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Diagram: Enslaved States

Enslaved States

Emergent states often constrain  the agents that initially formed that state.

An enslaved state can persist as an attractor (see Attractor States) within a Fitness Landscape.

The term 'enslavement' was introduced by Hermann Haken, and suggests how particular emergent phenomena reinforce themselves once they have developed. There are similarities between the notion of enslavement and the concept in economic geography of 'lock-in'.

Some enslaved states may represent highly fit situations, whereas others might be residues of states that were fit at one time, but may now be sub-optimal. In this case, the system may suffer from 'lock-in', where it can no longer adapt to shifting fitness parameters because it has become too entrenched in self-reinforcing regimes.  

Enslavement captures how emergent phenomena, even though they are generated from the bottom up, take on agency once formed, and thereafter can constrain the actions of the agents that form the system. 

Thus, while one state might emerge as more viable than another due to processes that are initially somewhat random, this can be gradually amplified over time due to positive Feedback processes, until such point when actors within the system effectively only have one option of how to act. Accordingly, Hollywood has enslaved the movie industry, and Silicon Valley has enslaved the tech industry. At this point in time, it would take a major system Perturbation to disrupt these patterns. 

In Evolutionary Economic Geography the term "lock-in" is used to refer to the same dynamic. 


 

Cite this page:

Wohl, S. (2022, 7 June). Enslaved States. Retrieved from https://kapalicarsi.wittmeyer.io/definition/enslaved-states

Enslaved States was updated June 7th, 2022.

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Hermann Haken - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hermann Haken popularized the concept of 'enslavement' in his book Synergetics.

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Synergetics | Enslaved States

Haken popularized the concepts of Enslaved States and 'synergetics'. The notion of 'enslavement' is similar to the idea of Attractor States, wherein a system will tend to gravitate towards a particular regime and then remain in that state unless there is a system Perturbation.

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Complex Systems can unfold in multiple trajectories. However, there may be trajectories that are more stable or 'fit'. Such states are considered 'attractor states'.

Complex Adaptive Systems do not obey predictable, linear trajectories. They are "Sensitive to Initial Conditions", such that small changes in these conditions can lead the system to unfold in unexpected ways. That said, in some systems, particular 'potential unfoldings' are more likely to occur than others. We can think of these as 'attractor states' to which a system will tend to gravitate.

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There would be some thought experiments here.

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