conversation and invite responses as part of a synchronous conversation and an asynchronous metalogue.
If we do not develop equanimity and solidarity – what are the implications for social and environmental justice ? What will it mean for the future of life ( as we know it ) on this planet?

{{#ev:vimeo| 1129991205 |600|left|Re-imagining our world, making friends and making a difference: Janet McIntyre}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Janet McIntyre]] publishes as Janet J. McIntyre-Mills (D.Litt. et Phil., Sociology). She is Adjunct Professor Extraordinarius at the University of South Africa in the College of Education and Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Adelaide Business School) since 2019. She also holds affiliations with universities in Indonesia, such as Universitas Padjadjaran where she is linked with the Centre for Decentralization and Participatory Development Research and chairs Balancing Individualism and Collectivism , a Special Integration Group of the International Systems Sciences . Her research focuses on systemic representation, accountability and re-generation applied to social and environmental justice concerns and includes several articles in accredited journals as well as edited and sole-authored volumes such as ‘Affirmative Intervention to support Multispecies Relationships’(2024), ‘From Polarisation to Multispecies Relationships’, Springer (2021); ‘Planetary Passport: Re-presentation, Accountability and Regeneration’ (2017); and ‘Systemic Ethics and Non-anthropocentric Stewardship’ (2014), Springer, New York. She has supervised 35 Ph.D. students to successful completion and continues to mentor and facilitate research with colleagues. She facilitates a community of practice spanning academics, practitioners and community members.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Janet McIntyre]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Feb 25 - Norma Romm

2026-03-06T10:25:29Z

Laouris: /* Short Bio */

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= NormaRomm.jpg
| name=[[Norma Romm]]
| title= The importance of recognizing the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars
| date=February 25, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1168257341
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> The importance of recognizing the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars''</span>

==Abstract==
In this presentation, [[Norma Romm]] discussed the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars’, which is grounded in a relational ontoepistemology and attendant axiology. The argument is that at the moment of “knowing/inquiring” we co-constitute with other agents (and not only human ones) the worlds that are brought forth. Otherwise expressed, there are never spectators, only participants in ongoing world-construction. This is the meaning (for them) of saying we live in a participative universe. One implication is that the language we use and the mental models we create already make a difference (constructive or destructive), to the worlds of which they are part. For example, the language of “natural resources” means that we do not recognize the sacred life forces of all of creation as our kin (family). They are seen as something to be exploited for human use. Likewise, the language of “growth” in our dominant economic models has consequences for the displacement of Indigenous people from their lands in the name of “development”. The language excludes consideration of this as indeed part of the polycrisis facing humanity, but which normally does not feature in accounts of this crisis. The systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars recognizes that our knowing processes cannot be divorced from generating outcomes in human-to-human and human-to-more than-human relations. One of the qualities of Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) is the recognition that knowing (as a collective process) needs to be tied at the outset, to “making the world better”. In other words, given that knowing is already consequential, we need to consider the values underpinning the knowing endeavor. In the presentation I will indicate the strength of Structured Dialogical Design (SDD) as a methodology which incorporates this intention. I will show how it is a form of systemic thinking which resonated, inter alia, with African participants in a re-invent democracy project organized by the Future World Center (2016-2018). I will also show how the triggering questions now formulated for the SDDs to take place in 2026 (organized by the 21st Century agoras, the FWC, and ISSS) contain the understanding that knowing (even at the moment of mapping challenges facing humanity, and of course at the moment of actively seeking leverage points for the most influential action towards systemic transformation) is never a detached exercise (as also understood in IKS).

{{#ev:vimeo| 1168257341 |600|left|The importance of recognizing the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars: Norma Romm}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Norma Romm]] (DLitt et Phil) is author of The Methodologies of Positivism and Marxism (1991), Accountability in Social Research (2001), New Racism (2010), Responsible Research Practice (2018), People’s Education in Theoretical Perspective (with V McKay 1992), Diversity Management (with R Flood 1996), and Assessment of the Impact of HIV and AIDS in the Informal Economy of Zambia (with V McKay 2006). She has co-edited six books—Social Theory (with M Sarakinsky 1994), Critical Systems Thinking (with R Flood 1996), Balancing Individualism and Collectivism (with J McIntyre-Mills and Y Corcoran-Nantes 2017), Mixed Methods and Cross-Disciplinary Research (with J McIntyre-Mills 2019), Democracy and Governance for Resourcing the Commons(with J McIntyre-Mills and Y Corcoran-Nantes 2019), and Covid-19: Perspectives Across Africa (with A Fymat and J Kapalanga 2022). She has published over 120 research articles on social theorizing, transformative research towards social and ecological regeneration, and Indigenous paradigms of knowing.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Norma Romm]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Feb 25 - Norma Romm

2026-03-06T10:25:06Z

Laouris: photo

Mini Symposium 2026 Feb 25 - Norma Romm

2026-03-06T10:24:24Z

Laouris: populated

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=AbelMavura_2025.jpg
| name=[[Norma Romm]]
| title= The importance of recognizing the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars
| date=February 25, 2026
| presentation=
| link=https://vimeo.com/1168257341
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> The importance of recognizing the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars''</span>

==Abstract==
In this presentation, [[Norma Romm]] discussed the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars’, which is grounded in a relational ontoepistemology and attendant axiology. The argument is that at the moment of “knowing/inquiring” we co-constitute with other agents (and not only human ones) the worlds that are brought forth. Otherwise expressed, there are never spectators, only participants in ongoing world-construction. This is the meaning (for them) of saying we live in a participative universe. One implication is that the language we use and the mental models we create already make a difference (constructive or destructive), to the worlds of which they are part. For example, the language of “natural resources” means that we do not recognize the sacred life forces of all of creation as our kin (family). They are seen as something to be exploited for human use. Likewise, the language of “growth” in our dominant economic models has consequences for the displacement of Indigenous people from their lands in the name of “development”. The language excludes consideration of this as indeed part of the polycrisis facing humanity, but which normally does not feature in accounts of this crisis. The systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars recognizes that our knowing processes cannot be divorced from generating outcomes in human-to-human and human-to-more than-human relations. One of the qualities of Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) is the recognition that knowing (as a collective process) needs to be tied at the outset, to “making the world better”. In other words, given that knowing is already consequential, we need to consider the values underpinning the knowing endeavor. In the presentation I will indicate the strength of Structured Dialogical Design (SDD) as a methodology which incorporates this intention. I will show how it is a form of systemic thinking which resonated, inter alia, with African participants in a re-invent democracy project organized by the Future World Center (2016-2018). I will also show how the triggering questions now formulated for the SDDs to take place in 2026 (organized by the 21st Century agoras, the FWC, and ISSS) contain the understanding that knowing (even at the moment of mapping challenges facing humanity, and of course at the moment of actively seeking leverage points for the most influential action towards systemic transformation) is never a detached exercise (as also understood in IKS).

{{#ev:vimeo| 1168257341 |600|left|The importance of recognizing the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars: Norma Romm}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
[[Norma Romm]] (DLitt et Phil) is author of The Methodologies of Positivism and Marxism (1991), Accountability in Social Research (2001), New Racism (2010), Responsible Research Practice (2018), People’s Education in Theoretical Perspective (with V McKay 1992), Diversity Management (with R Flood 1996), and Assessment of the Impact of HIV and AIDS in the Informal Economy of Zambia (with V McKay 2006). She has co-edited six books—Social Theory (with M Sarakinsky 1994), Critical Systems Thinking (with R Flood 1996), Balancing Individualism and Collectivism (with J McIntyre-Mills and Y Corcoran-Nantes 2017), Mixed Methods and Cross-Disciplinary Research (with J McIntyre-Mills 2019), Democracy and Governance for Resourcing the Commons(with J McIntyre-Mills and Y Corcoran-Nantes 2019), and Covid-19: Perspectives Across Africa (with A Fymat and J Kapalanga 2022). She has published over 120 research articles on social theorizing, transformative research towards social and ecological regeneration, and Indigenous paradigms of knowing.

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Norma Romm]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Norma RA Romm (DLitt et Phil) is author of The Methodologies of Positivism and Marxism (1991), Accountability in Social Research (2001), New Racism (2010), Responsible Research Practice (2018), People’s Education in Theoretical Perspective (with V McKay 1992), Diversity Management (with R Flood 1996), and Assessment of the Impact of HIV and AIDS in the Informal Economy of Zambia (with V McKay 2006). She has co-edited six books—Social Theory (with M Sarakinsky 1994), Critical Systems Thinking(with R Flood 1996), Balancing Individualism and Collectivism (with J McIntyre-Mills and Y Corcoran-Nantes 2017), Mixed Methods and Cross-Disciplinary Research (with J McIntyre-Mills 2019), Democracy and Governance for Resourcing the Commons(with J McIntyre-Mills and Y Corcoran-Nantes 2019), and Covid-19: Perspectives Across Africa (with A Fymat and J Kapalanga 2022). She has published over 120 research articles on social theorizing, transformative research towards social and ecological regeneration, and Indigenous paradigms of knowing.

