Suggestion exercise for SSPM

This course features class exercises to each meeting to let students experience the theoretical material from lectures and literature. Develop one class exercise to replace one that you felt was not entirely suitable.







My suggestion for an improvement of one of the class exercises is about the game of harvest.During the game we are divided into 6 groups, each team act as a fishing boat. The game we have played consist of a few simple rules:

1.Each round is one year. Each team decides how many fish they want to catch. Write down this number and put it in your boat

2.Facilitator takes boats and gives fish randomly to teams until they are gone. Rest of teams receive nothing.

3.You get back both of your boat and harvest. Write down your profit again.

4.The resources that we had was a ‘sea’ which contains 50 units of fish. . Each year, the remaining fish are able to produce one new fish, with a maximum of 50.


After the game, we wrote blogs about the improvement of this game. But the improved version is only in theory. I think It would be great if we could play the game in vision 2.0. Reasons can be listed as follow.

1.Different people have different thoughts. If we only play the game for once, we couldn’t put some of our ideas into action .

2. Playing the improved game could help us understand in depth of the system.

3. I think we can come up with new suggestions if we play the game in new rules.

LCA & Sabatier’s framework

LCAs are a tool for assessing the environmental impact of products. Think up four ways in which government can increase the use of LCAs through external control and setting boundary conditions.

Use Sabatier’s framework to assess the potential effectiveness of external control vis-a-vis other options.



(1).increase the use of LCAs

Life-cycle assessment (LCA, also known as life-cycle analysis, ecobalance, and cradle-to-grave analysis)is a technique to assess environmental impacts associated with all the stages of a product's life from cradle to grave (i.e., from raw material extraction through materials processing, manufacture, distribution, use, repair and maintenance, and disposal or recycling). LCAs can help avoid a narrow outlook on environmental concerns by:

· Compiling an inventory of relevant energy and material inputs and environmental releases;

· Evaluating the potential impacts associated with identified inputs and releases;

· Interpreting the results to help make a more informed decision.

The four ways in which government can increase the use of LCAs through external control and setting boundary conditions are, in my opinion:

1. The government could create a LCA controlling authority and make it mandatory for companies to comply with the law within a specific year. Failure to comply could result in fines or temporarily shutting down the company until this can demonstrate it has done the necessary analysis.



2.The government can make subsidies for companies which use the LCA method for environmental impact analysis. By doing this, the government can motivate firms to act according to the goals of the government if we assume that monetary value is a motivational factor. This is a way of setting boundary condition that makes the use of LCAs more desirable.

3. The Government can alter market conditions, giving incentives to industries in order for them to create job positions which functions will be analyzing environmental impacts of the production, using LCA analysis and other models of life cycle thinking. The Government will give a subsidy for the payment of that position.



4.Create gradually an open source database of all LCAs. The database of LCA is enormous, which needs sufficient cooperation between companies and government and timely update. In this way the diffusion of necessary information is easier.


(2)Sabatier’s framework





Tractability of the problem

The target group in case of the external control would be group of companies that have a production line around a product or a service and may potentially cause environmental impacts. In this group as the Life Cycle Thinking proposes, it is taken into account the whole system of the actors involved directly or indirectly in each event or stage all the way from cradle to death of the product. Thus it is easily realized that the target group is really broad covering nearly the total of industrial actors. The large number of actors involved makes the problem difficult to tackle as information intensity and reliability.



Ability of statute to structure implementation

The implementation of boundary conditions doesn’t ensure that the desired effect of the policy actually takes place. Therefore, in my opinion, the government plays an important role. The external control policies will have a greater effect on policy objectives than creating boundary conditions



Non-statutory variables affecting implementation

The external control policies have the potential to gather media attention. The pressure from the public support and media plays a vital role. And also in order to a good perception of the use of LCA, the Government should develop media campaigns about its use and benefits.



In conclusion,. the cooperation between companies and government is of great importance. A combination of the legislative state control and setting boundaries would be the best way to achieve increase the use of LCAs.

Game of Harvest

Last week, we played the game of harvest. We are divided into 6 groups, each team act as a fishing boat. The game we have played consist of a few simple rules:


1.Each round is one year. Each team decides how many fish they want to catch. Write down this number and put it in your boat


2.Facilitator takes boats and gives fish randomly to teams until they are gone. Rest of teams receive nothing.


