Bob Hodge

Mexico Inc.? : discourse analysis and the triumph of managerialism

Multinational corporations have become players on the global stage, alongside nations. This article addresses one aspect of this development, the way leaders of nations now use discourses and ways of thinking formerly characteristic of business in major policy documents. The paper distinguishes different senses of ‘discourse’ to identify what is managerial discourse, using textbooks as data. It then looks at a specific instance, the Mexican Government’s ‘Plan-Puebla-Panama’, showing how it subordinates discourses of government to see Mexico as a commodity. Yet the contradictions this introduces act as an ideological complex, a functional set of contradictions implemented in dialogue.

The politics of text and commentary

This paper addresses the politics of the relations between texts in situations where one text offers commentary on another.

Crossing Paradigms: A Meta‐Autoethnography of a Fieldwork Trip to Brazil

This article develops the term meta‐autoethnography to describe self‐transformative narratives of border‐crossings between paradigms and cultures. It focuses on one formative experience, a field trip by a Brazilian‐Australian sociologist on a Brazilian urban sustainability project, planned within a positivistic framework, which went badly wrong. But the ‘failure’ revealed the complicity of the positivistic paradigm with local issues of ideology and identity, and generated a new openness to the study of Brazilian creative use of informal practices and flexible identities.

Towards a postmodern science of language

This article outlines the terms and rationale for a ‘postmodern’ science of language, and illustrates it with reference to a single text: President George Bushs speech to Congress in the wake of September 11. It first addresses the issue of whether and how students of language can or should draw on scientific concepts and theories, and where the acute anxieties on this topic come from. It then proposes that a new stage in science needs to be recognised that changes the terms of the relations between science and the humanities. ‘Postmodern’ forms of science accept and work with the uncertainty, unpredictability, ambiguity and contradiction that characterise the phenomena of language and society in every era, and is especially marked in the present ‘postmodern condition’. The article then briefly explains key concepts from this body of scientific work: Poincare´s Three Body Analysis, Prigogines far-from-equilibrium analysis, Zadehs fuzzy logic, Mandelbrots fractals, Heisenbergs Uncertainty Principle, and Lorenzs Butterfly Effect.

‘Cultural making’: how complexity and power relations are modulated in transdisciplinary research

Abstract There is an increasing adoption of large-scale, multisectoral collaborations which draw upon diverse expertise and innovative processes to tackle complex issues. How social change emerges through such transdisciplinary research alliances is the focus of our paper. Yet, broader participation and openness to uncertainty exacerbates issues of multidimensional power and complexity which continually shape and reshape practices. In this article, we introduce the term ‘cultural making’ to illustrate how complexity and power are modulated according to particular interrelationships, roles and understandings. These issues are examined from a particular vantage point, the needs and values of a research enterprise, the Young and Well Cooperative Research Centre (Young and Well CRC), and within that, the project Safe and Well Online. Themes of power and complexity are explored in relation to better fulfilling the major aim of Young and Well CRC: to understand and maximize the role of digital technologies to promote the mental health of young people. We demonstrate how the heuristic of ‘cultural making’ blends spatio-temporal critique with practical ontology to consider how proximities, methods and practices unfold within a transdisciplinary research initiative. This lens aims to enhance practical engagement with complexity through showing the changing composition of potentialities and actualizations – and that participation is always a ‘matter of making’.

Culture/communication/theory in Australia

Disclaimer Please note that this is an electronic, pre – print version of this article produced by the Institute for Culture & Society, University of Western Sydney, in accordance with the requirements of the publisher. Whilst this version of the article incorporates refereed changes and has been accepted for publication, differences may exist between this and the final, published version. Citations should only be made from the published version.

Complexity theory and engaged research: Critical incidents in the Sydney rail system

This article reports on a study of Sydneys rail system to argue that engaged research requires a problem-oriented complexity framework. This needs a richer method drawing on ideas from more scientific and mathematical forms of complexity/chaos theory to complement cultural studies understandings of complexity. The paper develops the idea of critical incidents as a bridge between science, cultural studies and business, and uses it to analyse small and large problems of Sydney rail, from loose roof-hatch bolts to communication problems in the organization. It also proposes a strategy, virtual trialogues, to construct a manageable intermediate level of complexity and analyse it by adapting digital software.

Why Does Fuzzy Logic Need the Challenge of Social Complexity

In 2000, just before the start of the third millennium, Fuzzy Logic reached its 35th year. It is a good time to take stock of what it has achieved up till now, and what lines it should seek to follow for the future. Fuzzy Logic emerged in Zadeh’s famous article [1] as a proposal to use logic closer to the ways of thinking inherent in human languages and perceptions, in order to understand and deal with the complexity and uncertainty of the life unfolding. We believe that the field of complex phenomena in which that human capacity for making sense of uncertainty evolved should continue to be used as a real-life laboratory for developing a comprehensive theory of the fuzziness of human knowing.

