The Instrumental Genesis of Collective Activity. The Case of an ERP Implementation in a Large Electricity Producer

Collective activity should be a focal subject to study organizational dynamics, particularly in relation with the implementation of management systems such as ERPs. Collective activity is analyzed here as an ongoing dialogical construction by actors. It is always mediated by signs and particularly by instruments. To design and adapt collective activity, a reflexive dialogical exchange between actors, a “collective activity about collective activity”, mediated by instruments, is necessary: we call it “the instrumental genesis of collective activity”. We analyze the case of an ERP implementation at EDF, a large electricity company, in the purchase and procurement area of the production division. The design and implementation of the new system was not clearly viewed as the instrumental genesis of collective activity. Difficulties appeared particularly for cross-functional cooperation and for the construction of new professional profiles of competence. In the light of this case, we suggest that key conditions for the intelligibility and the actionability of collective activity are the establishment of communities and the hybridization of professional competences.Collective Activity; Collective Sensemaking; Community; Dialogical; ERP; Instruments; Instrumental Genesis of Activity; Interpretation; Sign

Living City, A Collaborative Browser-Based Massively Multiplayer Online Game

This work presents the design and implementation of our Browser-based Massively Multiplayer Online Game, Living City, a simulation game fully developed at the University of Messina. Living City is a persistent and real-time digital world, running in the Web browser environment and accessible from users without any client-side installation. Today Massively Multiplayer Online Games attract the attention of Computer Scientists both for their architectural peculiarity and the close interconnection with the social network phenomenon. We will cover these two aspects paying particular attention to some aspects of the project: game balancing (e.g. algorithms behind time and money balancing); business logic (e.g., handling concurrency, cheating avoidance and availability) and, finally, social and psychological aspects involved in the collaboration of players, analyzing their activities and interconnections

Housing rural-urban migrants in Katutura: A transition towards a place in which "we want to stay"

The focus of this dissertation is on housing for rural-urban migrants in Katutura translated in the Otjiherero language as “a place where we do not stay”, is a former Black African township in Windhoek Namibia. Katutura is characterised by the NE51/9 house type (NE stands for Non-European, 51 stands for the year of design, and 9 for the specific type), and by the lack of social space and community cohesion that typically accompanies this type of urban settlement across Southern Africa. This urban condition contributes to a loss of identity for these new city dwellers and difficulties in integrating into their new living conditions. The purpose of the dissertation is to offer an alternative housing model that aims to facilitate a transition from rural to urban conditions. The model acknowledges the significant aspects of both rural and urban realities in a sustainable way addressing issues of identity, integration and food security. The research proposes to change the name of the suburb to Tukara (a place we want to stay) as a counter strategy towards the Apartheid government's spatial planning strategies in Katutura, which made it “a place where we do not stay”. The studies will be looking at the spatial justice theory to address the spatial inefficiency of the NE51/9 house type, as a framework for developing counter strategies for spatial justice. Flexible housing and Spatial agency principles are strategies for providing quality, and affordable housing for people of rural origins. This integration is activated through the hybridization of ways in which ruralurban migrants have adapted their NE51/9 houses to accommodate their needs with vernacular traditional practices, and ways of making from rural life. The hybridization of aspects from the rural and urban helps create a sense of identity, and belonging for rural-urban migrants in a contemporary urban environment with rapid new technological developments and globalization in the construction industry

Agents enacting social roles: balancing formal structure and practical rationality in MAS design