Mini Symposium 2026 Feb 25 - Norma Romm

2026-03-06T10:19:33Z

Laouris: Created

In this presentation, Norma discussed the systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars’, which is grounded in a relational ontoepistemology and attendant axiology. The argument is that at the moment of “knowing/inquiring” we co-constitute with other agents (and not only human ones) the worlds that are brought forth. Otherwise expressed, there are never spectators, only participants in ongoing world-construction. This is the meaning (for them) of saying we live in a participative universe. One implication is that the language we use and the mental models we create already make a difference (constructive or destructive), to the worlds of which they are part. For example, the language of “natural resources” means that we do not recognize the sacred life forces of all of creation as our kin (family). They are seen as something to be exploited for human use. Likewise, the language of “growth” in our dominant economic models has consequences for the displacement of Indigenous people from their lands in the name of “development”. The language excludes consideration of this as indeed part of the polycrisis facing humanity, but which normally does not feature in accounts of this crisis. The systemic thinking of Indigenous sages and scholars recognizes that our knowing processes cannot be divorced from generating outcomes in human-to-human and human-to-more than-human relations. One of the qualities of Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) is the recognition that knowing (as a collective process) needs to be tied at the outset, to “making the world better”. In other words, given that knowing is already consequential, we need to consider the values underpinning the knowing endeavor. In the presentation I will indicate the strength of Structured Dialogical Design (SDD) as a methodology which incorporates this intention. I will show how it is a form of systemic thinking which resonated, inter alia, with African participants in a re-invent democracy project organized by the Future World Center (2016-2018). I will also show how the triggering questions now formulated for the SDDs to take place in 2026 (organized by the 21st Century agoras, the FWC, and ISSS) contain the understanding that knowing (even at the moment of mapping challenges facing humanity, and of course at the moment of actively seeking leverage points for the most influential action towards systemic transformation) is never a detached exercise (as also understood in IKS).

Norma RA Romm (DLitt et Phil) is author of The Methodologies of Positivism and Marxism (1991), Accountability in Social Research (2001), New Racism (2010), Responsible Research Practice (2018), People’s Education in Theoretical Perspective (with V McKay 1992), Diversity Management (with R Flood 1996), and Assessment of the Impact of HIV and AIDS in the Informal Economy of Zambia (with V McKay 2006). She has co-edited six books—Social Theory (with M Sarakinsky 1994), Critical Systems Thinking(with R Flood 1996), Balancing Individualism and Collectivism (with J McIntyre-Mills and Y Corcoran-Nantes 2017), Mixed Methods and Cross-Disciplinary Research (with J McIntyre-Mills 2019), Democracy and Governance for Resourcing the Commons(with J McIntyre-Mills and Y Corcoran-Nantes 2019), and Covid-19: Perspectives Across Africa (with A Fymat and J Kapalanga 2022). She has published over 120 research articles on social theorizing, transformative research towards social and ecological regeneration, and Indigenous paradigms of knowing.

Mini Symposium 2026 Feb 18 - Mark Enzer

2026-02-27T16:18:10Z

Laouris: added photo

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Mark-enzer.jpg
| name=[[Mark Enzer]]
| title=Connect to change – advancing systems thinking in the built environment
| date=February 18, 2026
| presentation= xxxx
| link=https://vimeo.com/1166122989
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Connect to change – advancing systems thinking in the built environment''</span>

==Abstract==
It’s time that we saw the built environment differently, not as a series of construction projects, but as a system of systems whose explicit purpose is to enable people and nature to flourish together for generations. This is not just a nice concept; it is a powerful necessity because the key challenges of our generation are systemic: facing climate change, providing resilience and achieving a circular economy are all systems-level challenges that demand systems-based solutions. Therefore, we must use all the means at our disposal to understand our built and natural systems better and to intervene more effectively. This presentation will explore the connection between outcomes, systems and interventions and make a case for advancing systems thinking and driving positive systems change in the built environment.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1166122989 |600|left|Coming home to life, or exploring appropriate participation in nested complexity - Tom Flanagan}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Mark is a keen champion of outcomes-focused systems thinking, collaborative delivery models, digitalisation, connected digital twins and the circular economy in the built environment. As a Mott MacDonald Fellow, Mark provides advice to key clients on digitalisation and broader industry transformation. Previously, Mark was the CTO of Mott MacDonald and the Director of the Centre for Digital Built Britain, where he was the Head of the National Digital Twin programme. Mark is a visiting professor at the University of Cambridge and Imperial College London, and he is a member of the Prime Minister's Council for Science and Technology.

==Links==

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Mark Enzer]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

File:Mark-enzer.jpg

2026-02-27T16:17:47Z

Laouris:

Mini Symposium 2026 Jan 28 - Jindra Monique Čekan

2026-02-27T16:16:51Z

Laouris: added photo

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= JindraMoniqueČekan.jpg
| name=[[Jindra Monique Čekan]]
| title=Sustainability
| date=January 28, 2026
| presentation= xxxx
| link=https://vimeo.com/1159391817
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Sustainability''</span>

==Abstract==
Sustainability of results is often assumed hoped for but unproven. Ex-post evaluations are enormously rare. While we promise sustainability to our participants in partners in the global south far less than 1% of the time has 60 years of global foreign assistance (valued at over $5 trillion of public funded OECD projects) been evaluated for what lasts. Much can be learned from evaluating the sustainability, and how local communities and former aid partners sustained results often in different emerging pathways than what was designed, but which can be far more effective. Čekan/ová founded Valuing Voices 16 years ago to advocate for more ex-post sustainability evaluations, and lead teams of national evaluators, thereby building national capacities.

Climate change & weather variability has also added shocks and stresses to already fragile contexts, and resilience to these shocks is also rarely measured. Čekan/ová and Spearman were tasked with designing systems and tools for evaluating sustainability and resilience for the Adaptation Fund and Čekan/ová went on to do so for the Climate Investment Funds. Those lessons are included in this presentation.

Further, Spearman‘s and IPCC’s recognition that our planet’s carrying capacity is far overwhelmed by our consumption and Čekan/ová ‘s finance-experience understanding that a Return on Equity (ROE) needs to be changed into a Return on Environment (ROEn) led to the two proposing a new way to prioritize investable projects that are we generative. We propose including ecosystem services in financial balance sheets for our collective survival. NB: Society member Friend is in talks with Čekan/ová and Spearman on how her Compass work could be used to help corporations evaluate their readiness for such a shift in priorities, but that is not in the scope of the presentation.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1159391817 |600|left|Coming home to life, or exploring appropriate participation in nested complexity - Tom Flanagan}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Since 2013, she has focused on ex-post-project evaluation and what her firm Valuing Voices at Cekan Consulting LLC can show Global North and South clients about sustained and emerging impacts years after projects close, and before they do. Lately, Valuing Voices’ national evaluators have been evaluating ex-post project sustainability and climate resilience. She presents regularly at conferences and writes articles, including keynotes at Climate and Finance conferences in 2025.

Also, since 1996, she has managed a 535-hectare forest in her family for 150 years in the Czech Republic where she primarily resides. Jindra Čekan/ová is a dual citizen (Czech Republic/USA), presenter and writer, (grand)mother, Buddhist, and loves giraffes.

==Links==

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Jindra Monique Čekan]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

File:JindraMoniqueČekan.jpg

2026-02-27T16:16:28Z

Laouris:

Mini Symposium 2026 Jan 28 - Jindra Monique Čekan

2026-02-27T16:13:34Z

Laouris: created

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Jindra Monique Čekan.jpg
| name=[[Jindra Monique Čekan]]
| title=Sustainability
| date=January 28, 2026
| presentation= xxxx
| link=https://vimeo.com/1159391817
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Sustainability''</span>

==Abstract==
Sustainability of results is often assumed hoped for but unproven. Ex-post evaluations are enormously rare. While we promise sustainability to our participants in partners in the global south far less than 1% of the time has 60 years of global foreign assistance (valued at over $5 trillion of public funded OECD projects) been evaluated for what lasts. Much can be learned from evaluating the sustainability, and how local communities and former aid partners sustained results often in different emerging pathways than what was designed, but which can be far more effective. Čekan/ová founded Valuing Voices 16 years ago to advocate for more ex-post sustainability evaluations, and lead teams of national evaluators, thereby building national capacities.

Climate change & weather variability has also added shocks and stresses to already fragile contexts, and resilience to these shocks is also rarely measured. Čekan/ová and Spearman were tasked with designing systems and tools for evaluating sustainability and resilience for the Adaptation Fund and Čekan/ová went on to do so for the Climate Investment Funds. Those lessons are included in this presentation.

Further, Spearman‘s and IPCC’s recognition that our planet’s carrying capacity is far overwhelmed by our consumption and Čekan/ová ‘s finance-experience understanding that a Return on Equity (ROE) needs to be changed into a Return on Environment (ROEn) led to the two proposing a new way to prioritize investable projects that are we generative. We propose including ecosystem services in financial balance sheets for our collective survival. NB: Society member Friend is in talks with Čekan/ová and Spearman on how her Compass work could be used to help corporations evaluate their readiness for such a shift in priorities, but that is not in the scope of the presentation.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1159391817 |600|left|Coming home to life, or exploring appropriate participation in nested complexity - Tom Flanagan}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Since 2013, she has focused on ex-post-project evaluation and what her firm Valuing Voices at Cekan Consulting LLC can show Global North and South clients about sustained and emerging impacts years after projects close, and before they do. Lately, Valuing Voices’ national evaluators have been evaluating ex-post project sustainability and climate resilience. She presents regularly at conferences and writes articles, including keynotes at Climate and Finance conferences in 2025.

