This document discusses challenges and reflections related to information, knowledge, and wisdom societies and sociotechnical systems. It argues that human organizations are living systems that should be analyzed as such, and that their interactions with technology drastically affect human relationships. It also argues that beyond economic, organizational, cultural and technological dimensions, the specific sociotechnical context characterizes knowledge societies driven by the internet in an ubiquitous and collaborative manner. However, traditional management opposition persists as sociotechnical systems enable collaborative decision making and shared leadership instead of top-down control of information. The document questions who or what will drive innovations in this new era and what impact the sociotechnical system could have on innovation processes.

1. Balloni, Antonio J and Targowski, Andrew S. (2015). Challenges and Reflections on Information,
Knowledge, and Wisdom Societies and Sociotechnical Systems". In: Darshana Sedera; Norbert
Gronau; Mary Sumner. Enterprise Systems. Strategic, Organizational, and Technological Dimensions.
Chapter 14. Pages 1-22, LNBIP, Vol. 198, ISBN 978-3-319-17586-7, Springer Berlin. DOI:
10.1007/978-3-319-17587-4_14
Challenges and Reflections on Information, Knowledge, and
Wisdom Societies & Sociotechnical Systems (*).
Antonio José Balloni 1 and Andrew S. Targowski 2,
1 Center for Information Technology Renato Archer (CTI), Brazil
antonio.balloni@cti.gov.br
2 Western Michigan University, USA
President Emeritus of the International Society
for the Comparative Study of Civilizations (2007-2013)
andrew.targowski@wmich.edu
Extended Abstract. This paper has been invited to be published by the Springer LNBIP
series/2014 and so, it is an improved version from those version accepted for presentation at the
Fifth Pre-ICIS workshop on ES Research, St Louis/USA 2010 (*). The paper considers some
challenges and reflections concerned with Information and Knowledge/Wise Societies and
Sociotechnical Systems. After a brief and innovative panorama on the information and
knowledge/wise societies and sociotechnical system we present the core of this work: challenges
and reflections related with our society and systems. For some of these challenges and reflections
has been proposed answers such as: treatment of the organization as a living being → synergism &
collaborative ecosystem research efforts; a unfair shared leadership, information partnership and a
collaborative relationship in the age of knowledge and, a new way of development, which
comprises the social, economical, cultural and environmental spheres leading us to a new model of
perception and knowledge of the world & present financial crisis; …Our world is fundamentally a
sociotechnical world, which is characterized by Human and technological interactions; Human
organizations are living systems and should be analyzed accordingly; Their interactions drastically
affect people relationships in space and time. If we consider that the core knowledge is embodied
in people’s heads (tacit knowledge), and their abilities to utilize them generate new knowledge, we
cannot speak about knowledge/wise society without taking into account these interactions. Since
the Internet brings together the computer, media, and the distributed intelligence of the family and
the community, constituting a new basis for the effectiveness of socio-technical organizations then,
in this way, beyond the economic, organizational, cultural, and technological dimensions, the
specific sociotechnical context characterizes every knowledge/wise society initiatives: synergism
and ubiquitously driven by the Internet! However, management opposition persists, because
sociotechnical system by nature enables collaborative decision-making and shared leadership.
Management has been reluctant to give up the power and authority they have worked so hard to
establish. Sociotechnical system challenges the traditional management taboos that of sharing
information and knowledge with subordinates on a need to know basis only. The central corner
stone of a technocratic bureaucracy is that decision-making is top-down and implementation is
bottom up. Amazingly, many postmodern organizational leaders still believe information is best
kept in the minds of senior management who have been trained how to use it, make decisions, and
implement policy. In this mechanistic model, managers pretend to know and employees pretend to
cooperate. This new emerging scope of the social modus operandi is changing our mentality about
knowledge and wisdom. The last questions remain to be answered: Who or what will be driving
innovations in this new era? What can be the impact of the sociotechnical system in such innovations process? Or, is
the Sociotechnical system is being considered by the political leaders of the emerging knowledge/wise society?
* Work partially supported by the State of São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP). Esse trabalho
foi desenvolvido durante o período que estava participando de congresso internacional em Portugal/2010
<http://goo.gl/Hytzh6> e, que foi submetido no congresso ‘ES Research/2010’, citado no resumo acima.