3.You get back both of your boat and harvest. Write down your profit again.


4.The resources that we had was a ‘sea’ which contains 50 units of fish. . Each year, the remaining fish are able to produce one new fish, with a maximum of 50.


HOWEVER, our resource system, the ocean, became empty in the 4th round. the players eventually follow their self-interest and fishing more than the sustainable amount.


In this blog, I will try to come up with some additional rules so that the fisher villages can harvest from the sea generation after generation.





RULE 1. Set up a Committee as the inspectors.


Every team appoints a person as the inspector before the game starts. These people from different group forming the monitoring committee. The committee members will together supervise the harvest of each team. If any team is found to exceed the sustainable harvest amount, they will be punished. Possible punishments could be being banned for 1 round. When a group is being fined for the 2nd time, they would be kicked out of the game.






RULE 2.Make sure that everyone knows what is the best option.


Before each fishing season the committee which i mentioned above promotes sustainable fishing by giving speeches. This is to make sure that all members of the game understand what is the best for them and for the sustainability of the ocean.






RULE 3. Teams take turns to receive the extra fish.


During our game in the class, there was one extra fish which could be caught without damaging the sustainability of the ocean. All the teams who comply with the rules take turns to receive the extra profits. This is a bonus for those team who obey the rules.

East Asia regional production network

Since 1990s, with the development of the international economic globalization， the international division of labor pattern has been deeply transformed from the initial inter-industry to intra-industry. Such intra-product division of labor production mode makes the productive process of the same final product split into several links,which shall be produced dispersively in the most efficient countries or areas with the lowest cost in accordance with the comparative advantages of every country.

The international production network initially permeated into East Asia in 1960s, and the USA semiconductor company and Texas company built the assembly shop in Singapore.In the late 1970s, the multinational corporation with the production equipments in Singapore began to configure the final processing and assembly link in the neighboring countries especially in Malaysia, Philippines and Thailand. A number of multinational corporations began to setup the production base in these countries. Singapore became the regional center for designing and assembling the components， as well as the total service sector for producing the configuration in the neighboring countries. In recent years， as the global production center for the components， the occurrence of China has reinforced the the inter linkage of the country in the aspect of the international production chain， and the success in the exporting of manufacturing industry in China has obviously relied on the importing of the components and parts from the countries in East Asia and Southeast Asia. This regional network is a social network,  since this kind of network requir trust.

Just as Fukunari Kimura (2010) pointedout， the development of East Asia free trade area promoted the liberalization of the trade and investment， and further promoted the development of the regional production network. Due to this open market，dependency reduced through alternative resource.

As far as I can see, the constraints of this network is that in which way could the incentive measures be adopted to attract the medium-sized and small enterprises to join the regional production network， so as to enhance the operating efficiency of the overall East Asia regional production network.

legitimacy in NOKIA case

In an increasingly globalized economy, more corporations are 'outsourcing' their production to countries with cheaper labor costs and less legal protection of workers' rights. Some corporate managers, whether out of sincere moral concern or because they must respond to the considerations of investors and shareholders, are attempting to balance profit-making with social morality.

A DECENT FACTORY focuses on such an effort by Nokia, the Finnish electronics firm, which sends a team led by two business ethics advisors to examine conditions at a Chinese factory that supplies parts to Nokia. During their tour the Nokia team investigates working and safety conditions, payroll records, and potential environmental hazards. They also have interviews with the factory managers as well as several young Chinese female employees.

Q1. Analyze how the two key organizations in this case (Nokia and the supplier) are striving for legitimacy.
The extent to which the activities of a firm ‘are desirable, proper, or appropriate within some socially constructed system of norms, values, beliefs, and definitions’ (Suchman 1995)
Obviously, Nokia and Chinese supplier come from two totally different backgrounds.
Nokia is striving for legitimacy by making an assessment of their supplier in China. Nokia wants to make sure that not only the company itself works in a legitimacy circumstance, but also their part suppliers. The Nokia wants to know not only whether their employees being paid at least the legal minimum wage, but also how long they have to work every day and the condition of their dorms and workshops. The Nokia wants to know whether their Chinese supplier meets the legitimacy standards or not.
However the Chinese supplier is in a developing country. What they do to strive for legitimacy is paying the minimum wage to employees but hold back certain amount of money for dorms and food. Also no contacts signed. It’s not only because of lack of a legal consciousness, but also they are satisfied with what they get from the company. In China, a factory in such condition is better than most other factories. Can you imagine places where the employees come from is even worse?
Apparently it can’t meet Nokia’s expectation.

