week 49 - class exercise

Question: This course features class exercises to each meeting to let students experience the theoretical material from lectures and literature. Develop one class exercise to replace one that you felt was not entirely suitable.

One of the class exercises that I felt not entirely suitable is the debate over Friedman's proposition. Due to the large class size, it is challenging to allow everyone in the two teams to contribute to the debate. With all the different background we have in the class, I think the debate could be organised to allow us to bring out the best from the class members. The 2 judge who commented at the end of the debate is really helpful to wrap up the whole process. In general I think the debate can be more dynamic and more people can be involved in the process.

Preparation

To give the class members more opportunities to be a part of the debate, the debate statement and the rules can be provided to the two teams a week ahead of the debate to allow preparation. The teams can distribute the work by assigning people into subgroups to do research and organize talking points, etc. This can be organised by students. Doing so not only gives the students sense of responsibility to contribute to the debate, it also allows people who are not familiar with the debate rules to look into the debate styles and discuss their strategy. Since there are only limited time to deliver the points and to ask the other team questions, some preparation to simulate the debate would be very helpful.

 

Debate style

Since there are more than 20 people on each team, more people can take part in speaking. A session with more interactions can be saved after the affirmative and negative arguments are delivered. Each team can send 3-4 people to take turns answering or giving questions to the other team to create more dynamics between two teams and allow a more immediate response from another team when a question is raised. 

Wrap up

The judges can give final comments at the end of the debate to bring attention to the main conclusion and observation. Also, in the end, both teams can provide records on paper. People in the class all come from different backgrounds and cultures, sometimes it is not the easiest to come up with ideas immediately if people are not familiar with the oral debate style or exchange. People with social science background tend to have a better idea of how to approach a problem and how to analyze some topics in this course. I come from natural science background and the discussions in the course takes some time for me to take in and put it in my own words. Therefore it would be helpful to have students to summarise the debate and comb through the debate afterwards. It is like the quote from the class on culture, "When I hear, I forget. When I see, I remember. When I do, I understand. "

Week 45 - Increase the use of LCAs: in seek of incentives

In the first part, four external control measures are proposed to increase the use of LCAs in products. In the second part of this blog post, Paul Sabatier's framework is used to assess the potential effectiveness of external control.

Part 1: Four external control measures proposals

LCAs as a tool to gain more knowledge in
environmental impacts of products

1) Mandatory LCAs and information disclosure
External control: The first proposed measure is the most stringent method. It involves rule making by the government. Performing LCAs and documenting the results are required before the company's new products can be put on the market. For the products already on the market, grace period is given to allow the company to perform LCAs while the products are allowed on the market if demonstrating a plan to perform LCAs. Inspections will be done by the government for compliance check. Companies fail to comply with the rules will be fined. Product is banned on the market if LCAs are not performed after the company received 3 warning notices from the inspector. Business operation will be forced to shut down if the products without LCAs remain on the shelf. The results of LCAs will be translated into green ranking and made public to encourage a more sustainable consumption pattern on the market. the information disclosure and the rankings can help drive the competition for sustainable production.

Boundary conditions: To demonstrate an extreme case, the range of the products in this policy measure covers the full spectrum of products. All products sold on the market in the country are subject to prove that LCAs has been done in a report. This include retailers, importers, manufacturers, raw material suppliers, etc. The business entities are responsible for delivering the report while most of the data needs to be obtained from the upstream supply chain members, making all the supply chain members that is involved in any economic activity responsible for their products' environmental impact.

2) Mandatory LCAs and information disclosure - multistage implementation 
External control: Identical to the first proposal, the second proposal requires the companies to perform mandatory LCAs for their products. Companies are required to demonstrate LCAs are performed and the LCAs results are made available for their products.

Boundary conditions: Scope of the policy subject is narrowed down by timeline in this proposed measure. Industrial sectors such as resource extraction and resource processing are prioritised because they have a relatively straightforward product supply chain comparing with products with a complex supply chain, such as cellphone manufacturers. Prioritising the upstream industries could help filling the data gap during LCAs for the further downstream sectors and achieve more sophisticated LCAs results.

Cefic, European Chemical Industry Council, 

an industrial association of chemical 

industry in Europe.

