Ignorance, Strategy and Complex Adaptive Systems

Abstract

Complexity and chaos have become one of most frequently applied notions in management theory and practice. From multitude of applications, the use of complexity studies ideas in strategic management deserves a special attention. Despite numerous attempts to investigate the problem of complexity and ignorance in studies on strategy, the gap in the strategic management literature still exist. The main aim of this conceptual/theoretical paper is to investigate what are the relations between knowledge and ignorance in applications of ideas taken from complexity studies in strategic management theory and practice. Two types of ignorance are analyzed. The ignorance identifiable in applications of the complex systems ideas in management theory, which is called second-level ignorance, and the ignorance which results from those applications, i.e. the ignorance which may be treated as positive from the point of view of development of theory and practice of management. As a result of the paper, a concept of new inter- and multi-disciplinarity is proposed. Accomplishment of this aim will allow to study a set of interfaces and four of them are the subject of a deeper scrutiny: knowledge vs. ignorance, complexity vs. ignorance, strategy vs. ignorance, knowledge vs. complexity.