Intention in Intervention: A Philosophical, Theoretical and Empirical Exploration

This thesis seeks to explore the role of agent or 'user' intention in the fields of Management Science and Systems Thinking. Primarily through the use of various modelling approaches these fields seek to provide assistance to organisational stakeholders who are looking to intervene in situations with a view to dealing with problems and/or bringing about some form of 'improvement'. Although the literature acknowledges that the various methodologies, techniques and tools of MS/ST can be used flexibly depending upon user intention, to date, intention itself has not been the subject of detailed investigation. The thesis seeks to plug this gap in the literature. In exploring intention in some detail the thesis interlinks philosophy, theory and empirical work. The philosophical and theoretical components allow us to conceptualise intention and better understand how it might work in concrete settings. The empirical component, conducted with a team of action researchers, grounds the discussion in practice. The main proposition of the thesis is that intention is a dual-sided phenomenon, i.e. "we do things intentionally, and we intend to do things" (Bratman, 1997). Thus intention has a present and a future side. The research reported on through the thesis shows how, through language and actions, both sides of intention can significantly shape the nature of interventions. This being the case, the value of the work is that it provides new ways of accounting for and learning from interventions; in particular, it provides new frameworks for practitioners to better reflect on and guide their actions

Intention in Intervention: A Philosophical, Theoretical and Empirical Exploration

This thesis seeks to explore the role of agent or 'user' intention in the fields of Management Science and Systems Thinking. Primarily through the use of various modelling approaches these fields seek to provide assistance to organisational stakeholders who are looking to intervene in situations with a view to dealing with problems and/or bringing about some form of 'improvement'. Although the literature acknowledges that the various methodologies, techniques and tools of MS/ST can be used flexibly depending upon user intention, to date, intention itself has not been the subject of detailed investigation. The thesis seeks to plug this gap in the literature. In exploring intention in some detail the thesis interlinks philosophy, theory and empirical work. The philosophical and theoretical components allow us to conceptualise intention and better understand how it might work in concrete settings. The empirical component, conducted with a team of action researchers, grounds the discussion in practice. The main proposition of the thesis is that intention is a dual-sided phenomenon, i.e. "we do things intentionally, and we intend to do things" (Bratman, 1997). Thus intention has a present and a future side. The research reported on through the thesis shows how, through language and actions, both sides of intention can significantly shape the nature of interventions. This being the case, the value of the work is that it provides new ways of accounting for and learning from interventions; in particular, it provides new frameworks for practitioners to better reflect on and guide their actions

THE NEED FOR EXPLORING ALTERNATIVES IN SYSTEMIC INTERVENTION: TWO “INTENTIONAL” ARGUMENTS

A recurrent guideline in many of the systems approaches to intervention is the need for exploring different alternatives. This guideline is present despite the different types of tools, the different paradigms or the arguments behind it. The purpose of this paper is not to contradict this, but to provide new arguments to this need that can be applied to the whole range of tools. The arguments shown here use ideas from language pragmatics and a combination of philosophy of action and complexity theory. What is central to the arguments presented is the concern with the intentions of the agents. In light of those, it is claimed that the advantages in the exploration of alternatives are hindered if they are not used in an intentional way

STRETCHING THE CONCEPT OF BOUNDARY IN BOUNDARY CRITIQUE

The way in which boundary is marked around an issue, determines the way in which we understand, approach and intervene in such an issue.  Stretching the way in which we understand the concept of boundary can expand our understanding of how to approach interventions in themselves.  This paper proposes to contribute to understanding of boundary in Boundary Critique in two ways.  First, by showing that those bounds can be understood as flexible and changing with every interaction of the actors.  Second by showing that what is left outside of the limit defines the meaning of what is inside.  The arguments draw from philosophy and pragmatics of language

Intention in Intervention: A Philosophical, Theoretical and Empirical Exploration