Also, since 1996, she has managed a 535-hectare forest in her family for 150 years in the Czech Republic where she primarily resides. Jindra Čekan/ová is a dual citizen (Czech Republic/USA), presenter and writer, (grand)mother, Buddhist, and loves giraffes.

==Links==

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Jindra Monique Čekan]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Feb 18 - Mark Enzer

2026-02-27T16:10:28Z

Laouris: Created

{{Mini Symposia
| photo=
| name=[[Mark Enzer]]
| title=Connect to change – advancing systems thinking in the built environment
| date=February 18, 2026
| presentation= xxxx
| link=https://vimeo.com/1166122989
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Connect to change – advancing systems thinking in the built environment''</span>

==Abstract==
It’s time that we saw the built environment differently, not as a series of construction projects, but as a system of systems whose explicit purpose is to enable people and nature to flourish together for generations. This is not just a nice concept; it is a powerful necessity because the key challenges of our generation are systemic: facing climate change, providing resilience and achieving a circular economy are all systems-level challenges that demand systems-based solutions. Therefore, we must use all the means at our disposal to understand our built and natural systems better and to intervene more effectively. This presentation will explore the connection between outcomes, systems and interventions and make a case for advancing systems thinking and driving positive systems change in the built environment.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1166122989 |600|left|Coming home to life, or exploring appropriate participation in nested complexity - Tom Flanagan}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Mark is a keen champion of outcomes-focused systems thinking, collaborative delivery models, digitalisation, connected digital twins and the circular economy in the built environment. As a Mott MacDonald Fellow, Mark provides advice to key clients on digitalisation and broader industry transformation. Previously, Mark was the CTO of Mott MacDonald and the Director of the Centre for Digital Built Britain, where he was the Head of the National Digital Twin programme. Mark is a visiting professor at the University of Cambridge and Imperial College London, and he is a member of the Prime Minister's Council for Science and Technology.

==Links==

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Mark Enzer]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

Mini Symposium 2026 Feb 11 - Daniel Christian Wahl and Tom Flanagan

2026-02-27T16:07:53Z

Laouris: created

{{Mini Symposia
| photo= Tom_Flanagan2025.jpg
| name=[[Tom Flanagan]]
| title=Coming home to life, or exploring appropriate participation in nested complexity
| date=February 11, 2026
| presentation= xxxx
| link=https://vimeo.com/1164117737
}}

<span style="font-size:200%"> Part 2: Coming home to life, or exploring appropriate participation in nested complexity''</span>

==Abstract==
Tom Flanigan and Daniel Wahl met in 2016 at a two day exploration of the relevance of second order science to policy making organised by the Finnish futures foundation SITRA and the International Futures Forum of which both Tom and Daniel are members. In this mini-symposium, Tom and Daniel will be in conversation about past and present work, but more importantly the personal dimension of what it means to participate with more appreciation and awareness in the nested complex systems we emerge from and are co-creators in while fully embracing uncertainty, un-predictability and the paradox of humility and audacity that comes with living into how systems shape us as we cannot but shape the systems we participate in through our thoughts, worlds and actions. Daniel's work spans from his long-term commitments over the last 20 years to living systems informed education with the N.G.O. Gaia Education, past academic work on salutogenic design for human and planetary health, collaboration with Anthony Hodgeson on the World Systems Mandala and World Game (of the International Futures Forum), collaboration with Bill Sharpe in the development and application of the 3 Horizon framework, co-curation with Tobias Luthe of ETH Zürich's 'Designing Resilient Regenerative Systems' MOOC series and advanced studies masters in regenerative systems, co-hosting the 'Coming Home to Life' podcast with Philipa Duthie (now offered through the Arne Naess Foundation), consulting various n.g.o.s on the bioregional regeneration of the Mallorca and the Balearic archipelago and working with them to create community resilience, economic vitality, social cohesion and healing of ecological landscape functions, to gardening an 1ha regenerative agro-forestry research site he calls 'home' with his wife and eight year old daughter.
After an initial conversation between Tom and Daniel, the symposium will open up to a Q&A format.

{{#ev:vimeo| 1164117737 |600|left|Coming home to life, or exploring appropriate participation in nested complexity - Daniel Christian Wahl and Tom Flanagan}}

<div style="clear: both"></div>

==Short Bio==
Daniel Christian Wahl is one of the catalysts of the rising reGeneration and the author of Designing Regenerative Cultures - so far translated into seven languages. He works as a consultant, educator and activist with NGOs, businesses, governments and global change agents. With degrees in biology and holistic science, and a PhD in Design for Human and Planetary Health, his work has influenced the emerging fields of regenerative design and salutogenic design. Winner of the 2021 RSA Bicentenary Medal for applying design in service to society. Awarded a two year Volans-Fellowship in 2022.

Tom Flanagan served as president of the Institute for 21st Century Agoras between 2007-2021. Currently, Tom serves as treasurer. He has authored multiple articles and books about the practice of SDD. His research, product development, and management career has spanned marine science, insect physiology, environmental engineering, biomedical products, and behavioral healthcare, He lives in Warren, Rhode Islan, USA with his wife Jenny and son Danniel and continues scholarly research on SDD and related practices of design dialogue. His local missions include enhancing connections between the arts and participatory journalism, philanthropic community building, and behavioral self-care through times of civic stress. Tom leads a local initiative for enhancing awareness and support for alternative and complementary self-care for grief, depression, loneliness and pre-clinical anxiety (www.BlueskiesRI.org). Tom holds a PhD in neuroscience from Wesleyan University and an MBA in technology management from MIT. In addition to his local service on boards and committees, Tom is an active member of the AGORAS, International Society for Systems Science, and the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation.

==Links==

[[Category: Videos]]
[[Category: Videos by Tom Flanagan]]
[[Category: Videos from Mini Symposia]]
[[Category: Mini Symposia]]

ISSS Student Awards

2026-02-19T15:12:56Z

Laouris: /* Previous Margaret Mead Award Winners */

The International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS) offers several prestigious awards to encourage and recognize outstanding research by students in the systems sciences. These awards are generally presented at the annual meetings and are open to students from around the world.

==Student Paper Awards by the ISSS==
The ISSS may award one or several Memorial Awards at each Annual Meeting. These awards are given in the names of [[Sir Geoffrey Vickers]], [[Anatol Rapoport]], and [[Margaret Mead]], recognizing outstanding work by a student in distinct domains the systems sciences.
* The Vickers award encourages contributions to areas of consideration where systems approaches stand to enrich the social sciences, humanities and the arts.
* The Rapoport award recognizes works in the domains of the physical sciences, the life sciences, mathematics and engineering.
* The Mead award considers contributions across the domains considered by both the Vickers and the Rapoport awards, but distinguishes those that place special emphasis on feminist, collectivist, and culturally pluralistic perspectives.

==The Spirit of Sir Geoffrey Vickers==
The Sir Geoffrey Vickers Memorial Award commemorates the life and works of Sir Geoffrey Vickers. His view of the human condition as fundamentally embedded in a web of value relations, and of the dilemma of human action as both rational and valuative, lead him to the formulation of the Appreciative Systems approach. The spirit of his lifework is tremendously contemporary, even though he wrote his most significant works in the early second half of the 20th century: society as evolutionarily emergent; participative and interactive communication as a creative agent; humanization as the necessary normative component of socialization — all this as part of what he called "a science of human ecology." It is through a truly integrative and systemic approach to our humanity that Sir Geoffrey believed we can learn to navigate multi-valued choice in the ways we structure and value our situation. Being critical (without criticizing), judging (without being judgmental), and engaging in normative decision taking (without ignoring or subjugating the interests of others) — these are the challenges of a science of human ecology as he saw it. The realization that "Science is human"(1) derives from his assertion that we are "incorrigible valuers."(2) Indeed, it was Sir Geoffrey's fundamental affirmation that only by learning to be appreciative systems, ourselves, will we create social structures capable of supporting the essence of our humanity. The ISSS Vickers Award seeks to recognize promising work that advances the systems sciences toward this vision.

(1) Vickers, G. (1968) Value Systems and Social Process, Pelican Books, Middlesex, England, p.214.

(2) Ibid. 214.

==The Vision of Anatol Rapoport==
The Anatol Rapoport Memorial Award is offered in recognition of the best student paper presented at the annual ISSS Conference in a quantitative, engineering, hard science, natural science, technological, or logico-empirical systems framework. Submissions that present any one or combination of these perspectives will be eligible for this award. As such, it is distinct from the Sir Geoffrey Vickers Award which, as described above, is offered in recognition of work presented in a qualitative, humanistic, social science, artistic, phenomenological, or spiritual-intuitive systems framework (again, any one or combination of these). This award honors the contributions of one of the original founders of the Society for the Advancement of General Systems Theory, the original precursor of which the ISSS is a direct descendent.(3) Rapoport joined his skills in mathematics and formal logic with those of biologist Ludwig von Bertalanffy, economist Kenneth E. Boulding, and psychologist, Ralph W. Gerard to establish the aims of the original Society in 1954 in support of what came to be known as the Systems Movement. These aims included the idea that, as a result of work across different disciplines of knowledge, there would arise a high-level meta-theory of systems that could be mathematically expressed. His vision focused on what he characterized as "the creative exploration of analogies,"(4) especially those deducible from mathematical models. Such efforts served to illustrate his conviction of the fundamental interconnectedness of everything to everything else, as he expressed so eloquently in his keynote address to the ISSS/World Congress of the System Sciences in 2000. On that occasion, he pointed out that the symbol for the Society was the integration symbol from mathematics — the ∫ sign — and that exploration of mathematical analogies or "isomorphisms" is the main interest of a general system-theory. The ISSS Rapoport Award seeks to recognize promising work in the systems sciences in this spirit of inquiry.