3) Voluntary LCAs, in cooperation with industrial associations
External control: In this proposal the LCAs are voluntary initiatives. The government works with industrial associations such as chemical industrial association to promote using LCAs tool among their members. No obligatory measures are required. Companies are encouraged to share their information among the association members or to the public. The data made public can be used as a reference for future regulatory controls. Comparing with the mandatory LCAs measure, there is less incentives in this measure to motivate industrial association members to adopt voluntary LCAs since such initiative involves human resources and cost. If the companies demonstrate that their products are low in environmental impact, the products are less of environmental concern so they have less possibilities of being subjected to certain rules. Companies have incentives of a more free market given that they prove their products to be low in environmental impacts.

Boundary conditions: Industrial associations chosen to be partners for LCAs promotion are identical to the logic for prioritisation process in proposal 2. The upstream industrial sectors are chosen first to fill in the data gap for the further downstream industrial sectors.

4) Voluntary LCAs with tax break as reward
External control: In the last external control proposal, the government will draft the guidelines and standards of LCAs for companies to adopt while performing LCAs. The companies voluntarily participate in this initiative and meet the requirements will be able to enjoy a tax break for the particular product. Tax break is used as an incentive to stimulate the motivation of companies to invest in the technical capacity and human resources.

Boundary conditions: The boundary condition in this case covers the companies that participate in the voluntary program. Companies that choose to take part in this voluntary LCAs program need to interact with the government.

2. Assessing the effectiveness of external controls

To assess how effective the four external control measures proposals are, Sabatier's framework is used in below. Sabatier's framework is built upon three pillars, 1) tractability of the problem; 2) ability of statute to structure implementation; 3) non-statutory variables affecting implementation. While effective governmental external controls can be seen in many examples, it is truly challenging to design an external control measure that will work in practice, especially when the incentives for the actors are sometimes not easily identified immediately. The four proposed measures are assessed based on the three criteria from Sabatier's framework.


1) Tractability of the problem
For all four proposals, availability for valid technical theory and technology are at a similar level since the LCAs tool is generally considered accessible. Although overall the actors in option 1 and 4 might face more challenges with some data gaps due to the wide coverage of industrial actors. Target actors in proposal 2 and 3 have a relatively less complex supply chain and are expected to encounter less obstacles due to the lack of information. The behaviours of the actors in all four proposals are expected to vary significantly. Since proposal 1 and 2 are obligatory, the interests of the companies are at stake. Stronger response from the industrial actors are expected to be seen.

Diversity of target group behaviour is expected to be higher when the companies are not obligated to perform LCAs. This is because companies have the choice to determine if it is desirable to invest in the resources to perform LCAs. In the first proposal where the scope of the measures cover the widest range, the target groups takes up the biggest proportion of the population. Extent of behavioural change required is larger for the mandatory LCAs measures, companies do not have an option to choose the degree of how compliant they want to be. Companies need to put in more efforts in order to survive on the market. For the voluntary measures, companies can take their time to assess the feasibility of the investment in LCAs or how much effort they want to put in. Therefore the extent of behavioural change is less than the mandatory measures in general.

2) Ability of statute to structure implementation 
Among the four measures, adequate causal theory is best incorporated in the second and the third proposals. The issue of data gap in LCAs could be addressed by targeting the prioritised groups first. Mandatory LCAs can be less unambiguous with requirements and target group while the voluntary measures require less financial resources for implementation because they require less recruitment of human resources and investment to enforce the rules. However, voluntary LCAs with tax breaks also require financial resources to compensate for the reduction of tax revenue.

The integration within and among implementing institutions are considered to work the best for the mandatory measures since the government agencies are more structured and responsibilities distribution is less ambiguous. On the other hand, the structure and interactions between the actors implementing the measures in the voluntary options are considered less formal and more flexible, which might be an advantage that the mandatory proposals do not possess. In order for the results of LCAs to be reviewed and examined by outsiders, it is crucial for the measures to have a mechanism to open up its data and process to professionals or organisations from outside the institution.

Challenges are expected to be encountered in all measures but especially in the third option where the LCAs is voluntary. Information of the processes of the business operation is regarded as confidential for many business entities. For an outsider to have access to these information might cause concern for the companies because it might be considered as a threat to business.