This thesis seeks to explore the role of agent or 'user' intention in the fields of Management Science and Systems Thinking. Primarily through the use of various modelling approaches these fields seek to provide assistance to organisational stakeholders who are looking to intervene in situations with a view to dealing with problems and/or bringing about some form of 'improvement'. Although the literature acknowledges that the various methodologies, techniques and tools of MS/ST can be used flexibly depending upon user intention, to date, intention itself has not been the subject of detailed investigation. The thesis seeks to plug this gap in the literature. In exploring intention in some detail the thesis interlinks philosophy, theory and empirical work. The philosophical and theoretical components allow us to conceptualise intention and better understand how it might work in concrete settings. The empirical component, conducted with a team of action researchers, grounds the discussion in practice. The main proposition of the thesis is that intention is a dual-sided phenomenon, i.e. "we do things intentionally, and we intend to do things" (Bratman, 1997). Thus intention has a present and a future side. The research reported on through the thesis shows how, through language and actions, both sides of intention can significantly shape the nature of interventions. This being the case, the value of the work is that it provides new ways of accounting for and learning from interventions; in particular, it provides new frameworks for practitioners to better reflect on and guide their actions.</p

INTENTION IN INTERVENTION: A CONCEPTUAL MODEL

Intentions serve multiple roles in human action. They help in making sense of our actions and those of others, and on this basis, coordination is possible. They cause, guide and sustain our actions. Additionally, they are about the present when we do act intentionally, but also they are about the future when we intend to do something later. From the aforementioned characteristics, it can be argued that intentions have a fundamental part in organizational interventions. Based on this assumption the paper proposes a model to make use of intentions in interventions. It aims to help in describing, conducting and learning about intervention processes. The model uses the graphical language advanced by the Soft Systems Methodology. The concept of intention and the assembling of the model, draw from Philosophies of Action, Language and Explanation and by the Theories of Relevance, Boundary Critique, and Complex Adaptive Systems

INTENTION IN INTERVENTION: A CONCEPTUAL MODEL

Intentions serve multiple roles in human action. They help in making sense of our actions and those of others, and on this basis, coordination is possible. They cause, guide and sustain our actions. Additionally, they are about the present when we do act intentionally, but also they are about the future when we intend to do something later. From the aforementioned characteristics, it can be argued that intentions have a fundamental part in organizational interventions. Based on this assumption the paper proposes a model to make use of intentions in interventions. It aims to help in describing, conducting and learning about intervention processes. The model uses the graphical language advanced by the Soft Systems Methodology. The concept of intention and the assembling of the model, draw from Philosophies of Action, Language and Explanation and by the Theories of Relevance, Boundary Critique, and Complex Adaptive Systems

BOUNDARY GAMES: A LANGUAGE AND INTENTION BASED FRAMEWORK FOR BOUNDARY CRITIQUE

Exploring ways to understand the boundary of a problematic situation is fundamental to intervention.&nbsp; The boundary draws a difference between what is relevant and what is not relevant for the problem situation.&nbsp; In other words, it points out what it is and is not the system.&nbsp; Boundary Critique Theory, has used the notion of boundary to built ways to examine and reflect critically about the intervention process.&nbsp; It has developed ways to manage situations such as conflict, exclusion and the generation of reasonable discourse among the participants.&nbsp; These developments use ideas from sources such as critical theory, pragmatic philosophy, sociology, biology and cybernetics.&nbsp; This paper contributes to the range of theories informing Boundary Critique by adding a framework of Boundary Games.&nbsp;&nbsp; The framework is based on Wittgenstein&rsquo;s Language Games and Relevance Theory (a theory from Language Pragmatics).&nbsp; It shows new ways to reflect on the actions and language on a setting.&nbsp; Particularly, it proposes six possible &ldquo;moves&rdquo;, intentions or games in relation to the boundary.&nbsp; The framework implies a shift in how the boundary is usually managed in Boundary Critique, from a boundary that shapes our actions towards a boundary that is shaped by every action

Towards Understanding the Effects of Visual Artifacts in Problem Structuring Processes: A Boundary Games Approach

The construction of agreements about the nature of the problem confronted by a group can be seen as the aim of problem structuring methods. Visualizing issues to facilitate the discussions plays a protagonist role in the process. However, we lack methods to study this kind of interaction and therefore we know little about how these visual artefacts catalyse the structuration of the problem. This paper builds towards these two interrelated issues by analysing the interactions using Boundary Games, a theoretical synthesis based on philosophy, language pragmatics, and boundary critique. The Boundary Games framework shows how actors’ communications affect the boundary of what is considered relevant in a situation. Boundary Games have been applied to study oral segments of interaction; in this case, its application is extended to visual supported interactions, specifically whiteboard supported facilitation. The preliminary analysis shows that visual artefacts allow people to keep track of distant and varied ideas and that the visual is helping to connect and reinforce those ideas. This work can be seen as a stepping stone for understanding models, a more complex visual artefact of common use in structuring problems