Apuntes sobre la relación entre la cultura virtual y la cultura mexicana en la Internet

La creciente difusion de significados provenientes de culturas diversas que circulan en los nuevos medios de comunicacion global ha generado una transformacion de las culturas contemporaneas que ya no pueden entenderse alejadas del efecto del intercambio de significados culturales multiples. El creciente acceso al nuevo medio de comunicacion global, la Internet, y sus potencialidades, esta permitiendo nuevas formas de produccion e interaccion asi como respuestas culturales creativas y novedosas. El articulo hace una reflexion inicial sobre las condiciones de la interaccion entre la llamada cultura virtual y la cultura mexicana. El intercambio cultural vertiginoso de significados locales y globales esta produciendo manifestaciones que rebasan los limites del ciberespacio y que se desarrollan simultaneamente como mexicanas y globales

The Hydra Paradox: Global Disaster Management in a World of Crises

This article explores issues of disasters and their management, against a backdrop of multiple crises that are seen as defining the current condition of globalisation, driven by an ongoing dialectic between forces from ‘above’ and ‘below’. The article draws on forms of chaos theory, treating disasters and their management as a key site in which to examine intersections of crisis and chaos in global processes, colliding with destructive natural events and forces which are still outside dominant systems of control. The exposition starts from a new look at the ancient myth of Hydra, still used to capture the intractability of global crises and problems. Hydra represented hyper-complexity and exponential growth, qualities that characterise global problems today. It also presented a fantasy solution to the problems of agency from below which dominant groups have found irresistibly seductive for millennia. Este artículo explora asuntos sobre los desastres y sus gestiones, desde el punto de vista de múltiples crisis, que parecen definir la condición actual de la globalización, motivado por una constante dialéctica entre las fuerzas de ‘arriba’ y las de ‘abajo’. El artículo parte de las formas de la teoría del caos en los procesos globales, topándose con eventos y fuerzas naturales destructivas, que siguen siendo sistemas externos dominantes del control. La exposición comienza con una nueva mirada al antiguo mito de Hidra, usado todavía para captar la insolubilidad de las crisis y los problemas globales. Hidra representaba un crecimiento hipercomplejo y exponencial, cualidades que hoy caracterizan los problemas globales. También presentaba una solución de fantasía a los problemas de los organismos desde debajo, en los cuales, los grupos dominantes encontraron irresistiblemente seductores por milenios. 本文探讨各种灾难与对它们的管理，其背景是被视作定义当前全球化条件的多重危机，当前的全球化主要受“上”和“下”之间的辩证法驱动。应用大混乱（无序）理论的形式，把灾难和对它们的管理当作检讨全球过程中的危机和大混乱之间关系的关键之处，与毁灭性的自然事件和力量冲撞，这些力量仍然超出主导的各种控制系统。本文始于关于古代多头蛇（难于根除的祸患）的神话的新看法，以便说明全球危机和问题的难以解决性。多头蛇代表的是极端复杂性和指数般的增长，意指今天全球问题的特征。它也意味着对来自下层、主导性集团为了太平盛世已经发现极具吸引力的能动的问题的神奇解决方案。 이 글은 위로부터 힘과 아래로부터의 힘 간의 진행되고 있는 변증법에 의해서 추동되고 있는 세계화의 현재적 조건으로 정의되는 복합 위기를 배경으로 재해와 재해 관리를 쟁점을 검토한다. 재해와 재해관리를 아직까지 지배적인 관리 체계 밖에 있는 파괴적인 자연 사건과 힘과 충돌하면서 지구적 과정에서 위기와 카오스가 교차하는 핵심적인 영역으로 다루면서, 카오스 이론을 논한다. 이 논의는 지구적 위기와 문제의 해결 불가능성을 파악하는데 아직까지 사용되는 고대 힌드라 신화를 새롭게 조망하면서 시작한다. 힌드라는 오늘날 지구적 문제를 특징짓는 속성인 초-복합성과 지수적 성장을 대표한다. 또한 힌드라는 지배 집단이 수천 년 동안 매혹적인 것으로 본 행위자들의 문제에 대한 환상적인 해결책을 제시한다. Эта статья исследует проблемы бедствий и управления ими, на фоне многочисленных кризисов, которые рассматриваются определяющими текущее состояние глобализации, движимой продолжающейся диалектикой между силами «сверху» и «снизу». Статья основана на формах теории хаоса, рассматривает бедствия и управление ими в качестве ключевого места, в котором можно исследовать пересечения кризиса и хаоса в глобальных процессах, сталкивающихся с разрушительными природными явлениями и силами, которые все еще являются внешними доминирующими системами контроля. Экспозиция начинается с нового взгляда на древний миф о Гидре, все еще используемого для фиксации неподатливых глобальных кризисов и проблем. Гидра представляет собой гиперсложность и экспоненциальный рост, качества характеризующие глобальные проблемы сегодня. Также представлена фантазия принятия решения проблемы агентством снизу, которую доминирующие группы находили неотразимо соблазнительной на протяжении тысячелетий.