Q2. Is the approach taken by Nokia an effective way of diffusing sustainability criteria?

What Nokia did may have little effect. Because I believe that force can not help to this situation.

In my opinion, I suggest that Nokia should try to understand how this situation came up. And why the Chinese supplier does in such ‘illegitimacy ’ way.

Also, I believe that communication will help. The Nokia’s team could listen to some of the employees’ requirements. Not only do Nokia need to ask questions that Nokia really care about, but also it should to care what supplier cares about.

I think this will be more efficiently.

Q3. How could another coordination mechanism improve on this?

There are 3 ways that we learned from class,which are coercive pressure, mimicry and normative pressure.

In this case, I think normative pressure would help. Because if supplier does not lead to the desired effect, external control should be needed. And this control, in my opinion, had better from the government. Because in China, legislation is convincing. If supplier doesn’t obey the law, it would face severe punishment by Chinese government.

feedbacks

Assignment1：
feedback for Koen koenjjkuipers.wordpress.com

as for the ‘correlation between per capita income and the adoption of good climate policies. i do agree with you. i think in developed countries, people there have rich resources. but in some parts of developing cuntries ,they even don’t have enough food and water, how could they care about environmental problems? so i think developing countries should develope their economy first.

‘business of business ‘ i agree that a business intentions are primarily focused on the profit-making process. and i think the core part of business is gain profits.

feedbacks for Weiwen https://weiwenzhong.wordpress.com/

well, i am really interested in your question. if a man is stuck in a isolated island, he has to consider about how long it will take before being rescued.if it only take several hours, i believe that eating the hen is a wise idea. But if the situation is like Robinson of Robinson Crusoe, i think he’d better feed the only hen he has and wait for chickens hatched from eggs. In my opinion, this is also suitable for energy resources, if just focused on the present, it’s okay to ride a fuel motor. However if you focused on the long term, i think electricity is more eco-friendlier than fuel. I think that is also the reason why traditional gasoline or diesel petrol is replaced by blended fuel for buses in China.

&

i agree with your opinion. but i think the core part of business is increase its profits. wihtout increasing profits, how can those businessmen care about other things like charity? if their companies cant gain profits, i think they wouldn’t like to reach a tradeoff that benefits the whole.

Assignment 2.
feedbacks for Elke http://anieperspective.wordpress.com/

DEVELOPMENT TOWARDS MY POSITION ON THE FRIEDMAN PROPOSITION

I really agree with opinion, especially ‘the concept of profit will no longer be divided from people and planet but a form a strong coalition’.I agreed with Friedman‘s words from very beginning, but then after I read some articles, I found that the meaning of profits should keep pace with the times.I think your opinion is not much different from mine. however, as for your last paragraph, I think it will be powerful if you have a detailed explanation about ‘The government has its role to play and guide companies even if they do not embed these factors into their vision’.
best,
cenyang

RATIONAL DECISION-MAKING AND BOUNDED RATIONAILITY

hi Elke,

First of all, you have a very specific explanation about Rational decision-making, Rational Actor Model and bounded rationality. And I think your structure is very clear. It's easy for me to read and understand your opinion. 

In my opinion, the nuclear resource itself is controversial. I believe that it's impossible to make a 100% guarantee for the safety of those people who live aroud nuclear power plants. for those people, if some accidents happen, it is irreversible.

It's a nice post.

best,

Cenyang

Assignment3.

feedback for Jason http://sspm-ie.blogspot.nl/

hi Jason,

I think your view is unique. Your blog make me clear headed. What I struggled about before is the priority of making profits and sustanability. I used to consider that companies should increase profits first so that they would have abilities to make a contribution to sustainability. I never noticed that both of them could be achieved at the same time. thanks for your post.

