Towards Governance for Uncertain Times: Joining up Public, Business and Civil Society Sectors

This paper examines the complexity and "fuzzy logic" actually at play in governance in case studies such as HIH (Australia) and Enron (USA). The rules applying to each sector cannot fully explain events. Non?prescribed factors influencing behaviours affecting the interconnections, interdependencies and interactions of the individuals and institutions concerned often determine outcomes. Socio-political systems are dynamic complex evolving systems that function according to bounded self?organisation. Their governance often involves decision-making behaviour that does not operate according to formulaic rules but is analogous to the fuzzy logic according to which certain systems behave. Viewing the relationship between public management as regulators, corporations and others as complex dynamic relationships assists understanding the role of unanticipated events and the management of responses and adaptation to uncertainty in a society’s internal and external environments. This can facilitate the protection and advancement of the public interest by public management.