Learning history in an open system: Creating histories for sustainable futures

Abstract

What kind of learning is required to bring us towards a more sustainable future? We argue that when behaviourally and technically complex issues intertwine, a collaborative social learning process that engages diverse actors in deep systems change is necessary. The learning required includes but overtakes debate, bringing organisations, individuals and communities into cycles of experiential, cumulative, ad hoc and opportunistic, yet systematic, learning. Current conceptualisations and approaches to learning have not been framed with the requisite level of integrated complexity given our sustainability challenges. This article introduces the action research approach of 'learning history in an open system' in the service of such learning. Updating the heretofore single-project focussed learning history, we present recent methodological developments for its use in open systems that support a joining up of projects and sites of endeavour to support deeper and accumulating systems' learning. We explore the links to learning literature drawing on developments in aesthetics and arts-based action research to suggest our approach is one useful way of responding to the more general challenge of scale that concerns action researchers.

Understanding Sustainability Through the Lens of Ecocentric Radical-Reflexivity: Implications for Management Education

“…Working from an open systems perspective, Gearty et al (2015) propose a form of collaborative social learning in which learning histories from a number of organizations are written around sustainability initiatives and used in group discussion (students and managers) as a means of generating change. Ways of achieving this include exploring how the consequences of managerial decisions 'cascade down to ground level' (Walck 2003, p. 210), and engaging students in reflection on their differing value orientations towards the environment (e.g.…”

Learning from Regional Sustainable Development in The Netherlands: Explorations from a Learning History

“…Inspired by oral history, Gearty and Bradbury-Hung noted, the MIT researchers set out to gather experiential knowledge by staying close to the stories of those involved. Unlike the typical listing of best practices found in project reports, learning histories were intended from their inception to invite readers into the inside world of those who directly faced the complexity of project issues [8] (citing Roth and Kleiner, 1998). Learning histories in root form were designed to stimulate learning from self-told project stories.…”

“…As Gearty and Bradbudy-Hung recently discussed [8], the learning history model was developed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers in the early 1990s and was first used at a large US automobile company. The MIT researchers' intention was to chart the learning of a highly successful team in a form that could be communicated more widely within the company.…”

“…Building awareness is an important step in the Natural Step's ABCD change sequence ("A" stands for awareness). Gearty and Bradbury-Huang [8] made the point that the link between human behavior and climate change repsonses remain largely under-explored. These researchers noted that only recently have studies examined the psychological and sociological dimensions that affect people's response to sustainability challenges.…”

Positive emotion in workplace impact

“…They can include work-based learning with various degrees of negotiation (Boud and Solomon, 2001;Raelin, 2008), reflective and critically reflective practices (Helyer, 2015;Wall, 2017aWall, , 2018, action research (Gearty et al, 2015), action learning (Trehan and Rigg, 2015), and other approaches which combine aspects or processes of these such as action inquiry (Torbert, 2004), synergic inquiry (e.g. Tang and Joiner, 2006), and work applied learning (Abraham, 2012).…”