(3) Checkland, P. (1993) Systems Thinking, Systems Practice, John Wiley & Sons, Chichester, England, p. 93.

(4) Hammond, D. (2003) The Science of Synthesis, University Press of Colorado, Boulder CO, USA, p. 157.

==The Empowerment of Margaret Mead==
The Margaret Mead Memorial Award was established in 2013 to commemorate the memory of the first woman to serve as President of the ISSS (at a time when it was called the International Society for General Systems Research – ISGSR – in 1972). Margaret Mead was involved with the society since it was first established as the Society for the Advancement of General Systems Theory at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in 1956. At that meeting, she admonished the newly formed society to apply systems principles to itself as an organization, "with the aim of fostering a more collaborative and inclusive organizational structure."(5) Her work with indigenous – or more properly, autochthonous – peoples the world over emphasized the role of the individual in the collective, and the role of the collective as enabler for the flourishing of the individual. Deeply committed to social process, Mead's view of systems was fundamentally relational. Sir Ken Robinson notes that ‎"human communities depend upon a diversity of talent, not a singular conception of ability, and the heart of our challenge is to reconstitute our sense of ability and of intelligence."(6) It is in this spirit of relational intelligence, drawing on the type of systemic consciousness so well embodied by Margaret Mead, that this award has been established. Whereas the other two Student Paper Awards both celebrate the vision for inspired systemic thought, being, and action as embodied and manifest through the efforts of individuals such as Sir Geoffrey Vickers and Anatol Rapoport, the Margaret Mead Memorial Award recognizes contributions to systems experience, thinking, design, and action that empower individuals in communities, and in so doing, empower communities as purposeful systems in their own right. This award invites papers that address contemporary challenges in ways that advance understanding of how collective intelligence and collective impact(7) foster emergence, thrivability and systemic wellbeing. The ISSS honors Margaret Mead and the inspirational role her work continues to play in the life of the society, as attested to by her presence on the main page of our website (http://isss.org/world/).

(5) Hammond, D. (2003). The Science of Synthesis, University Press of Colorado, Boulder CO, USA, p. 249.

(6) Robinson, Ken (2010). Bring on the learning revolution! TED Talk – online at http://www.ted.com/talks/sir_ken_robinson_bring_on_the_revolution.html [sourced 10 February 2013].

(7) Kania, J. and Kramer, M. (2013). Embracing Emergence: How Collective Impact Addresses Complexity, Stanford Social Innovation Review – online at http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/embracing_emergence_how_collective_impact_addresses_complexity [sourced 10 February 2013].

==Prospectus for students presenting a paper at an annual meeting==
In memory of the humanistic vision of Sir Geoffrey Vickers, the integrative vision of Anatol Rapoport, and the collectivist vision of Margaret Mead, and in recognition of their deep commitment to, and belief in, the power of young people to contribute creatively to the betterment of the human condition, a plaque and check for $500 will be awarded for the best student paper in each of the three award domains. The Vickers Award, the Rapoport Award, and the Mead Award recognize outstanding work done in the domain of the systems sciences, and are considered the most prestigious prizes in the field at the pre-doctoral level. Submissions that draw on perspectives covered by any of these three Awards are warmly invited. Generally speaking, it will be in the author's best interest to indicate for which award they wish to have their submission considered.

* The competition takes place only once a year.
* It is open to all students from any country.
* The student must actively request that their paper be considered for the Vickers Award OR the Rapoport Award OR the Mead Award OR any combination of the three. However, a paper may receive only one award.
* The student must submit the paper to the ISSS Office in addition to submitting the paper online to the Journals site. The eMail to the ISSS Office accompanying the paper should indicate that the student wishes this paper to be submitted for the Award(s) of their interest.
* Student-authored papers are eligible for consideration, and preference will be given to individually authored work. A determination of contributions to the paper will be made by interaction between the committee and the student if there are any other authors listed on the paper.
* Only one paper per student should be submitted for consideration in any given year.
* A single outstanding paper will be selected each year for each award category. Awards will no longer be split between two winners.
* A full paper must be submitted by the publication deadline and will be included on the web Journals.isss.org proceedings unless stated otherwise by the Student Award committee.
* The paper must adhere to the instructions for submitting abstracts found on https://www.isss.org/submitting-abstracts/
* Certification must be provided showing that this work was performed while the contestant was a student and, in the case of recent graduates, that it has been submitted for consideration no later than one year from the date of the award of their terminal degree (Bachelor's, Master's, or Doctorate).
* Previous winners of this Award Competition may not enter again.
* Student papers will be judged for each Award by separate committees convened by the VP Research and Publications.
* In any given year, any one or even up to all three Awards may not given if no paper is found to qualify for the established Award categories. As such, none of these Awards need be granted obligatorily each year, but will only be bestowed if merited by specific submissions.
* A completed student conference registration confirmation fee should accompany the paper submission.
* The successful paper may be scheduled for presentation in a plenary session during the conference at the discretion of the President and the Program Committee.
* If it is not possible for the student to travel to the conference, it may be possible to arrange for a video link (depending on the facilities available to the conference) or another person may make the presentation on the student's behalf. The preferred options are as follows and in order of preference:

** that the winning Vickers, Rapoport, and Mead Award papers be presented in Plenary in person by the winners; or
** that they be presented "virtually"; or
** that they be presented in absentia by a designated proxy as long as the student(s) or co-author(s) has also submitted and paid for registration of that paper.

==Previous Sir Geoffrey Vickers Award Winners==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! 1988
! St Louis
! Donald de Raadt
|-
| 1989
| Edinburgh
| Bela A Banathy
|-
| 1990
| Portland
| two awards: Sally Goerner; Daune West
|-
| 1991
| Sweden
| Erin Artigiani, Cliff Joslyn
|-
| 1992
| Denver
| Sen Suan Tan
|-
| 1993
| Australia
| Jeremy Chui
|-
| 1994
| Asilomar
| T. Dahl and Darek Erikson
|-
| 1995
| Amsterdam
| two awards: Craig Crabtree; Jennifer Wilby
|-
| 1996
| Louisville
| Parviz Ahari
|-
| 1996
| Budapest
| No Award
|-
| 1997
| Seoul, Korea
| No Award
|-
| 1998
| Atlanta
| Martine Dodds
|-
| 1999
| Asilomar
| Molly Dwyer and Jane Zimmerman
|-
| 2000
| Toronto
| two awards: Gabor Horvath; Kathia Laszlo
|-
| 2001
| Asilomar
| Lynn M. Rasmussen
|-
| 2002
| Shanghai, China
| two awards: Pamela Buckle; K. C. Wang
|-
| 2003
| Crete
| Sabrina Brahms
|-
| 2004
| Asilomar
| Janette Young
|-
| 2005
| Cancun
| Honorato Teissier
|-
| 2006
| Sonoma
| Hanne Birgitte Jensen
|-
| 2007
| Tokyo
| Nicholas Magliocca
|-
| 2008
| Madison
| Devin Wixon
|-
| 2009
| Brisbane
| Anne Stephens
|-
| 2010
| Waterloo
| Todd D. Bowers
|-
| 2011
| Hull
| Mary Edson
|-
| 2012
| San Jose
| William J. Varey
|-
| 2013
| Hai Phong, Viet Nam
| Victor MacGill
|-
| 2014
| Washington, DC
| Anne Powel Davis
|-
| 2015
| Berlin, Germany
| Alexandre Strapasson
|-
| 2016
| Boulder, Colorado
| Skyler Knox Perkins
|-
| 2017
| Vienna, Austria
| No award.
|-
| 2018
| Corvallis, OR
| Sage Kittleman
|-
| 2019
| Corvallis, OR
| Peter Roolf
|-
| 2020
| No Conference
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | No award
|-
| 2021
| Online
| No award
|-
| 2022
| Online
| Shae Brown
|-
| 2023
| Kruger, South Africa
| Anthony Fry
|-
| 2024
| Washington, DC, USA
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Yunlong Xu
|-
| 2025
| Birmingham, UK
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | R. Eva King
|}

==Previous Anatol Rapoport Award Winners==

This award was first given in 2011.

{| class="wikitable"
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
! 2011
! Hull
! David Greenwood
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2012
| San Jose, USA
| Andreas Hieronymi
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2013
| Hai Phong, Viet Nam
| Novie Setianto
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2014
| Washington, DC
| No award
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2015
| Berlin, Germany
| Kwamina Ewur Banson
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2016
| Boulder, Colorado
| Aleksandar Malecic
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2017
| Vienna, Austria
| Anh B. Tong
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2018
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Corvallis, OR
| No award
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2019
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Corvallis, OR
| Jeff Scales
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2020
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | No Conference
| No award
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2021
| Online
| No award
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2022
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Online
| No award
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2023
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Kruger, South Africa
| No award
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2024
| Washington, DC, USA
| Haider Al-Shareefy
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2025
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Birmingham, UK
| Bruno Nunes Vaz
|}

==Previous Margaret Mead Award Winners==

This award was first given in 2013.

