Page 128 - Sustainability Communication Interdisciplinary Perspectives and Theoritical Foundations

10 Sustainability Communication: A Systemic-Constructivist Perspective 111

simplified – is that complex social, political, economic and ecological systems are
characterized by reciprocal effects, effect networks (instead of effect chains), feed-
back couplings, butterfly effects, incalculable side and follow-on effects and chaotic
turbulences. A linear, dualising (either-or), calculating, mechanistic thinking (which
is suitable for modern technology and industry) does not do justice to such networking.
A ‘flexible intelligence’ is needed, one that does not search for final, irreversible
solutions (nuclear power plants are irreversible in that they cannot be ‘undone’), but
that can ‘carefully’ handle ambiguous, circular processes, insecurities and uncer-
tainties. Systemic thinking is thinking in contexts. Systemic ecological thinking
finds a touchpoint with systemic therapy and systemic pedagogy (Balgo and Werning
2003). For environmental education this means context sensitivity. For example
explaining to high school students how their own behaviour can be environmen-
tally destructive is to simultaneously question their social, cultural, biographic and
economic interrelationships. Therapy and counselling have been strongly influenced
by systemic-constructivist paradigms. Family therapy in particular no longer ‘treats’
individual family members but views circular interactions within a family system.
The therapist foregoes the pretence of understanding those involved better and more
deeply than they themselves do (by uncovering the subconscious). Feelings and
thoughts can only be perceived by each individual himself. Childhood stories are
also no longer a central element of therapy. A key concept and instrument of sys-
temic therapy is observation. How do family members observe (and construct)
themselves and each other? As an observer of the second order, the therapist regis-
ters how those involved observe each other, while at the same time reflecting on his
own role as observer. He also has blind spots and he does not know any ‘objective’
facts. Simon asks self-critically: “Are not phenomena also constructed through
observation or by the observer himself? (…) Doesn’t the system ‘family therapist’
also need to be observed?” (1997: 13). Simon concludes that “The most important
premise one has to leave behind is the assumption that one could make any indepen-
dent, that is ‘objective’, statements about any patient that are independent from the
conditions of observation” (1997: 14).

Constructive Epistemology

Systems theory and constructivism are closely related. As disciplines, systems
theory is a social science and constructivism is a part of epistemology. The founders
of neuro-biological constructivism, the biologists Maturana and Varela, argue from
a systems theoretical perspective. Luhmann also examined constructivism more
closely in his later work. The explanation for this fusion has to do with the compre-
hensive definition of system. Luhmann defines society as a (social) system, but also
human consciousness as a (psychic) system and the human organism as a (biological)
system. Autopoiesis, self-reference (that is recursivity) and operational closure are
concepts also made use of in these systems.
Developments in cognitive and neuro-sciences have ‘strengthened’ the thesis
that our brain is a self-organised, structurally determined system that does not rep-
resent the reality outside subjectivity ‘truly’ but instead constructs realities of its