THE SYSTEMS DYNAMICS OF GEOSCIENCE CULTURE AND LEVERAGE POINTS TO EFFECT CULTURE SHIFT

From a systems dynamics perspective, culture is an emergent, self-organizing property of complex human interactions. Once established, cultures persist through cultural activities and reinforcement of cultural mores, folkways, and norms specifically intended to perpetuate the culture. In the systems dynamics frame, culture persists through multiple interacting positive and negative feedbacks that operate collectively to reinforce culture and resist dramatic systemic changes. Norming (the establishment and maintenance of cultural norms) and sanctioning (formal and informal procedures to discipline cultural infractions) are feedback processes intended to preserve current cultural practices and maintain the cultural system. To effect significant change in dynamic systems like culture, one must intervene in the established system dynamics to drive the system toward new equilibrium states. While there are many leverage points to intervene in a system, not all leverage points have the same power to effect systemic change. To alter system states, one must engage leverage points with sufficient power to do so. Historically, the Geosciences community engaged low-power leverage points with minimal effects on Geoscience equity, diversity, and inclusion – decades of effort with minimal changes in Geosciences culture and demography. Geosciences Associated Societies Committed to Embracing & Normalizing Diversity (Geosciences ASCEND) aims to advance toward a more inclusive Geoscience Culture by utilizing high-power leverage points (re-orienting system structures and rules) such that new mores, folkways, and norms emerge to establish a new system equilibrium – i.e., culture.