{| class="wikitable"
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
! 2013
! Hai Phong, Viet Nam
! Magda Kaspary
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2014
| Washington, DC
| Raghav Rajagopalan
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2015
| Berlin, Germany
| Eshantha Ariyadasa
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2016
| Boulder, Colorado
| Jackwin Simbolon
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2017
| Vienna, Austria
| Kendra Rosencrans
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2018
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Corvallis, OR
| Maria Alejandra Torres-Cuello
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2019
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Corvallis, OR
| Marty Jacobs
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2020
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | No Conference
| No award
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2021
| Online
| No award
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2022
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Online
| No award
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2023
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Kruger, South Africa
| Monique Potts
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2024
| Washington, DC, USA
| Rudolph Wiraman
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2025
| Birmingham, UK
| Abel Mavura
|}

==Prospectus for students (in Spanish)==
El Sir Geoffrey Vickers Memorial Award se estableció en memoria de la visión humanística de Sir Geoffrey Vickers y su profundo compromiso y convicción en el poder de la gente joven para contribuir creativamente al mejoramiento de la condición humana. De la misma manera, se estableció el Anatol Rapoport Memorial Award para reconocer trabajo sobresaliente hecho por gente joven en las áreas quantitativas y de modelación formal. Y en 2013, se estableció el Margaret Mead Memorial Award para promover contribuciones de la gente joven en ambitos de investigaciones feministas, colectivistas, y de un carácter culturalmente pluralista. Los tres premios consisten en una plaqueta y un cheque por U$D 500. cada uno — a ser otorgados a los mejores trabajos de un estudiante universitario, y son los premio más prestigiosos en esta área del conocimiento en el nivel pre-doctoral. Los trabajos ganadores son presentados en una sesión plenaria de la conferencia anual de la entidad.

ISSS Student Awards

2026-02-19T15:12:10Z

Laouris: /* Previous Anatol Rapoport Award Winners */

The International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS) offers several prestigious awards to encourage and recognize outstanding research by students in the systems sciences. These awards are generally presented at the annual meetings and are open to students from around the world.

==Student Paper Awards by the ISSS==
The ISSS may award one or several Memorial Awards at each Annual Meeting. These awards are given in the names of [[Sir Geoffrey Vickers]], [[Anatol Rapoport]], and [[Margaret Mead]], recognizing outstanding work by a student in distinct domains the systems sciences.
* The Vickers award encourages contributions to areas of consideration where systems approaches stand to enrich the social sciences, humanities and the arts.
* The Rapoport award recognizes works in the domains of the physical sciences, the life sciences, mathematics and engineering.
* The Mead award considers contributions across the domains considered by both the Vickers and the Rapoport awards, but distinguishes those that place special emphasis on feminist, collectivist, and culturally pluralistic perspectives.

==The Spirit of Sir Geoffrey Vickers==
The Sir Geoffrey Vickers Memorial Award commemorates the life and works of Sir Geoffrey Vickers. His view of the human condition as fundamentally embedded in a web of value relations, and of the dilemma of human action as both rational and valuative, lead him to the formulation of the Appreciative Systems approach. The spirit of his lifework is tremendously contemporary, even though he wrote his most significant works in the early second half of the 20th century: society as evolutionarily emergent; participative and interactive communication as a creative agent; humanization as the necessary normative component of socialization — all this as part of what he called "a science of human ecology." It is through a truly integrative and systemic approach to our humanity that Sir Geoffrey believed we can learn to navigate multi-valued choice in the ways we structure and value our situation. Being critical (without criticizing), judging (without being judgmental), and engaging in normative decision taking (without ignoring or subjugating the interests of others) — these are the challenges of a science of human ecology as he saw it. The realization that "Science is human"(1) derives from his assertion that we are "incorrigible valuers."(2) Indeed, it was Sir Geoffrey's fundamental affirmation that only by learning to be appreciative systems, ourselves, will we create social structures capable of supporting the essence of our humanity. The ISSS Vickers Award seeks to recognize promising work that advances the systems sciences toward this vision.

(1) Vickers, G. (1968) Value Systems and Social Process, Pelican Books, Middlesex, England, p.214.

(2) Ibid. 214.

==The Vision of Anatol Rapoport==
The Anatol Rapoport Memorial Award is offered in recognition of the best student paper presented at the annual ISSS Conference in a quantitative, engineering, hard science, natural science, technological, or logico-empirical systems framework. Submissions that present any one or combination of these perspectives will be eligible for this award. As such, it is distinct from the Sir Geoffrey Vickers Award which, as described above, is offered in recognition of work presented in a qualitative, humanistic, social science, artistic, phenomenological, or spiritual-intuitive systems framework (again, any one or combination of these). This award honors the contributions of one of the original founders of the Society for the Advancement of General Systems Theory, the original precursor of which the ISSS is a direct descendent.(3) Rapoport joined his skills in mathematics and formal logic with those of biologist Ludwig von Bertalanffy, economist Kenneth E. Boulding, and psychologist, Ralph W. Gerard to establish the aims of the original Society in 1954 in support of what came to be known as the Systems Movement. These aims included the idea that, as a result of work across different disciplines of knowledge, there would arise a high-level meta-theory of systems that could be mathematically expressed. His vision focused on what he characterized as "the creative exploration of analogies,"(4) especially those deducible from mathematical models. Such efforts served to illustrate his conviction of the fundamental interconnectedness of everything to everything else, as he expressed so eloquently in his keynote address to the ISSS/World Congress of the System Sciences in 2000. On that occasion, he pointed out that the symbol for the Society was the integration symbol from mathematics — the ∫ sign — and that exploration of mathematical analogies or "isomorphisms" is the main interest of a general system-theory. The ISSS Rapoport Award seeks to recognize promising work in the systems sciences in this spirit of inquiry.

(3) Checkland, P. (1993) Systems Thinking, Systems Practice, John Wiley & Sons, Chichester, England, p. 93.

(4) Hammond, D. (2003) The Science of Synthesis, University Press of Colorado, Boulder CO, USA, p. 157.

==The Empowerment of Margaret Mead==
The Margaret Mead Memorial Award was established in 2013 to commemorate the memory of the first woman to serve as President of the ISSS (at a time when it was called the International Society for General Systems Research – ISGSR – in 1972). Margaret Mead was involved with the society since it was first established as the Society for the Advancement of General Systems Theory at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in 1956. At that meeting, she admonished the newly formed society to apply systems principles to itself as an organization, "with the aim of fostering a more collaborative and inclusive organizational structure."(5) Her work with indigenous – or more properly, autochthonous – peoples the world over emphasized the role of the individual in the collective, and the role of the collective as enabler for the flourishing of the individual. Deeply committed to social process, Mead's view of systems was fundamentally relational. Sir Ken Robinson notes that ‎"human communities depend upon a diversity of talent, not a singular conception of ability, and the heart of our challenge is to reconstitute our sense of ability and of intelligence."(6) It is in this spirit of relational intelligence, drawing on the type of systemic consciousness so well embodied by Margaret Mead, that this award has been established. Whereas the other two Student Paper Awards both celebrate the vision for inspired systemic thought, being, and action as embodied and manifest through the efforts of individuals such as Sir Geoffrey Vickers and Anatol Rapoport, the Margaret Mead Memorial Award recognizes contributions to systems experience, thinking, design, and action that empower individuals in communities, and in so doing, empower communities as purposeful systems in their own right. This award invites papers that address contemporary challenges in ways that advance understanding of how collective intelligence and collective impact(7) foster emergence, thrivability and systemic wellbeing. The ISSS honors Margaret Mead and the inspirational role her work continues to play in the life of the society, as attested to by her presence on the main page of our website (http://isss.org/world/).

(5) Hammond, D. (2003). The Science of Synthesis, University Press of Colorado, Boulder CO, USA, p. 249.

(6) Robinson, Ken (2010). Bring on the learning revolution! TED Talk – online at http://www.ted.com/talks/sir_ken_robinson_bring_on_the_revolution.html [sourced 10 February 2013].

(7) Kania, J. and Kramer, M. (2013). Embracing Emergence: How Collective Impact Addresses Complexity, Stanford Social Innovation Review – online at http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/embracing_emergence_how_collective_impact_addresses_complexity [sourced 10 February 2013].

==Prospectus for students presenting a paper at an annual meeting==
In memory of the humanistic vision of Sir Geoffrey Vickers, the integrative vision of Anatol Rapoport, and the collectivist vision of Margaret Mead, and in recognition of their deep commitment to, and belief in, the power of young people to contribute creatively to the betterment of the human condition, a plaque and check for $500 will be awarded for the best student paper in each of the three award domains. The Vickers Award, the Rapoport Award, and the Mead Award recognize outstanding work done in the domain of the systems sciences, and are considered the most prestigious prizes in the field at the pre-doctoral level. Submissions that draw on perspectives covered by any of these three Awards are warmly invited. Generally speaking, it will be in the author's best interest to indicate for which award they wish to have their submission considered.

