Cybernetics of the Collaborative Networks Discipline
Abstract
Collaborative Networks (CNs) research, like any other developing discipline, needs a roadmap facilitating the integration of previous results into a theoretical foundation. CN researchers argue that the required theoretical foundation must consolidate the existing body of knowledge, and provide grounding to define how to invoke results of other relevant disciplines. The authors have previously proposed the 'Cybernetics of the Collaborative Networks' (C2N) as a field of CN-research intended as a unified theory of CNs, formalising, synthesising, harmonising and systematising individual CN-related results addressing management ...
View more >Collaborative Networks (CNs) research, like any other developing discipline, needs a roadmap facilitating the integration of previous results into a theoretical foundation. CN researchers argue that the required theoretical foundation must consolidate the existing body of knowledge, and provide grounding to define how to invoke results of other relevant disciplines. The authors have previously proposed the 'Cybernetics of the Collaborative Networks' (C2N) as a field of CN-research intended as a unified theory of CNs, formalising, synthesising, harmonising and systematising individual CN-related results addressing management and control problems in CNs. This article aims at further extending the concept of C2N and answering the question: what is a unified evolving theory of the CN discipline itself? To model the discipline-asa- system, we use Beer's Viable System Model (VSM) and introduce three basic components of the CN discipline as a viable system. A 'co-evolution mechanisms' for the discipline is proposed and a cybernetic model of coevolution is applied to the CN discipline.
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View more >Collaborative Networks (CNs) research, like any other developing discipline, needs a roadmap facilitating the integration of previous results into a theoretical foundation. CN researchers argue that the required theoretical foundation must consolidate the existing body of knowledge, and provide grounding to define how to invoke results of other relevant disciplines. The authors have previously proposed the 'Cybernetics of the Collaborative Networks' (C2N) as a field of CN-research intended as a unified theory of CNs, formalising, synthesising, harmonising and systematising individual CN-related results addressing management and control problems in CNs. This article aims at further extending the concept of C2N and answering the question: what is a unified evolving theory of the CN discipline itself? To model the discipline-asa- system, we use Beer's Viable System Model (VSM) and introduce three basic components of the CN discipline as a viable system. A 'co-evolution mechanisms' for the discipline is proposed and a cybernetic model of coevolution is applied to the CN discipline.
View less >
Journal Title
IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology
Volume
408
Copyright Statement
© IFIP International Federation for Information Processing 2013. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Subject
Information systems
Information systems organisation and management