Timo Hämäläinen:
The historical evolution of civilisations has been characterised by growing specialisation and the division of physical and intellectual labour. Every now and then, this evolution has been interrupted by a governance crisis when the established organisational and institutional arrangements have become insufficient to deal with the ever-increasing complexity of human interactions.
Some complexity scientists use the term “complexity gap” for this situation. Today’s societies are, again, experiencing a complexity gap. There are serious governance problems at all levels of our societies: individuals suffer from growing life-management problems, corporations struggle to adapt their rigid hierarchies, governments run from one crisis to another and multinational institutions make very little progress in solving global problems. A transition to the next phase of societal development requires closing the complexity gap with new governance innovations. Or else societies may face disintegration and chaos.
According to Mr. Hämäläinen, one way to overcome this complexity gap is by practicing second order science.