Complexity Theory <> Social Theory Smith and Jenks (2005)

THIS ARTICLEseeks to contribute to the growing body of complex- 

ity theory within the social sciences. It is structured around four 

themes. The first corresponds roughly with the distinction between 

chaos and complexity. Some authors (e.g. Gray, 2002, 2003) might 

emphasize the chaotic, uncontrollable or unexpected outcomes of complex 

social processes; others (e.g. Cohen and Stewart, 1995; Schnitman and 

Schnitman, 2002) emphasize the emergence of complex, ‘homeodynamic’ 

structures. 

The second theme is more critical. We argue that much contemporary 

sociology makes tacit use of the remnants of a humanistic concept of the 

human subject and its agency. This is not the case for complexity theory, 

which emerges from cognitive theory more embedded in biology. Cohen and 

Stewart (1995) are important here, so are Maturana and Varela (1980), from 

whom the concept of autopoiesis, so central to Luhmann’s sociology, is 

derived. 

The third theme juxtaposes both a degree of chance, or chaos, and a 

degree of order, or the propensity of complex structures to organize them- 

selves. This is not a new idea. It lies at the root of evolution, systems theory, 

of autopoiesis, in Maturana and Varela’s sense (relating to organisms), in 

Luhmann’s sense (relating to social systems) and Prigogine’s work on thermo- 

dynamics. We argue that it needs further development in sociology. 

Though self-organisation obviously signifies autonomy a self-organising 

system ... must work to construct and reconstruct its autonomy and this 

requires energy. ... [T]he system must draw energy from the outside; to be 

autonomous ... it must be [also] dependent. (Morin, 2002: 4, citing Von 

Foerster, 1984) 

■ 

Theory, Culture & Society2005 (SAGE, London, Thousand Oaks and New Delhi), 

Vol. 22(5): 141–163 

DOI: 10.1177/0263276405057048 

 at University of Lincoln on October 19, 2010tcs.sagepub.comDownloaded from 

This is clearly allied with Prigogine’s notion of ‘dissipative structures’. Its 

paradox can be resolved by an ‘ecological’ perspective: a self-organizing 

system in an environment of self-organizing systems is reciprocal in terms of 

cause and effect. Put simply, it has to be viable; and at other times it may 

not be viable. Morin (2002) offers auto-eco-organization, a significant 

development with which we concur. We stress that ‘reciprocal’ causality does 

not imply that the temporal order of causes and effects can be ‘loosened’. 

The fourth theme argues that knowledge, representation, information, 

cognitions of any kind, are material consequences of this same ecology. 

Cognition is not therefore ‘determined’. This does not imply a return to any 

kind of base/superstructure model, whether representational, corresponden- 

tial or ‘economic’. Rather, it is to say that cognition is self-organizing or 

auto-referential; and that this occurs within a material and informational 

ecology. As Morin puts it: 

[Just] as auto-organisation is in fact auto-eco-organisation, self or auto refer- 

ence is really auto-exo-reference, which is to say that to refer to oneself one 

must refer to the outside world. (2002: 49) 

Unlike ‘representationalism’ – the idea that the world ‘provides’ information 

‘to be processed’ – we argue, that auto-organization and informational 

imperatives are mutually attracted. Both are evolved, system or organism- 

specific phenomena. 

142 Theory, Culture & Society 22(5) 

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