1. Conducting a Systemic Conversation:

2. Discourse for ‘Public’ Judgment in the Risk Society of a Mixed-up World Richard Bawden Michigan State University

3. “In the course of the exponentially growing forces of the modernization process, hazards and potential threats have been unleashed to an extent previously unknown”. Ulrich Beck A Risk Society?

4. “We are concerned no longer exclusively with making nature useful, or with releasing mankind from traditional constraints, but also and essentially with problems of techno-development itself.” Ulrich Beck A New Imperative

5. “…in present-day America, few institutions are devoted to helping the public to form considered judgments, and the public is discouraged from doing the necessary hard work because there is little incentive to do so” Daniel Yankelovich ‘Public’ Judgment?

6. “If reading the daily paper is modern man’s form of prayer, then it is a very strange man indeed who is doing the praying today while reading of these mixed-up affairs. All of culture and all of nature get churned up again every day”. Bruno Latour A Mixed-up World?

7. So The matters of every-day life are complex and risk-laden on a scale that is increasingly global. They demand the engagement of the entire citizenry in a ‘universe of human discourse’. Systemic conversations represent a useful foundation for such discourse.

8. Take the every-day matter of food for example:

9. … talk about the churning up of both nature and culture!!!

10. Most intellectual maps of agriculture fail to recognize it as the very interface between people and their environments Ken Dahlberg

11. Nature Culture Agriculture/Food

12. ‘Natural Systems’ ‘Social Systems’ ‘Agri-food Systems’ Or in ‘Systems Terms’…

13. And most intellectual maps of agriculture also fail to reinforce the responsibilities that come with operating at that interface.

14. Ecological Economic Ethical The responsibilities that come with actions at the interface.

15. Wholeness Boundaries Inter-connectivities Dynamic Inter-relationships Hierarchies/Embeddedness Emergence Systems Ideas:

16. Observed environment Observed system Observed sub-systems Type I Systemics Perspective.

17. ‘ Natural Systems’ ‘ Social Systems’ ‘Agri-food Systems’ Input/Throughput/Output Flows

18. ‘ Natural Systems’ ‘ Social Systems’ ‘Agricultural Systems’ Extended Input/Throughput/Output Flows

19. ‘ Natural Systems’ ‘ Social Systems’ ‘Agricultural Systems’ ‘The Ambient Environment’

20. ‘ Natural Systems’ ‘ Social Systems’ ‘Agricultural Systems’ ‘The Ambient Environment’ Feedback and Other Flows

21. Local Regional Global Hierarchy and Embeddedness

22. Local Regional Global

23. ‘Social Systems’

24. Citizenry Academia Governance Commerce Church Service Media Various ‘sub-systems’ within ‘Social Systems’

25. Citizenry Academia Governance Commerce Church Service Media Language networks

26. Construed environment Type II Systemics Perspective. Construed/conceptual system Construing/learning sub-system

27. Issue of shared concern Concerned participants A Systemic Process of Construing/Learning Perceptions Actions Ideas

28. Issue of shared concern Concerned participants A Systemic Process of Construing/Learning e.g. Genetic engineering in food production Inter-connected learning activities ‘A Learning System’

29. Window on the world

30. Worldviews reflect sets of assumptions about The nature of nature (ontology) The nature of knowledge (epistemology) The nature of human nature (axiology) The nature of language and human inquiry (discourse/methodology)

31. Holism Reductionism Objectivism Some Dimensions of Windows on the World Contextualism

32. Holism Reductionism Objectivism Some Key Dimensions of ‘Windows on the World’ Contextualism Type I Systemics ECOCENTRIC Type II Systemics HOLOCENTRIC

33. [Meta-discourse] Embedded learning Learning about learning – meta-learning

34. Epistemic discourse Learning about the nature of knowledge Epistemic-learning

35. Learning System Emotions Dispositions

36. Learning System Experiential inquiry Inspirational Inquiry Emotions Dispositions

37. Natural SocialPolitical EconomicCultural Technological Learning sub- system ‘The Environment’ Conceptual System

38. Natural SocialPolitical EconomicCultural Technological Learning sub- system

39. Ecological Economic Harmonization Optimization Ethical Realization The Spirit of ‘Inclusive Well-being’

40. Ethical Realization Does it do harm? (non-maleficience) Is it in society’s best interest? (beneficience) Is there freedom of choice? (autonomy) Is there just distribution of benefits and burdens? (justice)

41. If genetic engineering is to be accepted it will have to be used with respect for : Human autonomy and dignity and for the integrity and vulnerability of life. Danish Ministry of Trade

42. My Workshop Tomorrow “A Systemic Perspective on the Triple Bottom Line” (TBL) will progress through three phases of discourse: 1.The identification of issues associated with the TBL in situations in which participants are currently engaged. 2.The generation of ‘scenarios’ of plausible future states of the ‘environments’ in which they believe that they might have to operate. 3.The development of TBL strategies in response to some of the ‘future environmental challenges’ that have been identified.