The science of complexity: An alternative perspective for strategic change processes

Abstract The two perspectives of strategy process most firmly established in the literature—strategic choice and ecology—assume the same about system dynamics: negative feedback processes driving successful systems (individual organizations or populations of organizations) toward predictable equilibrium states of adaptation to the environment. This paper proposes a third perspective, that of complex adaptive systems. The framework is provided by the modern science of complexity: the study of nonlinear and network feedback systems, incorporating theories of chaos, artificial life, self‐organization and emergent order. Here system dynamics are characterized by positive and negative feedback as systems coevolve far from equilibrium, in a self‐organizing manner, toward unpredictable long‐term outcomes.