Unexpected Linkages

image: Thomas Hughes, Networks of Power: Electrification inward Western Society, 1880-1930 One of the things that I notice most interes...

image: Thomas Hughes, Networks of Power: Electrification inward Western Society, 1880-1930

One of the things that I notice most interesting inward social evolution is the regain of unexpected linkages betwixt innovations inward 1 champaign together with outcomes inward another.

Here is a somewhat hypothetical example. Improvement of long distance banking transactions inward Qing Cathay produces an increase inward the frequency of rebellion. How so? Because the long distance carry of merchant silvery created a sub-culture of rural bandits preying on merchant travelers. The creation of letters of credit reduced these opportunities, together with under-employed bandit gangs were to a greater extent than easily recruited into rebel forces. (This corresponds loosely to arguments offered yesteryear Liz Perry inward Rebels together with Revolutionaries inward North China, 1845-1945 concerning the dialectic betwixt predation together with rebellion, though I've speculated a fleck virtually the banking part.)

The full general persuasion hither is that large changes inward social systems of interaction -- roads, railways, telegraph systems, etc. -- often practise novel opportunities for social actors that were non anticipated yesteryear designers precisely that accept large social consequences.

Here are some examples of these kinds of effects. Discovery of diamonds inward a portion leads to severe deforestation (as diamonds get tearing conflict, leading to large refugee flows, leading to novel destructive uses of forests). Extension of trolleys inward the Boston suburbs leads to an increase inward the frequency of spikes inward illness mortality (as carriers motility to a greater extent than or less the portion to a greater extent than frequently). Growth of the electrical ability grid inward Pennsylvania results inward a refuse inward church building attendance (as immature people notice other social options inward well-lit towns together with cities).

I am led to intend virtually these kinds of effects because of the rapidity of organization alter inward Cathay today. The prepare system, the extension of video surveillance, changes inward social safety provisions, the ever-growing population of internal migrants -- all these processes are probable to accept unexpected together with novel consequences. And as complexity theory tells us, systems amongst multiple interlinked causal processes are vulnerable to abrupt changes of terra firma as causal factors get unexpected behaviors. This is familiar inward ecological research, precisely it seems as applicable to the social world.

One number of this trouble of persuasion is that nosotros involve to go cautious virtually predictions of the time to come that depend on shine extrapolations of existing trends. In the instance of China, possibly the most confident prediction nosotros tin brand is that at that topographic point volition go many surprises inward the coming decades.