* The competition takes place only once a year.
* It is open to all students from any country.
* The student must actively request that their paper be considered for the Vickers Award OR the Rapoport Award OR the Mead Award OR any combination of the three. However, a paper may receive only one award.
* The student must submit the paper to the ISSS Office in addition to submitting the paper online to the Journals site. The eMail to the ISSS Office accompanying the paper should indicate that the student wishes this paper to be submitted for the Award(s) of their interest.
* Student-authored papers are eligible for consideration, and preference will be given to individually authored work. A determination of contributions to the paper will be made by interaction between the committee and the student if there are any other authors listed on the paper.
* Only one paper per student should be submitted for consideration in any given year.
* A single outstanding paper will be selected each year for each award category. Awards will no longer be split between two winners.
* A full paper must be submitted by the publication deadline and will be included on the web Journals.isss.org proceedings unless stated otherwise by the Student Award committee.
* The paper must adhere to the instructions for submitting abstracts found on https://www.isss.org/submitting-abstracts/
* Certification must be provided showing that this work was performed while the contestant was a student and, in the case of recent graduates, that it has been submitted for consideration no later than one year from the date of the award of their terminal degree (Bachelor's, Master's, or Doctorate).
* Previous winners of this Award Competition may not enter again.
* Student papers will be judged for each Award by separate committees convened by the VP Research and Publications.
* In any given year, any one or even up to all three Awards may not given if no paper is found to qualify for the established Award categories. As such, none of these Awards need be granted obligatorily each year, but will only be bestowed if merited by specific submissions.
* A completed student conference registration confirmation fee should accompany the paper submission.
* The successful paper may be scheduled for presentation in a plenary session during the conference at the discretion of the President and the Program Committee.
* If it is not possible for the student to travel to the conference, it may be possible to arrange for a video link (depending on the facilities available to the conference) or another person may make the presentation on the student's behalf. The preferred options are as follows and in order of preference:

** that the winning Vickers, Rapoport, and Mead Award papers be presented in Plenary in person by the winners; or
** that they be presented "virtually"; or
** that they be presented in absentia by a designated proxy as long as the student(s) or co-author(s) has also submitted and paid for registration of that paper.

==Previous Sir Geoffrey Vickers Award Winners==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! 1988
! St Louis
! Donald de Raadt
|-
| 1989
| Edinburgh
| Bela A Banathy
|-
| 1990
| Portland
| two awards: Sally Goerner; Daune West
|-
| 1991
| Sweden
| Erin Artigiani, Cliff Joslyn
|-
| 1992
| Denver
| Sen Suan Tan
|-
| 1993
| Australia
| Jeremy Chui
|-
| 1994
| Asilomar
| T. Dahl and Darek Erikson
|-
| 1995
| Amsterdam
| two awards: Craig Crabtree; Jennifer Wilby
|-
| 1996
| Louisville
| Parviz Ahari
|-
| 1996
| Budapest
| No Award
|-
| 1997
| Seoul, Korea
| No Award
|-
| 1998
| Atlanta
| Martine Dodds
|-
| 1999
| Asilomar
| Molly Dwyer and Jane Zimmerman
|-
| 2000
| Toronto
| two awards: Gabor Horvath; Kathia Laszlo
|-
| 2001
| Asilomar
| Lynn M. Rasmussen
|-
| 2002
| Shanghai, China
| two awards: Pamela Buckle; K. C. Wang
|-
| 2003
| Crete
| Sabrina Brahms
|-
| 2004
| Asilomar
| Janette Young
|-
| 2005
| Cancun
| Honorato Teissier
|-
| 2006
| Sonoma
| Hanne Birgitte Jensen
|-
| 2007
| Tokyo
| Nicholas Magliocca
|-
| 2008
| Madison
| Devin Wixon
|-
| 2009
| Brisbane
| Anne Stephens
|-
| 2010
| Waterloo
| Todd D. Bowers
|-
| 2011
| Hull
| Mary Edson
|-
| 2012
| San Jose
| William J. Varey
|-
| 2013
| Hai Phong, Viet Nam
| Victor MacGill
|-
| 2014
| Washington, DC
| Anne Powel Davis
|-
| 2015
| Berlin, Germany
| Alexandre Strapasson
|-
| 2016
| Boulder, Colorado
| Skyler Knox Perkins
|-
| 2017
| Vienna, Austria
| No award.
|-
| 2018
| Corvallis, OR
| Sage Kittleman
|-
| 2019
| Corvallis, OR
| Peter Roolf
|-
| 2020
| No Conference
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | No award
|-
| 2021
| Online
| No award
|-
| 2022
| Online
| Shae Brown
|-
| 2023
| Kruger, South Africa
| Anthony Fry
|-
| 2024
| Washington, DC, USA
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Yunlong Xu
|-
| 2025
| Birmingham, UK
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | R. Eva King
|}

==Previous Anatol Rapoport Award Winners==

This award was first given in 2011.

{| class="wikitable"
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
! 2011
! Hull
! David Greenwood
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2012
| San Jose, USA
| Andreas Hieronymi
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2013
| Hai Phong, Viet Nam
| Novie Setianto
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2014
| Washington, DC
| No award
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2015
| Berlin, Germany
| Kwamina Ewur Banson
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2016
| Boulder, Colorado
| Aleksandar Malecic
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2017
| Vienna, Austria
| Anh B. Tong
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2018
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Corvallis, OR
| No award
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2019
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Corvallis, OR
| Jeff Scales
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2020
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | No Conference
| No award
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2021
| Online
| No award
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2022
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Online
| No award
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2023
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Kruger, South Africa
| No award
|- style="vertical-align:middle;"
| 2024
| Washington, DC, USA
| Haider Al-Shareefy
|-
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | 2025
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Birmingham, UK
| Bruno Nunes Vaz
|}

==Previous Margaret Mead Award Winners==

This award was first given in 2013.

2013 Hai Phong, Viet Nam Magda Kaspary
2014 Washington, DC Raghav Rajagopalan
2015 Berlin, Germany Eshantha Ariyadasa
2016 Boulder, Colorado Jackwin Simbolon
2017 Vienna, Austria Kendra Rosencrans
2018 Corvallis, OR
Maria Alejandra Torres-Cuello
2019 Corvallis, OR
Marty Jacobs
2020 No Conference
No award
2021 Online No award
2022 Online
No award
2023 Kruger, South Africa
Monique Potts
2024 Washington, DC, USA Rudolph Wiraman
2025 Birmingham, UK Abel Mavura

==Prospectus for students (in Spanish)==
El Sir Geoffrey Vickers Memorial Award se estableció en memoria de la visión humanística de Sir Geoffrey Vickers y su profundo compromiso y convicción en el poder de la gente joven para contribuir creativamente al mejoramiento de la condición humana. De la misma manera, se estableció el Anatol Rapoport Memorial Award para reconocer trabajo sobresaliente hecho por gente joven en las áreas quantitativas y de modelación formal. Y en 2013, se estableció el Margaret Mead Memorial Award para promover contribuciones de la gente joven en ambitos de investigaciones feministas, colectivistas, y de un carácter culturalmente pluralista. Los tres premios consisten en una plaqueta y un cheque por U$D 500. cada uno — a ser otorgados a los mejores trabajos de un estudiante universitario, y son los premio más prestigiosos en esta área del conocimiento en el nivel pre-doctoral. Los trabajos ganadores son presentados en una sesión plenaria de la conferencia anual de la entidad.

ISSS Student Awards

2026-02-19T15:10:28Z

Laouris:

The International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS) offers several prestigious awards to encourage and recognize outstanding research by students in the systems sciences. These awards are generally presented at the annual meetings and are open to students from around the world.

==Student Paper Awards by the ISSS==
The ISSS may award one or several Memorial Awards at each Annual Meeting. These awards are given in the names of [[Sir Geoffrey Vickers]], [[Anatol Rapoport]], and [[Margaret Mead]], recognizing outstanding work by a student in distinct domains the systems sciences.
* The Vickers award encourages contributions to areas of consideration where systems approaches stand to enrich the social sciences, humanities and the arts.
* The Rapoport award recognizes works in the domains of the physical sciences, the life sciences, mathematics and engineering.
* The Mead award considers contributions across the domains considered by both the Vickers and the Rapoport awards, but distinguishes those that place special emphasis on feminist, collectivist, and culturally pluralistic perspectives.

==The Spirit of Sir Geoffrey Vickers==
The Sir Geoffrey Vickers Memorial Award commemorates the life and works of Sir Geoffrey Vickers. His view of the human condition as fundamentally embedded in a web of value relations, and of the dilemma of human action as both rational and valuative, lead him to the formulation of the Appreciative Systems approach. The spirit of his lifework is tremendously contemporary, even though he wrote his most significant works in the early second half of the 20th century: society as evolutionarily emergent; participative and interactive communication as a creative agent; humanization as the necessary normative component of socialization — all this as part of what he called "a science of human ecology." It is through a truly integrative and systemic approach to our humanity that Sir Geoffrey believed we can learn to navigate multi-valued choice in the ways we structure and value our situation. Being critical (without criticizing), judging (without being judgmental), and engaging in normative decision taking (without ignoring or subjugating the interests of others) — these are the challenges of a science of human ecology as he saw it. The realization that "Science is human"(1) derives from his assertion that we are "incorrigible valuers."(2) Indeed, it was Sir Geoffrey's fundamental affirmation that only by learning to be appreciative systems, ourselves, will we create social structures capable of supporting the essence of our humanity. The ISSS Vickers Award seeks to recognize promising work that advances the systems sciences toward this vision.