3) Non-statutory variables affecting implementation
To assess how the non-statutory variables affect the implementation of the measures proposals, social economic and technological environment are reviewed. Here the socio-economic environment is considered not favouring the third option since it has less incentives for the industries to gain interests in the voluntary program. Although exceeding the regulatory requirement would help the industry maintain its reputation, the cost associated with the efforts do not guarantee the return of investment and the uncertainty is high. On the other hand, media attention and public support could put pressure on the industries to comply with the policy measures. It is expected that the mandatory measures would receive the most positive results from these pressure since the companies will only considered to be legitimate if they meet the requirements.

All measures share the same level of support from the sovereigns and the constituency groups except for the third measure where the LCAs is voluntary. With the cooperation between the industry and the government, major responsibility will be expected to fall on the industrial association. organisation within the industry is expected to take on the burden. The threshold for accountability of implementing officials the first and second proposals. Therefore the commitment and leadership skills are more demanding for these two proposals.

Conclusion 
Overall speaking, the criteria under Sabatier's framework seem to favor proposal 2. With relatively specific target group and clearer implementation timeline, proposal 2 stands out as the strongest option. The introduction of LCAs into companies are extremely complex in this case since in reality the nature of industries vary from one another significantly. Therefore without setting the scope to cover specific targets, the results of the assessment would be overly generic and would not generate results that are representative enough. Various challenges are foreseeable in the introduction of the LCAs, however, with the specific target group in proposal 2, it is also expected that proposal 2 has the best conditions to resolve emerging problems.

Week 43 - Harvest Game 2.0

Although all of the classmates would have agreed that an ocean with fish resources that can replenish itself is ideal when we played the harvest game. The ocean was not able to replenish itself before the fishing boats exhausting it. The tragedy of the commons took place in a class full of people that are environmentally conscience.

Taiwanese fisherman (my brother) and his catch. 

As Hardin (1968) described in his paper, when all people try to go full speed in maximising his/her interest in a society that upholds the value of freedom of the commons, this freedom eventually take us all to ruin for everyone. To improve this "remorseless working of things" and avoid the eventual exhaustion of common resources, some mechanisms are suggested as below.

Assumptions

Assuming all the conditions of the harvest game remain the same except that the 6 teams are able to communicate with each other. We can distribute the resources with communications. The maximum number for each team to catch remains at 4 in order for the sea to double the fish for next year to have 50 fish. One team might be able to get the extra fish and the total fish next year would still meet 50.

In the previous game, the actors are individual fishing boats which cannot talk to each other. Even if we could calculate the maximum number of 4 fish per boat per year, some boats thought one more fish can't hurt. This overfishing based on individual rationality led to an empty sea after 5 years. When a team exceeds 4 fish per year, a crisis occur and the population of the fish is reduced to a level that is hard to come back. Therefore we need to establish a mechanism to ensure that no fishing boat goes beyond 4 fish every year and the maximum number of fish in total can be caught every year. 

One boat scenario

Of course it is also possible to just let one boat each year taking turns to go out to do all the fishing and comes back with 25 fish to distribute among all other teams. But that way the whole society would depend on that boat to supply all the fish to make a living. In real life this will seem risky since all the resources is only held by one actor and there is nothing to leverage with the boat. 

Six boats scenario

To distribute the risks more evenly to secure fish supply, we should let all the boats go catch their fish. On one hand we want to have the largest number of fish. On the other hand, the fishing boats needs to be checked to ensure that the catch number is below the maximum quota. The surveillance can be done by inspection at the port. The inspection group is formed by one member from each of the six teams to ensure the impartiality during inspection work. The team found to overfish will be punished. The team that failed to respect the 4 fish rule is banned from fishing the next year, allowing the reduced fish population to come back under less stress.

Possible challenges
It is foreseeable that some challenges may emerge. Since there is no way to find out if the boats overfish until the boat is back to the pier, the only way to ensure that the fishing boats stays within the 4 fish limit is to count on the fishermen's compliance. However, if more than one boat violate the rule, or one boat exceeds significantly beyond the limit, the punishment might not even help to recover the population. By then, the damage might have been irreversible. More rules are needed to secure the surveillance mechanism to prevent the violation of the rules while the fish is still in the sea. We need to make the action of overfishing a less rational option. This means that the benefits of staying within the limit needs to outweigh the benefit of catching every extra more fish. Or, put it in another way, to make the disadvantage larger than the advantage of overfishing.

