BANI environments and digital society. Epistemological issues from interpretive systemology and complexity

Abstract

The article analyzes the question of scientific prediction from some categories of management epistemology in disruptive contexts. The history of the social sciences shows that prediction has always been its central problem, so in this paper we present an interpretation of scientific predictions in a philosophical and epistemological key regarding uncertain organizational environments. To this end, the theory of unpredictability of Macintyre (1985) is analyzed, through phenomenological-hermeneutical methodology (Heidegger, 2002; 2022; Villalobos, 2017), from his four perspectives of unpredicting, within the framework of the so-called digital society; this is described as chaotic and complex context, considering the "digital networks", which imply future challenges, according to our interpretation. The reality studied is exemplified from what has been called BANI Environments, especially as a challenge for organizations, characterized as unstable systems: they are fragile, impregnated with fears, they manifest themselves in unknown environments and often incomprehensible; this is due to the abundant information they receive from the context, resulting in a certain paralysis of action by virtue of threats,  also due to the impacts it receives from disruptive environments as a result of technological innovations. It is concluded that the innovation systems that emerge as a response to these chaotic systems that characterize the BANI Environments, can assume interpretation criteria derived from the epistemology of complexity, and the so-called Interpretative Systemology, tools with which the internal and external tensions of organizations can be alleviated in the face of the systemic phenomenon described.