(1) Vickers, G. (1968) Value Systems and Social Process, Pelican Books, Middlesex, England, p.214.

(2) Ibid. 214.

==The Vision of Anatol Rapoport==
The Anatol Rapoport Memorial Award is offered in recognition of the best student paper presented at the annual ISSS Conference in a quantitative, engineering, hard science, natural science, technological, or logico-empirical systems framework. Submissions that present any one or combination of these perspectives will be eligible for this award. As such, it is distinct from the Sir Geoffrey Vickers Award which, as described above, is offered in recognition of work presented in a qualitative, humanistic, social science, artistic, phenomenological, or spiritual-intuitive systems framework (again, any one or combination of these). This award honors the contributions of one of the original founders of the Society for the Advancement of General Systems Theory, the original precursor of which the ISSS is a direct descendent.(3) Rapoport joined his skills in mathematics and formal logic with those of biologist Ludwig von Bertalanffy, economist Kenneth E. Boulding, and psychologist, Ralph W. Gerard to establish the aims of the original Society in 1954 in support of what came to be known as the Systems Movement. These aims included the idea that, as a result of work across different disciplines of knowledge, there would arise a high-level meta-theory of systems that could be mathematically expressed. His vision focused on what he characterized as "the creative exploration of analogies,"(4) especially those deducible from mathematical models. Such efforts served to illustrate his conviction of the fundamental interconnectedness of everything to everything else, as he expressed so eloquently in his keynote address to the ISSS/World Congress of the System Sciences in 2000. On that occasion, he pointed out that the symbol for the Society was the integration symbol from mathematics — the ∫ sign — and that exploration of mathematical analogies or "isomorphisms" is the main interest of a general system-theory. The ISSS Rapoport Award seeks to recognize promising work in the systems sciences in this spirit of inquiry.

(3) Checkland, P. (1993) Systems Thinking, Systems Practice, John Wiley & Sons, Chichester, England, p. 93.

(4) Hammond, D. (2003) The Science of Synthesis, University Press of Colorado, Boulder CO, USA, p. 157.

==The Empowerment of Margaret Mead==
The Margaret Mead Memorial Award was established in 2013 to commemorate the memory of the first woman to serve as President of the ISSS (at a time when it was called the International Society for General Systems Research – ISGSR – in 1972). Margaret Mead was involved with the society since it was first established as the Society for the Advancement of General Systems Theory at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in 1956. At that meeting, she admonished the newly formed society to apply systems principles to itself as an organization, "with the aim of fostering a more collaborative and inclusive organizational structure."(5) Her work with indigenous – or more properly, autochthonous – peoples the world over emphasized the role of the individual in the collective, and the role of the collective as enabler for the flourishing of the individual. Deeply committed to social process, Mead's view of systems was fundamentally relational. Sir Ken Robinson notes that ‎"human communities depend upon a diversity of talent, not a singular conception of ability, and the heart of our challenge is to reconstitute our sense of ability and of intelligence."(6) It is in this spirit of relational intelligence, drawing on the type of systemic consciousness so well embodied by Margaret Mead, that this award has been established. Whereas the other two Student Paper Awards both celebrate the vision for inspired systemic thought, being, and action as embodied and manifest through the efforts of individuals such as Sir Geoffrey Vickers and Anatol Rapoport, the Margaret Mead Memorial Award recognizes contributions to systems experience, thinking, design, and action that empower individuals in communities, and in so doing, empower communities as purposeful systems in their own right. This award invites papers that address contemporary challenges in ways that advance understanding of how collective intelligence and collective impact(7) foster emergence, thrivability and systemic wellbeing. The ISSS honors Margaret Mead and the inspirational role her work continues to play in the life of the society, as attested to by her presence on the main page of our website (http://isss.org/world/).

(5) Hammond, D. (2003). The Science of Synthesis, University Press of Colorado, Boulder CO, USA, p. 249.

(6) Robinson, Ken (2010). Bring on the learning revolution! TED Talk – online at http://www.ted.com/talks/sir_ken_robinson_bring_on_the_revolution.html [sourced 10 February 2013].

(7) Kania, J. and Kramer, M. (2013). Embracing Emergence: How Collective Impact Addresses Complexity, Stanford Social Innovation Review – online at http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/embracing_emergence_how_collective_impact_addresses_complexity [sourced 10 February 2013].

==Prospectus for students presenting a paper at an annual meeting==
In memory of the humanistic vision of Sir Geoffrey Vickers, the integrative vision of Anatol Rapoport, and the collectivist vision of Margaret Mead, and in recognition of their deep commitment to, and belief in, the power of young people to contribute creatively to the betterment of the human condition, a plaque and check for $500 will be awarded for the best student paper in each of the three award domains. The Vickers Award, the Rapoport Award, and the Mead Award recognize outstanding work done in the domain of the systems sciences, and are considered the most prestigious prizes in the field at the pre-doctoral level. Submissions that draw on perspectives covered by any of these three Awards are warmly invited. Generally speaking, it will be in the author's best interest to indicate for which award they wish to have their submission considered.

* The competition takes place only once a year.
* It is open to all students from any country.
* The student must actively request that their paper be considered for the Vickers Award OR the Rapoport Award OR the Mead Award OR any combination of the three. However, a paper may receive only one award.
* The student must submit the paper to the ISSS Office in addition to submitting the paper online to the Journals site. The eMail to the ISSS Office accompanying the paper should indicate that the student wishes this paper to be submitted for the Award(s) of their interest.
* Student-authored papers are eligible for consideration, and preference will be given to individually authored work. A determination of contributions to the paper will be made by interaction between the committee and the student if there are any other authors listed on the paper.
* Only one paper per student should be submitted for consideration in any given year.
* A single outstanding paper will be selected each year for each award category. Awards will no longer be split between two winners.
* A full paper must be submitted by the publication deadline and will be included on the web Journals.isss.org proceedings unless stated otherwise by the Student Award committee.
* The paper must adhere to the instructions for submitting abstracts found on https://www.isss.org/submitting-abstracts/
* Certification must be provided showing that this work was performed while the contestant was a student and, in the case of recent graduates, that it has been submitted for consideration no later than one year from the date of the award of their terminal degree (Bachelor's, Master's, or Doctorate).
* Previous winners of this Award Competition may not enter again.
* Student papers will be judged for each Award by separate committees convened by the VP Research and Publications.
* In any given year, any one or even up to all three Awards may not given if no paper is found to qualify for the established Award categories. As such, none of these Awards need be granted obligatorily each year, but will only be bestowed if merited by specific submissions.
* A completed student conference registration confirmation fee should accompany the paper submission.
* The successful paper may be scheduled for presentation in a plenary session during the conference at the discretion of the President and the Program Committee.
* If it is not possible for the student to travel to the conference, it may be possible to arrange for a video link (depending on the facilities available to the conference) or another person may make the presentation on the student's behalf. The preferred options are as follows and in order of preference:

** that the winning Vickers, Rapoport, and Mead Award papers be presented in Plenary in person by the winners; or
** that they be presented "virtually"; or
** that they be presented in absentia by a designated proxy as long as the student(s) or co-author(s) has also submitted and paid for registration of that paper.

==Previous Sir Geoffrey Vickers Award Winners==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! 1988
! St Louis
! Donald de Raadt
|-
| 1989
| Edinburgh
| Bela A Banathy
|-
| 1990
| Portland
| two awards: Sally Goerner; Daune West
|-
| 1991
| Sweden
| Erin Artigiani, Cliff Joslyn
|-
| 1992
| Denver
| Sen Suan Tan
|-
| 1993
| Australia
| Jeremy Chui
|-
| 1994
| Asilomar
| T. Dahl and Darek Erikson
|-
| 1995
| Amsterdam
| two awards: Craig Crabtree; Jennifer Wilby
|-
| 1996
| Louisville
| Parviz Ahari
|-
| 1996
| Budapest
| No Award
|-
| 1997
| Seoul, Korea
| No Award
|-
| 1998
| Atlanta
| Martine Dodds
|-
| 1999
| Asilomar
| Molly Dwyer and Jane Zimmerman
|-
| 2000
| Toronto
| two awards: Gabor Horvath; Kathia Laszlo
|-
| 2001
| Asilomar
| Lynn M. Rasmussen
|-
| 2002
| Shanghai, China
| two awards: Pamela Buckle; K. C. Wang
|-
| 2003
| Crete
| Sabrina Brahms
|-
| 2004
| Asilomar
| Janette Young
|-
| 2005
| Cancun
| Honorato Teissier
|-
| 2006
| Sonoma
| Hanne Birgitte Jensen
|-
| 2007
| Tokyo
| Nicholas Magliocca
|-
| 2008
| Madison
| Devin Wixon
|-
| 2009
| Brisbane
| Anne Stephens
|-
| 2010
| Waterloo
| Todd D. Bowers
|-
| 2011
| Hull
| Mary Edson
|-
| 2012
| San Jose
| William J. Varey
|-
| 2013
| Hai Phong, Viet Nam
| Victor MacGill
|-
| 2014
| Washington, DC
| Anne Powel Davis
|-
| 2015
| Berlin, Germany
| Alexandre Strapasson
|-
| 2016
| Boulder, Colorado
| Skyler Knox Perkins
|-
| 2017
| Vienna, Austria
| No award.
|-
| 2018
| Corvallis, OR
| Sage Kittleman
|-
| 2019
| Corvallis, OR
| Peter Roolf
|-
| 2020
| No Conference
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | No award
|-
| 2021
| Online
| No award
|-
| 2022
| Online
| Shae Brown
|-
| 2023
| Kruger, South Africa
| Anthony Fry
|-
| 2024
| Washington, DC, USA
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | Yunlong Xu
|-
| 2025
| Birmingham, UK
| style="vertical-align:middle;" | R. Eva King
|}

==Previous Anatol Rapoport Award Winners==

This award was first given in 2011.