Can human's desire of owning more resources be
restricted when we are reminded of the finite resources?
(Seafood buffet in Queichou, 

an inland province 

in China.)

Internal policing - sense of honour
So how do we make the collective rational choice of not overfishing attractive to the individual boats? We can further break down the actor structure and see the actors as individual members of the fishing boats. The external surveillance will be shifted towards internal surveillance to let all the fishing boat crew members take part in preventing overfishing. The number of fish that the boat aims to catch needs to be agreed among all the crew members. The crew members will be aware of each other's decisions. Therefore when someone on the boat proposes to catch an extra fish, the desire of proposing to overfish would be overcome by the fear of shame and greediness in others' eyes.

Through a combination of establishing 4 fish limit, surveillance, and sanction. The members of the fishing teams are involved in the rule enforcement and their interests are tied with the enforcement of the rules. Therefore the chances of the number of the fish in the sea being overfished could hopefully be lowered through this coordination.

Week 41 Feedback to: Paulina Gual

Original post: 4rd Assignment

Dear Paulina,

Reading your blog is a truly intellectually stimulating experience. The arguments you presented are well rounded and showed high clarity. In your arguments, you tied the theories we learned in the course to the examples in the documentary observations, which made the legitimacy analysis convincing. I especially appreciate the short summary of the three types of isomorphism before you brought them in the analysis.

-----Part 1-----

I completely agree that coercive isomorphism best describes Nokia and its supplier’s efforts to legitimize themselves. The external pressure from another organization provided both organizations driving force to change. However, I am not sure if I agree with you on the supplier’s effort to gain legitimacy being more evident. I feel that the supplier is deeper down the supply chain and its sustainability performance does not affect the overall image of Nokia product easily. After all, the components it produces is not very visible on a cellphone among thousands of other components. Therefore it’s easier for the supplier to get by without coping with the newly introduced policy.

In this case Nokia did not react strongly or provide any pressure for improvement. If the supplier’s business is truly at stake, we would probably see the management level doing a better cover up job in the factory rather than admitting hiring labors without a contract or paying lower than minimum wage. My guess is that this supplier might hold a critical technology for certain components and it has few competitors on the market. That’s why it did not seem to be afraid of its behaviour triggering negative results.

-----Part 2-----

I can’t agree with you more regarding the needs for more government intervention in ensure the sustainability standards can be met. To be in compliance would be a minimum requirement for a business to exist and therefore the basic code of conduct it subscribes to. If the supplier cannot even satisfy legal requirements, NOKIA also bears the responsibility of poor oversight. It came shocking to me that the NOKIA consultants has such limited knowledge of the local regulations. It’s either that NOKIA expects its supplier to be fully in compliance without a doubt or it does not care for the legal status more than low cost cellphone components.

If we come back to this case for the interactions between the organizations, maybe addressing possible actions that can be taken from NOKIA’s side to enhance implementation of sustainability standards at the Chinese supplier’s factory could be another direction to pursue. Since sustainability goes beyond the company and deeper into the supply chain, ultimately the goal is to mobilize a self-organization mechanism. Doing so, besides fulling the legal requirements, NOKIA and its business partners could have more capacity to make themselves more competitive in a market that values sustainability.

Thank you for the inspiring article. It really helps me understand the concepts of the reading assignments. I like the neutral tone you use in the article. It certainly makes the criticism more convincing. Great job!

Cheers,
Sho

Week 41 Feedback to: Zev Starmans

Original post: Nokia; implementing sustainability values along the supply chain?

-----Part 1-----
Zev,
The arguments you made in your blog articles show good clarity. I can understand the points and examples you deliver very well. Your analysis is very different from mine while we shared more or less the same views so it was interesting to read your blog.