In your post, the profits are long term profits. but what about the short one? Actually, improvident companies exist indeed. These companies could roil the market. It's not that easy to keep a balanced between supply and demand.

thaks again for your post. I really like it.

best

cenyang

feedback for Kjell kwansleeben.wordpress.com

hi kjell,
Thanks for your post.
I think your post is in a distinct frame, so that it’s really easy for me to understand what’s your post taliking about. And you also have a very detailed introduction about SES and the Great Barrier Reef.
However, in my opinion the framework which Ostrom constructed is not well applied. I think it would be better if you stretched your last paragraph with your opinion, like in which way would governance systems play a more important role in Ostrom’s framework.

best,

Cenyang

Assignment 4.

Feedback for Stephany



Overall I think your Nokia blog is well structured. Nice to start with the definition of legitimacy.

Maybe there are other mechanisms that can help? Such as governance?



Feedback for Anne



I think the blog overall is very well written and interesting.

I do not agree with the fact that the strategy of Nokia would have been more effective if they sent male investigators.

I think it might be better to detail more which coordination mechanism or a combination of some of them should be involved such as: self organization, self governance.



Assignment 5.

there is no blog for this week on http:\\bobindustrial.wordpress.com



Feedback for Hans



I don’t have anything to add.

I think your blog is well structured and easy to read. You made a clearly explanation on Resource dependency, the network ,Resource networks etc.

I think it could be better if you have a general introduction of The Kalundborg Eco industrial park at the beginning of your blog.

Thanks for your blog.



Assignment 6.



there is no blog for this week on http://iektkj.wordpress.com/

there is no blog for this week onhttps://sspmblog.wordpress.com/





Assignment 7

there is no blog for this week on http://iezejun.wordpress.com/

there is no blog for this week on http://michaeloconnorindustrialecology.blogspot.nl/



Assignment 8

there is no blog for this week on http://sairamiroslava.wordpress.com/



Feedback for Nicole

Thanks for your post.

Reading through the rules you designed for the car game made me feel I really want to try it out now and see how it works! I think the game you developed is very interesting and also very executable.





Assignment 9

there is no blog for this week on http://suchasocialsystem.wordpress.com/

there is no blog for this week on http://silverliningsspm.blogspot.nl/





Assignment 10

there is no blog for this week on http://dicapojura.blogspot.nl/

there is no blog for this week on http://thesocialsideofie.blogspot.nl/ 

decisionmaking in site selection

Choose a newsitem about an event in which the actions of a firm or governmental agency play a crucial role. 

Write a plausible account of how these actions might be the result of rational decisionmaking.

Write an alternative, equally plausible account, showing how these actions might result from a boundedly rational organization (à la Jones 2003).
Rational decision-making is a systematic approach that is reliant on obtaining sufficient data through observations and mathematical/statistical analysis or modeling in order to formulate long-term decisions.A Rational Actor Model is such a way that the action is optimal, the beliefs are supported by evidence, and where the evidence is a result from optimal investment in information gathering. And bounded rationality can be difined as individuals that are known to formulate decisions in such a way that it systematically differs from the RAM. A more realistic approach is required that builds on the insights of cognitive science. Jones (1999) difined that at an organisational level, optimal rational decisions are limited by organisational rules, agenda setting, as well as parallel and serial processing.

during my undergraduate study, I learnt something about site selection in my logistics course.I believe that site selection has a very close relationship with boundedly rational decisionmaking. I'd like to introduce the site selection of  university town as an example. university town is a district with several universities in city or suburban area. it's very common to have a university town in big cities of China, such as xi'an an wuhan. in Xi'an the site of university town is located in the southern suburbans which is quite far from the city center.

rational decisionmaking：

There are lots of factors should be taken into consideration when selecting a site of universities, such as environment, transportation convenience，the educational attenment of surrounding residents etc.

in Rational decisionmaking, you need to choose several sites as alternates. and you should rank the importance level of the factors too. then you should evaluate each factor of each site with AEIOU(A means the most relative one). fianlly the site with highest score is the place for university town.

boundedly rational decisionmaking:

Bounded rationality is due to limited by the information they have, the cognitive limitations of their minds, and the finite amount of time they have to make a decision. in this case， the agency may lack of information about which idle land is available. and not all the requirement could be met.so the place they finally chose is in the southern suburbans which is not so convenient for a good weekend but is a good place for study.