2011 Hull David Greenwood
2012 San Jose, USA Andreas Hieronymi
2013 Hai Phong, Viet Nam Novie Setianto
2014 Washington, DC No award
2015 Berlin, Germany Kwamina Ewur Banson
2016 Boulder, Colorado Aleksandar Malecic
2017 Vienna, Austria Anh B. Tong
2018 Corvallis, OR
No award
2019 Corvallis, OR
Jeff Scales
2020 No Conference
No award
2021 Online No award
2022 Online
No award
2023 Kruger, South Africa
No award
2024 Washington, DC, USA Haider Al-Shareefy
2025 Birmingham, UK
Bruno Nunes Vaz

==Previous Margaret Mead Award Winners==

This award was first given in 2013.

2013 Hai Phong, Viet Nam Magda Kaspary
2014 Washington, DC Raghav Rajagopalan
2015 Berlin, Germany Eshantha Ariyadasa
2016 Boulder, Colorado Jackwin Simbolon
2017 Vienna, Austria Kendra Rosencrans
2018 Corvallis, OR
Maria Alejandra Torres-Cuello
2019 Corvallis, OR
Marty Jacobs
2020 No Conference
No award
2021 Online No award
2022 Online
No award
2023 Kruger, South Africa
Monique Potts
2024 Washington, DC, USA Rudolph Wiraman
2025 Birmingham, UK Abel Mavura

==Prospectus for students (in Spanish)==
El Sir Geoffrey Vickers Memorial Award se estableció en memoria de la visión humanística de Sir Geoffrey Vickers y su profundo compromiso y convicción en el poder de la gente joven para contribuir creativamente al mejoramiento de la condición humana. De la misma manera, se estableció el Anatol Rapoport Memorial Award para reconocer trabajo sobresaliente hecho por gente joven en las áreas quantitativas y de modelación formal. Y en 2013, se estableció el Margaret Mead Memorial Award para promover contribuciones de la gente joven en ambitos de investigaciones feministas, colectivistas, y de un carácter culturalmente pluralista. Los tres premios consisten en una plaqueta y un cheque por U$D 500. cada uno — a ser otorgados a los mejores trabajos de un estudiante universitario, y son los premio más prestigiosos en esta área del conocimiento en el nivel pre-doctoral. Los trabajos ganadores son presentados en una sesión plenaria de la conferencia anual de la entidad.

ISSS Student Awards

2026-02-19T14:57:12Z

Laouris: created and polulated

Jason Jixuan

2026-02-12T04:37:27Z

Laouris:

{{
ISSS Member
|name=Jason Jixuan
|image=Jason_Jixuan_Hu.jpg
|period=To fill
|title=Member
|affiliation=To fill
|notable_works=To fill
|interests=To fill
|degrees=B.Sc. in Electronic Engineering <br> Ph.D. in Management and Organizations
|fields=System Engineer <br> System Dynamics Modeling <br> cybernetics <br> Management and Organizations <br> Philosophy of Social Sciences
|universities=The Heilongjiang Institute of Commerce <br> The George Washington University
|specializations=To fill
|orcid=To Fill
|achievements=To fill
|links= https://drjasonhu.com/

}}

'''Jason Jixuan''' has joined ISSS in 19XX.
==Personal Life==
Jason Jixuan Hu (born 1957, Kunming, People’s Republic of China) is a Chinese American cyberneticist, independent scholar, and managing director of the WINTOP Organizational Learning Laboratory. He is also the organizer and facilitator of the Club of Remy. Hu is known for his work on cognitive capacity in human communication, conflict resolution, and cooperation solicitation, as well as for his views on distance education in the United States.

==Academia and Career==
Hu received a B.Sc. in Electronic Engineering from the Heilongjiang Institute of Commerce in 1981 and was certified as a System Engineer in System Dynamics Modeling by the Sino-Japanese Software Developing Center in 1985. In 1986, he went to the United States as a visiting scholar to study cybernetics and systems science. He later earned a Ph.D. from The George Washington University in 1995, with a primary focus on Management and Organizations and a secondary focus on the Philosophy of Social Sciences. After returning briefly to China in 1988, he left following the events of June 4, 1989, and later became a United States citizen after September 11, 2001.

Hu’s academic interests were shaped by systems thinkers including Tsien Hsue-shen, Jin Guangtao, Jay Forrester, Stuart Umpleby, Heinz von Foerster, Humberto Maturana, Russell Ackoff, and others. In 1993, he completed a manuscript titled Introduction to Cybernetics, which outlined a framework of key principles and inquiry themes; it later served as course material in guest lectures at several universities in the United States and China. His subsequent work developed along three primary lines: applications of cybernetics to human communication (which he termed “Communicatics”); organizational development and leadership training through the WINTOP Roundtable Leadership Program (with “TOP” referring to Technology of Participation); and efforts to introduce large-scale education models in China, including the Apollo Project (1999–2002). Through WINTOP, he has also been involved in consulting and training initiatives and in translating selected works on systems thinking into Chinese.

Hu is the managing director of the WINTOP Organizational Learning Laboratory, based in Phoenix, Arizona, and organizes the Club of Remy, an international discussion forum. He is a lifetime member of the American Society for Cybernetics and initiated the CYBCOM forum in 1993. His later research has focused on cognitive capability and theories of civilization evolution. He has traveled extensively and conducted cross-cultural studies in multiple countries, and speaks Mandarin and English, with limited proficiency in German and Japanese.

==Special Interests==
Hu's inquiries can be classified into three periods:

* His early work (1982–1993) focused on social problem-identification due to his overwhelming experience with the severe social pathologies in PRC caused by communism as well as by the unhealthy elements of the Chinese traditions.His inquiry about what's wrong in the society of China started at his teenager years during the notorious "cultural revolution" stirred up by Mao.
* His mid-term work (1993–2009) were social-solution oriented, focusing on a new communication theory, large-scale education model, and grassroot participation model, and his scope of concern expanded from the country of China to the country of the United States, and to the sustainability issues of the whole planet.
* Hu's latest work (2010–current) is to establish a theory of the evolution of our civilization based on a synthesis of the cultural gene hypothesis with the multi-layer self-organization theory, which is his extension of classic (single-step) self-organization theories (e.g. of Ashby, Von Foerster, Prigogine & Haken.) This theory provides a new perspective to understand the history, the current status and the possible futures of the human civilization, suggesting priorities for and calling for attentions of action leaders at various levels in our societies.
* Hu has also developed a four-dimensional system thinking framework which was applied to comparative study of organizational dynamics, an expansion of Ashby's law of requisite variety, a taxonomy of system thinking, and to a new perspective of second-order cybernetics and second-order science.

==Video Presentations==
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJumBT3J15xhAoNs9CnrSVg/videos Club of Remy YouTube Channel]

==Selected Publications==
* Hu, Jixuan (January 1988). "On the Two-Phase Phenomenon of Value Sets". Cybernetics and Systems. 19 (6): 479–490. doi:10.1080/01969728808902181.
* Hu, Jixuan (January 1988). "The End of Utopia: On the Nondesignability of Social Systems". Cybernetics and Systems. 19 (6): 491–500. doi:10.1080/01969728808902182.
* Hu, Jixuan; Sun, Xiaoyun (July 1991). "China's Economic Reform as a Case of Large-Scale Social Change". Cybernetics and Systems. 22 (4): 505–514. doi:10.1080/01969729108902297.
* Hu, J. X. (1994). "O niemożliwości projektowania systemów żywych: wnioski z nieudanego eksperymentu krajów socjalistycznych. Projektowanie i systemy". Agadnienia Metodologiczne Nauk Praktycznych. 14: 64–65.
* Hu, Jixuan (June 1995). "Communicatics and communicationism as knowledge tools for a sustainable civilization". Proceedings 1995 Interdisciplinary Conference: Knowledge Tools for a Sustainable Civilization. Fourth Canadian Conference on Foundations and Applications of General Science Theory. pp. 282–291. doi:10.1109/ktsc.1995.569184. ISBN 978-0-7803-3365-9. S2CID 152605204.
* Hu, J. J. (June 2014). "Two human fates of human becoming are we splitting into two species?". 2014 IEEE Conference on Norbert Wiener in the 21st Century (21CW). pp. 1–5. doi:10.1109/norbert.2014.6893914. ISBN 978-1-4799-4562-7. S2CID 11717379.
* Hu, Jason Jixuan (2015). "Anthropocene? Yes, but Stratified – Measuring Existing Societies with Civilization Level Index". Proceedings of the 59th Annual Meeting of the ISSS - 2015 Berlin, Germany. 1 (1).

==Citations==
[https://scholar.google.co.za/citations?hl=en&user=LQMqdxQAAAAJ Google Scholar ]

==Links to relevant pages==
https://drjasonhu.com/

[[Category: Members]]