For the first question, it’s great that you didn’t fall for the details right away. Instead you provided a big direction of sustainability improvement leading Nokia’s way to legitimacy. It would be interesting to know your evaluation of how hard Nokia has tried to demonstrate their efforts for legitimacy just as an observation. It was very well noted in your argument that the supplier is striving for legitimacy at its lowest accepted value. Also I think you pointed out an important role in the motivation for legitimacy, the government. There is for sure a discrepancy in the operation standards between Nokia and its supplier. I feel that since Nokia is introducing these new standards, it has the responsibility to convince the supplier to bridge the gap and elevate the suppliers’ labor benefits and industrial safety practices.

However, I am not sure if I agree with you on the opinion of Nokia not caring about the local value (I suppose it includes the local regulations). I think for a Nokia would be very cautious about the fact that their supplier does not meet the legal standards. The reason is that Nokia is extending its sustainability standards onto its supply chain members. If the supplier is not even in compliance, Nokia will also get in trouble and fail its sustainability performance assessment. My view is that it’s not that Nokia does not care, they simply do not know about the local regulations.

-----Part 2-----

I agree with the good guy theory you provided here. In this way Nokia is not really responsible for the compliance failure of the supplier. Furthermore, maybe it intentionally wants to make the supplier look bad to show that Nokia has high standards of sustainability. The supplier is also probably too deep down in the supply chain to be seen on the market as a brand. So even if consumers who make purchasing decisions by the brand’s reputation, the information about sustainability is probably not readily accessible for the consumers. I definitely agree with your opinion about Nokia’s lack of sincerity when conducting an audit. Even if it’s not an official audit I would disagree with their approach since Nokia wasn’t really checking the working condition of the component product line that goes to Nokia.

To improve the efficiency to introduce higher sustainability standards, you made a good point of bringing third party certification organizations to do the job. To the outsiders, I agree it would be much more convincing to be endorsed by an independent certifying organization. With that being said, I think it’s still critical to conduct internal audits to ensure the performance of the factory. In the class we learned about isomorphism that makes organizations more and more similar, in your opinion, would this type of certification be driven by coercive pressure, mimicry, or normative pressure? How about for the benchmarking?

Week 41 - A decent factory?

NOKIA seeks to extend its sustainability strategy into its supply chain à Chinese suppliers have to fit with criteria established by NOKIA. How are the two key organizations in this case (Nokia and the supplier) striving for legitimacy?

In the movie “A Decent Factory”, Nokia sent its consultant and researcher to visit its supplier in Shenzen, China to investigate the company’s sustainability performance. The following paragraphs explain that both Nokia and its supplier took actions to gain legitimacy for recognition.

A Decent Factory is a documentary film 

directed by Thomas Balmès (2004). The film 

examines the ethics and profits of a multinational 

cellphone company through a visit to 

its supplier in China.

First, let's talk about Nokia.

The initiative that Nokia took to account for the sustainability performance of its supply chain member which provide components that contribute to its finished product could be seen as an effort to legitimize itself. Although not directly responsible for its supplier’s factory operation and compliance, Nokia worked it way to ensure that it is aware of the supply chain member’s operation practices as the first step. This gathered information could be further analyzed against current sustainability criteria and suggestions for improvements could be made for the stakeholders to decide if the company is striving to eliminate the risks of unsafe or unsustainable practices.

During the plant visit, the two consultants made suggestions and informed the factory management of their concerns. At the end of the visit, the consultants sat down with the high level managers to go over their observations and provided basic suggestions to ensure that the supplier is also aware of the potential use of information. Nokia tried to enhance the communication transparency with its supplier so there will be no surprises or misunderstanding, which is likely to happen in a different cultural environment. This transparency between the companies also strengthens the both company’s credibility and trust between two companies.

Not only does legitimacy matter externally, it also secures stability of cooperation relation within the supply chain. Both Nokia and its supplier could benefit from setting a sustainability goal that they can both expect to meet, as long as both sides know the criteria. In that way, both companies could rely on each other in the supply chain through this self-organization.

How about the factory?

Given that Nokia’s supplier failed to prove that it is a decent factory, it did demonstrate its sincerity for legitimacy by accepting the request of its downstream client for a plant visit. (ok, you can come!) The supplier gave Nokia access to see the dormitory, the restaurant, and the plant while many workers are performing their daily tasks. (ok, you can see!) During the plant visit, when the Nokia consultant expressed her concern because the water cups and chemicals are too close to each other. The manager immediately ordered workers to move the chemicals somewhere else. (ok, we can change!)