Der Soziologe Pierre Bourdieu zeigt die feine und häufig ignorierte Unterscheidung zwischen theoretischer Rationalität und der 'Logik der Praxis' auf. Diese Differenz, so die Annahme der Autoren, ist sowohl bei dem Versuch, menschliche Organisationen mit Robustheit und Flexibilität auszustatten, als auch bei jeder Bemühung, Informationssysteme auf der Basis von Mechanismen organisatorischer Koordination zu modellieren, zu berücksichtigen. Im INKA-Projekt, einem Bestandteil des deutschen Forschungsprogramms Sozionik, bildet diese Ansicht den Ausgangspunkt. Computergesteuerte Agenten, die sich selbst koordinieren und in einer Weise eigenständig agieren, ahmen im Prinzip menschliche Akteure in organisatorischen Umgebungen nach. Dabei müssen sie mit der Spannung zurechtkommen, die aus den formalen vorgegeben Beschreibungen der Organisation und den strukturierten Erwartungen, welche sich von den täglichen Interaktionen auf dem Level der Produktionsstätten ableiten, resultiert. In der Soziologie besteht eine Möglichkeit, diese Spannung in der Rollentheorie zu konzeptionieren, die auf verschiedene Formen der Darstellung von formalen Rollenbeschreibungen und praktischen Rollen ausgerichtet ist. Außerdem ist gemäß der Organisationstheorie und empirischen Untersuchungen bekannt, dass in der realen Welt die täglichen Aus- und Verhandlungen der Arbeitnehmer eine Form des Arbeitshandelns darstellen. Basierend auf diesen Betrachtungen orientiert sich das INKA-Projekt an zwei Hauptzielen: (1) Modellierung und Implementierung eines technischen Systems, in dem die Agenten fähig sind, sich auf der Basis von praktischen Rollen mittels Verhandlung selbständig zu koordinieren; (2) Entwicklung einer Annäherung an die Erforschung hybrider Sozialität, die bei dem Eintritt solcher Agenten in menschliche Organisationen entsteht. Die Ausführungen beginnen mit einer kurzen Diskussion der konzeptionellen Probleme, die auftreten, wenn Computerprogramme auf praktische Relationen oder auf soziologische Konzepte von praktischen Modalitäten der Interaktion, des Problemlösens und Planens zugeschnitten sind. Dies führt zu der Formulierung von drei generellen Herausforderungen innerhalb des Sozionik-Programms. Im Anschluss wird in einige Details der soziologisch basierten Schaffung von praktischen Rollen und aushandelnden Agenten eingeführt. Es folgt die Darstellung der Grundstruktur für die entsprechende MAS-Architektur. Dann werden zwei generelle Probleme behandelt, die bei dem derzeitigen Entwicklungsstand des vorgestellten Projekts und nach Ansicht der Autoren im gesamten Sozionik-Programm auftreten. Es wird ein integrierter Ansatz vorgeschlagen, der alle Aktivitäten in Sozionik-Systemen in einer systematischen Weise korreliert. Des Weiteren wird ein methodisches Instrument zur Erforschung der Hybridisierung präsentiert. Der Text schließt mit der Darstellung einiger konzeptioneller Erweiterungen und zukünftiger Arbeitsschritte. (ICGÜbers)Sociologist Pierre Bourdieu pointed out the subtle and often ignored difference between theoretical rationality and the 'logic of practice'. This difference, we will argue, has to be taken in account when trying to capture the robustness and flexibility of human organizations, and is especially important for any effort to model information systems on mechanisms of organizational coordination. In the INKA-project, part of the German Socionics program, we took this insight as our very starting point. Computational agents that 'act' and coordinate themselves in a way that at least mimics in principle human actors in organizational environments have to cope with the tension between the formal descriptions given by the organization at large and the structured expectations that derive from their daily interactions on the shop-floor level. In sociology one way of conceptualizing this tension is role theory, focusing on the different forms of enactment of formal role descriptions and practical roles. Furthermore, from organizational theory and empirical investigations we know that in the 'real world' daily negotiations by the employees themselves are one way of working around the incoherences of formal prescriptions, job descriptions and work schedules. Based on these considerations the INKA-project is oriented by two main objectives: To model and implement a technical system in which the agents are capable of coordinating themselves via negotiating on the basis of practical roles, and to develop an approach for the investigation of hybrid sociality that emerges if those agents are re-entered into human organizations. The contribution begins with a brief discussion of the conceptual problems that occur if computer programs are to be modeled on practical relations or on sociological concepts of practical modes of interaction, problem solving and planning; this leads us to the formulation of three general challenges within the Socionics program (2). In the next part we introduce in some detail our sociologically grounded modeling of practical roles and negotiating agents (3), and our framework for a corresponding MAS-architecture (4). Then we turn to two general issues, that came up at the present state of development in our project - and, as we assume, in the entire Socionics program. We propose an integrated approach that correlates all activities in Socionic systems development in a systematic way (5), and we present a methodological instrument for the investigation of hybridization (6). We conclude by sketching some conceptual extensions and further working steps (7)

