Adaptability
Social systems are widely accepted to be of a class called Complex Adaptive systems (CAS). In essence, complex adaptive systems adapt to changes in its environment to maintain fitness. Fitness of the system may be viewed both as functional fitness and structural fitness. Functional fitness is the ability of the system to perform a function in its environment including the ability to interact, utilize resources presented, and co-evolve with other systems. Structural fitness is the internal fitness relating to the robustness and strength of the connections between parts. The foundation behind a social system's drive to seek fitness in its environment, and to uphold its function, is debated on the basis of Maturana and Varela's concept of autopoiesis. Even though the original concept was introduced with reference to the phenomenon of biological life from an operational and temporal perspective, sociologists like Luhmann incorporated it later in his theories of social systems. The concept has proven to be useful to studies of social systems, and in particular developing its interdisciplinary character through systems theory.
Adaptation to environment may be seen from two perspectives. First, changes in the environment may introduce new variety of (re) actions and connections inside the system. With the introduction of variety and connections the complexity evolves incrementally to counteract and compensate for perturbations from the environment. This follows Ashby’s law of requisite variety, where the system needs at least the same variety of possible actions as the variety of challenges from the environment. Second, we may see changes in the environment that are too radical, too disruptive and of a dynamic nature where the system no longer can uphold its function with its present structure. The system itself needs to change its structure of interconnected categories, to reorganize, in order to support the continuity and coherence of the whole.
A real life paradox certainly may present a challenge of this magnitude. The system cannot only adapt incrementally to the situation. It must change its internal structure and architecture. New variety of actions must form new stable patterns of categories held by the system. There is always a risk that the system is unable to find a new stable state and that it might become unstable and disintegrate.
Micoro foundations of paradox experienced in social systems
With a description of an organization in terms of a social complex system, I am now ready to describe the foundations of a paradox experienced by a social system. I will utilize the three categories of social paradoxes as described above.