Finally, both Nokia and the supplier are showing their commitment for sustainability improvements by agreeing to let this documentary go public. This could be seen as their endeavour for legitimacy.

Is the approach taken by Nokia an effective way of diffusing sustainability criteria?
No, Nokia's approach to diffuse sustainability does not seem to be effective. Nokia attempted to harmonize its supplier's practice with Nokia's sustainability criteria. The effort of exerting pressure onto its supplier as a client could be seen as promoting an organizational change. This could be seen as coercive isomorphism by business ties between the two organizations. However, Nokia's actions to implement sustainability standards within the supply chain seem to be missing some elements. Here are some examples of why Nokia's approach might not be most effective in practice.

What? New rules? Never heard of them.

First, Nokia did not inform its supplier of the new policy of introducing the sustainability criteria into the supply chain. The consultants went to the factory without letting the management know what they intend to see. During the visit, the consultants had a checklist that they were making records of. However, it did not seem like the management of the plant have a copy of the checklist. One plant manager also reminded Nokia to let the supplier know what Nokia wants to see so it can better prepare. (Although Nokia made itself clear at the meeting at the end of the visit.) If a business is trying to promote a sustainable practice within an organization, it is probably a good idea to make sure the standards of sustainability are known by the individuals in the organization. It is unfair for the supplier to be ambushed because it does not know possible consequences of this investigation. Maybe Nokia would stop purchasing phone components from this supplier because it fails to meet one criteria that was not mentioned when putting the order. Maybe this is also why the supplier allow Nokia to see many units in the factory. It could be out of fear of losing business.

Could you tell me if you're illegal?

Second, it doesn't seem that Nokia has knowledge of the local regulations. Nokia consultants asked about the local minimum wage and the marital status of the factory employees as well as other questions during the visit. The fact that the consultants have no capability to verify if the supplier is in compliance weakens the legitimacy push. Most people would agree that normally the basic requirements for business to survive is to at least meet the regulations. However, in many cases Nokia consultant had to rely on the supplier's judgement to tell that the factory is not in compliance. It is reasonable for one to hesitate to believe Nokia's attempt to enhance sustainability since Nokia does not even know if it's relying on a supplier that violates multiple regulations intentionally.

Uncertainty

Third, it is uncertain if this sustainability criteria is mandatory. For the supplier to decide if it should accept the organizational change and implement the new rules, the decision makers would have to know if it's worth to invest on improvements. In order to make this decision, the CEO needs to know if this investment would help in securing relations with the client and facilitate future transactions. However, not only was the rules not provided. It does not seem like the rules are going to be enforced for sure. This casts uncertainty for the chances to achieve sustainability improvements. If Nokia were to honor its sustainability commitments, minimizing this uncertainty could increase the efficiency of policy dissemination.

Cultural differences

My country Taiwan shares a big part of cultural background with China so it was interesting to see it as an outsiders view and maybe understand the supplier's struggles a little more. I feel that the Nokia consultants experienced a lot of shocking moments during the visit. But they did not take a further step to address how things work in their headquarter Finland. They did express their concerns but it was never mentioned that the reason why they are concerned is because (a made-up example) in Finland, it would've violated the law by restricting the personal freedom of the employees in the dorm. If the supplier understands where all these strict rules are coming from, then there could be less resistance to accept the organizational change due to respect of the market and the value that the consumer's market promotes.

How could another coordination mechanism improve on this?

Overall, the coordination mechanism can be facilitated with communication before the visit to eliminate uncertainties and avoid unexpected surprises. This would include the supplier in the decision making early in the process to enhance the smoothness of cooperation. 