Architecture for "Other". China's eclectic pragmatism in developing countries within the framework of the Belt and Road initiative

L'abstract è presente nell'allegato / the abstract is in the attachmen

Revolutionizing a World

This book investigates the long-term continuity of large-scale states and empires, and its effect on the Near East’s social fabric, including the fundamental changes that occurred to major social institutions. Its geographical coverage spans, from east to west, modern-day Libya and Egypt to Central Asia, and from north to south, Anatolia to southern Arabia, incorporating modern-day Oman and Yemen. Its temporal coverage spans from the late eighth century BCE to the seventh century CE during the rise of Islam and collapse of the Sasanian Empire. The authors argue that the persistence of large states and empires starting in the eighth/seventh centuries BCE, which continued for many centuries, led to new socio-political structures and institutions emerging in the Near East. The primary processes that enabled this emergence were large-scale and long-distance movements, or population migrations. These patterns of social developments are analysed under different aspects: settlement patterns, urban structure, material culture, trade, governance, language spread and religion, all pointing at movement as the main catalyst for social change. This book’s argument is framed within a larger theoretical framework termed as ‘universalism’, a theory that explains many of the social transformations that happened to societies in the Near East, starting from the Neo-Assyrian period and continuing for centuries. Among other influences, the effects of these transformations are today manifested in modern languages, concepts of government, universal religions and monetized and globalized economies

Revolutionizing a world

This book investigates the long-term continuity of large-scale states and empires, and its effect on the Near East’s social fabric, including the fundamental changes that occurred to major social institutions. Its geographical coverage spans, from east to west, modern-day Libya and Egypt to Central Asia, and from north to south, Anatolia to southern Arabia, incorporating modern-day Oman and Yemen. Its temporal coverage spans from the late eighth century BCE to the seventh century CE during the rise of Islam and collapse of the Sasanian Empire. The authors argue that the persistence of large states and empires starting in the eighth/seventh centuries BCE, which continued for many centuries, led to new socio-political structures and institutions emerging in the Near East. The primary processes that enabled this emergence were large-scale and long-distance movements, or population migrations. These patterns of social developments are analysed under different aspects: settlement patterns, urban structure, material culture, trade, governance, language spread and religion, all pointing at movement as the main catalyst for social change. This book’s argument is framed within a larger theoretical framework termed as ‘universalism’, a theory that explains many of the social transformations that happened to societies in the Near East, starting from the Neo-Assyrian period and continuing for centuries. Among other influences, the effects of these transformations are today manifested in modern languages, concepts of government, universal religions and monetized and globalized economies

PRAGMATIC MODERNISM: PROJECT [\u3cem\u3ePROJEKT\u3c/em\u3e] AND POLISH DESIGN, 1956-1970

Recently Scholars of design history began to recognize the phenomenon of Socialist Modernism, the return to modernist aesthetics to Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union during the thaw, the disavowal of Stalinist policies by Nikita Khrushchev after the 20th Party Congress of the Communist Party in February of 1956 and the resulting turn away from Socialist Realism, a historicist method in architecture that expressed socialist values, which the Stalinist favored. Scholars of art and design argued that Socialist Modernism in Poland constituted an affirmation of the party’s authority and that of the political system because designers who practiced it focused on abstract form and technological experiments. Unlike the modernism of the early 20th century, which followed a utopian ideology to ensure universal well being through art and design, it focused on the aesthetics of elementary form. However, based on this research, I investigated the journal Projekt of the main state-sponsored publisher in the years, 1956-1970. I have found that its contributors practiced a pragmatic modernism. Although they focused on technological experiments and utilized abstract form, failing to engage in politics, the designers that surrounded Projekt attempted to create user center design that fostered the well being of man, avant-garde values that the 1920s and 1930s functional modernist groups of Central and Eastern advocated. Therefore, following a period of Socialist Realism (1948-1956) in Poland, Projekt advocated for avant-garde values in design while ignoring the political situation, therefore fulfilling a pragmatic site in which it tolerated the authoritarian party, but argued for user based, socially conscious design that connected it to like minded designers in the west