World Organisation of Systems and Cybernetics (WOSC): reflexions and update

Citation

Rach, R. (2012), "World Organisation of Systems and Cybernetics (WOSC): reflexions and update", Kybernetes, Vol. 41 No. 7/8. https://doi.org/10.1108/k.2012.06741gaa.008

World Organisation of Systems and Cybernetics (WOSC): reflexions and update

Article Type: Communications and forum From: Kybernetes, Volume 41, Issue 7/8

Systemic thinking and cybernetics have much to offer to mankind today. Global and ecological issues are critical to our survival in this planet. Today there are many collectives that share the systemic and cybernetic paradigms, but they are highly fragmented and so far their influence to overcome social inequalities and ecological devastation has been limited indeed. These collectives share responsibilities to solve/dissolve problems now and to form the professionals of the future with the competencies for a holistic appreciation of social problems. These collectives should be catalysts to transform our individual efforts into power houses for a better future. I believe that associations such as the International Academy for Systems and Cybernetics Sciences (IASCYS), the International Federation of Systems Research (IFSR), the European Union of Systems (EUS-UES), the “Association Française de Science des Systèmes Cybernétiques Cognitifs” et Techniques(AFSCET), the UK Systems Society (UKSS), the American Society for Cybernetics, the UK Cybernetic Society and WOSC, among others, share paradigms, methodologies and tools to contribute towards achieving values of solidarity, freedom, fairness and cohesion in society. The challenge is transforming all these associations into catalysts of new organisations with capabilities to produce such values at the local, regional and global levels.

One of WOSC’s concerns is enabling communications among all of us. The most natural media for this enabling is today’s internet. WOSC’s web site: www.wosc.co, is making progress but, not nearly as much as it should. It needs significant development and new capabilities. You are invited to contribute in whatever ways you think fit to the further development of this website.

But beyond virtual communications we need spaces for face-to-face interactions. Among others, these have to be interactions to construct refutable knowledge, built on the peer reviewing of our contributions and all this, most significantly, in a context that is crying for systems thinking and cybernetic approaches for problem solving. Today a good deal of the most recognisable of these contributions is coming from economics, complexity theory, social sciences, biological and physical sciences, arguably making our contributions more marginal and dispensable. The challenge is strengthening our science and making our views more meaningful to the wider public and credible to funding and governance bodies.

At a more immediate level, for the past few months, WOSC has been contributing to the organisation of the forthcoming European Meeting on Cybernetics and Systems Research (EMCSR 2012) to take place in Vienna from the 10 to the 13 of April. WOSC is responsible for Symposium S: Design and Self-organization in the Emergence of Effective Organizations (www.emcsr.net). Eight of WOSC’s directors are planning to be in Vienna.

Organising WOSC’s next triennial congress is slowly but surely making progress. This is a highly demanding activity, which relies on the commitment of national organisations and the support of Kybernetes. Dr Pedro Narvarte from the University of Santiago in Chile, and one of our directors, is responsible for organising WOSC’s 16th Congress in 2014. As already mention in an earlier communications this is going to be WOSC’s first congress in South America. We expect that Cybersyn, Stafford Beer’s invention and Chile’s project (see recent book by Eden Medina: the Cybernetic Revolutionaries, MIT Press, 2011), and Maturana’s and Varela’s theory of Autopoiesis will provide significant contributions to the content of this Congress.

Finally, the new Directorate of the World Organisation of Systems and Cybernetics is constituted as follows:

President: Professor R. Vallée (France)

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  Professeur émérite Université Paris-Nord

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  Président d’honneur de l’AFSCET

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  Founding member and Academician of IASCYS

Vice-President: Professor Brian H. Rudall (UK)

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  Director of the Norbert Wiener Institute of WOSC

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  Professor, formerly Bangor University, Wales, UK

Director-General: Professor Raul Espejo (UK)

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  Director of Syncho Research UK

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  Past Professor at Lincoln University UK

Dr Alex Andrew (UK)

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  Past Director-General of WOSC

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  Reading University (Retired), UK

Prof. Pierre Bricage (France)

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  Professor, University of Pau & Pays de l’Adour UPPA (France)

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  Biology & Health and Social Sciences Engineering

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  Institut de Biocénotique Expérimentale des Agrosystèmes IBEAS,

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  Laboratoire de Didactique et Communication Pédagogique LDCP,

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  Laboratoire des Processus d’Accompagnement et de Formation LPAAssociate

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  Secretary General of AFSCET (Association Française de Science des Systèmes Cybernétiques, Cognitifs et Techniques – www.afscet.asso.fr)

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  Associate Secretary General of the European Union of Systems (Brussels, Belgium) (2011) – www.aes.ues-eus.eu/index.html

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  Secretary General International Academy for Systems and Cybernetic Sciences (IASCYS)

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  Academician, IASCYS – www.iascys.org

Prof. François Dubois (France)

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  University Professor at Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers (Paris)

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  Master of Atomic and Statistical Physics (University Paris 6, 1980)

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  Doctor of University Paris 6 in Applied Mathematics (1988)

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  Expert in numerical modelling for applications (Lattice Boltzmann schemes discrete topology, vector fields. hyperbolic systems, etc.)

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  President of AFSCET (French Association for Systems Science) since 2011.