To improve the efficiency of the new sustainability criteria extension, Nokia's consultants can familiarize themselves with local regulation and request the supplier to proof that it is in compliance with all the labor and environmental regulations. This baseline of compliance could give the evaluation of the consultants a more solid reference when assessing the sustainability. On the other hand, Nokia can start with providing the sustainability criteria and suggest an expected timeline for full implementation to its suppliers. The suppliers needs to reply to Nokia regarding the feasibility of the timeline and possible challenges. The supplier will evaluate its current condition and decide if the suggested timeline is feasible. If not, then the supplier could propose another timeline for implementation. By doing this, both companies would have a clear idea of what to expect of each other. Once the implementation is in place or kicked off, Nokia can arrange a visit to go over the list of items that it expects to see. The supplier by then would be more prepared to explain to the consultants about what challenges it's facing and its plans to resolve the issues. Nokia could also provide trainings or workshops to explain to the supplier regarding the new policy and the background of the policy to gain mutual understanding.

Week 40 Feedback to: Milan Veselinov

Feedback to Milan Veselinov
Original post: Assignment 3 – The SES of the internet

Dear Milan,

First of all, I would like to let you know that the article is very well structured. The paragraphs and themes as well as the graphs, links, and the sub-titles are very well organized and they do a tremendous job leading readers through a topic that they have never seen. I also like the story-telling tone of this blog. It gives a personal touch and brings the readers closer to the topic. It reminds me of a friend who wrote books about adventurous stories also uses this similar tone throughout his books. (http://goo.gl/nrfzms)

Your choice of social-ecological system is indeed unique, considering that internet isn’t commonly characterized as a natural resource in a ecological system. Furthermore, the concept of internet does not exist in a physical way, making it more challenging topic. However, you are able to specify your scope and explain how internet requires to be driven by power and therefore consumes natural resources. In addition to that, you also explained how internet also has direct impact when performing its normal function by producing carbon dioxide. I find the system definition convincing. Also I agree with you that the human made system is not very different from natural resource system in this case since internet can be seen as a derived resource.

The subsystems of the SES are well presented in your article. I like the way you explained the internet suppliers as the ones who put data in order because it reflects reality. However, when it comes to the resource items, I am wondering if other elements that could possibly limit the internet speed, accessibility, development, etc. can be further explored. The reason why I asked this is that this summer my country (Taiwan) just introduced 4G internet for smartphones so it’s relatively slow compared with neighbouring countries Japan and Korean market. As far as I know the facilities were just not fully equipped to be upgrading the service to consumers and therefore the delay. As limiting factors that could contribute to different outcomes I wonder if they are something on the same level as resource item that can be discussed here. Also, I am interested to know if different types of users also have different interactions with other subsystems such as the resource units and the governance system. If so, how would you characterize them?

You did a fantastic job adding the challenge of SES in the article. I think this information shines a light on the main issue you would like to address and brings focus to this resources. Otherwise internet is a broad topic and it’s less interesting if there is no real-life issue awaiting to be solved. With that being said, I do want to confirm if my understanding is correct. Do you mean the challenge is to provide well-covered service in order to achieve internet of things?

For Friedman’s principle argument, I am not sure if I agree with you on the on-line hours not having the market value. As internet shopping becomes easier over time, commodities that are traded over internet represent the market demands. This information can be gathered and used for marketing and product promotion purposes that are designed to drive more consumption. In the USA, thanks to the membership system for chain retailers and online shopping that require log-in, retailers know about its consumers’ pregnancy before the consumers’ family do. Same thing can be observed include websites visited and keywords that one searches on google.com. These are all data that are able gathered and possibly sold for business purposes.

The last question you asked was as awakening as the speaker in the TEDex link you provided. If everything is recorded, monitored and controlled, no one would be able to enjoy the rights to privacy anymore. I believe there needs to be stringent rules and strong oversight of such business operation if google does have the majority of the market share so that it does not violate its consumers’ (users’) interest just because it does not have anything to lose due to the lack of competitors. With minimised government intervention and letting the market self-regulate, it is possible that the society which rely highly on the internet could be sharing the same fate of the internet company. That is to say, if google goes down, the system that involve all the things of the internet will lose its function and my heart rate monitor machine as mentioned in the video would not be able to notify the pharmaceutical company of my heart condition to send a “buy my medicine” ads to my phone while waiting for my ambulance. A big part of the industry would need to go back to the old-fashion way to carry out business. My conclusion is, huge risk is involved with this type of self-regulation and I do not have so much faith in the industry to uphold its value and social responsibility.

Great work! Your article made me think a lot!

Hsiu-Chuan (Sho)