Complexity theory would have a huge claim on the attention of managers if it could be demonstrated that the laws it reckons to have discovered, operating in physical and biological systems, apply equally to the complex evolving systems that managers have to deal with. If this were so, they could use the knowledge gained to manipulate and control organizations so that they
‘thrive and strive’. Through the control parameters they could ensure that their enterprises operated at the edge of chaos. Once this happy state was attained, the legitimate system would enable managers to plan for and control short-term performance. It would never be possible to plan for the long term, but an organization operating at the edge of chaos would self-organize and throw up patterns of behaviour that managers could intuitively understand, even if they could not predict in detail what was going to happen. Moreover, they could encourage creativity and learning in such a way as to give the organization the best chance of recognizing those patterns that could be detected and responding to whatever unpredict-able events the ¢tness landscape conjured up.
The ¢rst problem with this strong claim, according to Rosenhead (1998), is that chaos and complexity theory still has much to do, as a science, to establish its scope and validity in the domain of natural systems. There is some evidence of its power, but other results rest more on suggestive computer simulations rather than on empirical observations. In the social domain there is a complete lack of solid evidence that complexity theory holds and that adopting its prescriptions will produce the bene¢ts claimed.
Given its state of immaturity as a ¢eld of research, we should be careful of complexity theory even as a source of well-de¢ned analogies that managers can employ.
There is a more fundamental problem with applying complexity theory to management, which has to do with the di¡erence between natural and social systems. Physical systems, like the weather, are governed by a limited number of deterministic laws. In these circumstances it is possible to see how strange attractors arise. Social systems, however, are in£uenced by innumerable variables and probabilistic elements abound. Strange attractors do not seem to manifest themselves. In particular, Rosenhead (1998) argues, because of the self-consciousness and free will exhibited by humans, the behaviour of social systems cannot be explained in the same way.
Humans think and learn, act according to their own purposes and are capable of reacting against and disproving any law that is said to apply to their behaviour.
Even if the strong claim cannot be justi¢ed, complexity theory might still deserve the attention of managers as an illuminating metaphor ^ throwing light on those aspects of the organizational world ignored by traditional theory because they seem too ‘di⁄cult’, chaotic, unpredictable and contro-versial. Rosenhead sees the metaphor to which complexity theory gives rise as particularly useful because it challenges the classical view that consensus in organizations is a good thing. It suggests that shared vision can lead to
Critique of complexity theory 129
groupthink, which prevents valuable alternative opinions being expressed.
It suggests that organizational politics need to be fostered as a means of ensuring the creativity and learning necessary for organizational survival.
If this is true, it needs to be recognized that there are downsides to the metaphor as well. For the most part, complexity theorists believe that, even in social systems, there is enough order underlying chaos to enable them to provide advice to managers on how to improve their organizations.
Science tells them that organizations must be manoeuvred to the edge of chaos and how this can be achieved. To that extent, managers who embrace complexity theory believe that they have access to some specialist knowledge denied to other stakeholders. There is a justi¢cation for authoritarian action hidden in this.
And what does complexity theory seek to achieve? It denies that managers can use the techniques of planning to pursue purposes. At best they can act to increase the ability of their organizations to survive, adapt and reach higher ¢tness peaks. The market environment seems to be the determinant of all things. As with organizational cybernetics, ‘good’ management tends to be reduced to improving e⁄ciency and e⁄cacy, to doing things right.
E¡ectiveness, or doing the right things, is recognized as important by com-plexity theory, but not directly assisted by it. The idea of choosing purposes and using organizations as rational vehicles of, say, achieving social progress is not easily conceptualized in its language. Rosenhead (1998) suggests that complexity theory is so popular at present because it o¡ers intellectual succour to the political argument that there is no alternative to the market for ordering our social a¡airs.
Given its origins in the natural sciences, the emphasis on ¢nding order underpinning chaos and the representation of the edge of chaos as a desirable state, it is not surprising that complexity theory ¢nds itself most at home in the functionalist paradigm (see Jackson, 2000). The great majority of writers on complexity theory interpret it this way and discuss the apparent insights that it can o¡er managers about how to drive their organizations to the edge of chaos. Stacey’s more recent work (e.g., 2000, 2003), as we saw, is an exception. He wants to reinvent complexity theory by using its concepts in the service of interpretivism and postmodernism. Here lies a problem for complexity theory. If it remains theoretically underdeveloped, confused even, then its ideas can easily be captured by any paradigm. We end up with functionalist, interpretive, emancipatory and postmodern ver-sions of complexity theory emphasizing, respectively, order beneath chaos, learning, self-organization and unpredictability. Stacey sometimes seems to approve of this, regarding complexity theory as ordering a variety of
com-patible insights in one paradigm. The problem is that there is not just one paradigm at work. We have four competing paradigms interpreting com-plexity theory in radically di¡erent ways. The whole thing falls apart.
The only coherent future for complexity theory in management, I would argue, lies in the functionalist paradigm. It is comfortable playing around with a mix of machine, organism, brain, and £ux and transformation meta-phors and giving them its own twist through notions such as legitimate system, strange attractors, self-organization, edge of chaos and the ¢tness landscape. Although there is reference to culture and politics this is under-played by comparison, and these metaphors play a dependent role in assisting organizations to arrive at the edge of chaos. The functionalist paradigm is the natural home for complexity theory, and it can play a signi¢cant role there in revitalizing functionalism by introducing a set of original and insightful ideas and concepts. Beyond functionalism it will be unable to compete with other forms of systems thinking (explored under Types B, C and D) that have a much longer history of exploring and developing alternative paradigms.
7.5 THE VALUE OF COMPLEXITY THEORY TO MANAGERS