Mr German Bula Escobar (Colombia)

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  Past Minister of Education of Colombia

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  Past Deputy-Head of the Colombian National Audit Office

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  Consultant and arbitrator

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  Lecturer at the Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia

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  Substitute magistrate to the Colombian State Council

Dr Enrique G. Herrscher (Argentina)

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  Universidad Nacional de la Patagonia San Juan Bosco (in charge of organizing its PhD program)

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  Member of the Advisory Board of GESI, Grupo de Estudio de Sistemas Integrados

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  Member of the Advisory Board of ALAS, Asociación Latinoamericana de Sistémica

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  Member of the Board of Trustees (as past President) of ISSS, International Society for the Systems Sciences

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  Academician of IASCYS, International Academy for Systems and Cybernetic Sciences

Professor Ray Ison (Australia and UK)

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  Professor, Systems for Sustainability, Monash Sustainability Institute, Monash University, Clayton Victoria, Australia, +61 (0)404308180 mob

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  Professor of Systems, Communication and Systems Department, Faculty of Maths, Computing and Technology, The Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA, UK

Professor Jeffrey (Yi Lin) Forrest (USA)

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  Professor at Slippery Rock University, PA 16057, USA

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  President of International Institute of General Systems Studies, Inc., PA.

Professor Jerzy Józefczyk (Wrocław, Poland)

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  Wroclaw University of Technology, Institute of Informatics, Wroclaw, Poland, Address: Wybrzeze Wyspianskiego 27, 50-370 Wroclaw

Professor Kyoichi Kijima (Japan)

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  Professor of Decision Systems Sciences, Graduate School of Decision Science and Technology, Tokyo Institute of Technology (Tokyo Tech), 2-12-1 Ookayama, Meguro-ku, Tokyo, 152-8552 Japan. Tel./Fax: +81-3-5734-2363, web site: www.valdes.titech.ac.jp/∼kk-lab/overview/kijima.html

Dr Louis Klein (Germany)

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  Chief Executive Officer Systemic Excellence Group – Berlin

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  Visiting Faculty at University of Applied Sciences, North-western Switzerland

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  SIG Chair and Past Vice-president of the International Society for Systems Sciences

Dr Allenna Leonard (Canada)

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  Complementary Set, Principal

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  International Society for Systems Sciences, Member and Past President

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  American Society for Cybernetics, Member and Past President

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  Cwarel Isaf Institute, Director

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  Ecologos, Director and Vice-Chair

Professor Matjaz Mulej (Maribor, Slovenia)

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  University of Maribor, Faculty of Economics and Business, SI-2000 Maribor, Slovenia (retired, Professor Emeritus, working on part-time basis on research and with doctoral students)

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  IRDO Institute for Development of Social Responsibility, SI-2000 Maribor, Slovenia (head of the experts board, working on a free-time basis on conferences and research)

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  President: International Academy for Systems and Cybernetic Sciences (IASCYS), Vienna, Austria

Dr Pedro Narvarte Arregui (Chile)

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  Academic at the Department of Industrial Engineering of the Universidad de Santiago, Chile

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  Past Pro-Rector of the Universidad de Santiago, Chile

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  Member of ALAS, Asociación Latinoamericana de Sistémica

Professor José Pérez Ríos (Spain)

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  Professor of Business Organization at the University of Valladolid (Spain)

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  Member of the following societies:

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  System Dynamics Society (SDS)

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  The Society for Modeling & Simulation International

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  Institute of Industrial Engineers (IIE)

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  International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS)

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  World Futures Studies Federation (WFSF)

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  Sociedad Española de Sistemas generales (SESGES)

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  Asociación Española de Economía Aplicada

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  Asociación Española de Economía Regional

Professor Tom Ryan (South Africa)

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  Member of Faculty and Director of the Executive MBA program at the Graduate School of Business of the University of Cape Town

Professor Markus Schwaninger (St Gallen, Switzerland)

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  Institute of Management, University of St. Gallen, Dufourstr. 40a, 4. Stock, CH-9000 St Gallen, e-mail: Markus.Schwaninger@UNISG.CH, Tel.:++41 71 224 23 82, web site: www.ifb.unisg.ch/

Professor Vadim L. Stefanuk (Moscow, Russia)

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  Leading Researcher in the Institute for Information Transmission Problems (IITP) of the Russian Academy of Science, Moscow

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  Professor of Moscow University for People’s Friendship (RUDN)

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  Full member (academician) of Russian Academy for Natural Science

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  Full member (academician) of International Informatics Academy

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  Vice-Chairman of Russian Association for Artificial Intelligence (RAAI)

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  Fellow of European Coordinated Committee for Artificial Intelligence (ECCAI)

Professor Martin Smith (UK)

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  Team Leader and Principal Scientist at the UK Government Research Laboratory

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  President of the UK Cybernetic Society

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  Past Visiting Professor at the Open University, UK

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  Past Professor at the University of Central England

Professor Frank Stowell (UK)

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  Member of the Board and past president of the UK Systems Society (UKSS)

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  Chair of the Council of Information Systems Professors (CISP)

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  Past president of the UK Academy of Information Systems (UKAIS)

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  Editor in chief of the International Journal of Information Technology and Systems (IJITSA)

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  Chair of the Systems Practice for Managing Complexity network (www.northumbria.ac.uk/sd/academic/ceis/enterprise/spmc/)

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  Emeritus Professor of Systems and Information Systems at Portsmouth

Prof. Stuart Umpleby (USA)

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  Research Program in Social and Organizational Learning, Department of Management, School of Business, The George Washington University, 2033 K Street NW, Suite 230, Washington, DC 20052, USA. Tel.: (202) 994-1642, Fax: (202) 994-5284, e-mail: umpleby@gwu.edu, web site: www.gwu.edu/∼umpleby

Professor Raul EspejoFebruary, 2012

Editor’s note: Randolph Rach was a co-researcher of Professor George Adomian and we are pleased to receive such a comprehensive bibliography. Readers will recall that this journal has published numerous contributions about Dr Adomian’s work and the wide range of its application. This has been a time-consuming task and we are grateful to its compiler for preparing it.