Management Systems, Conflict, and the Changing Roles of the Military
J. Conflict Processes, Vol. 4, No. pp. 13-28, 1999
16 Pages Posted: 16 Mar 2009
Date Written: 1999
Abstract
Military roles need to respond to the change demanded of them with the decline of the superpower standoff. There are perspectives from which conflicts can be evaluated in terms of the optimisation of incursion outcomes, and from which judgements can be made about whether they can be won or lost. However, a new view is emerging that conflicts are not so simple as to make the notions of optimisation, or decisive lose outcomes, useful. To respond to this view, senior military strategists should adopt new ways of thinking that encompasses the idea of complexity. Viable systems theory, concerned with the survivability of organisations, provides a graphic way of exploring this.
Keywords: Military roles, change, conflicts, optimisation, strategists, complexity, viable systems theory
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