Chaos and Complexity Theory

Chaos theory replaces the common usage of chaos as a state of confusion and disorder with the more structured sense of the concept as movements between order and disorder that, over time, are only apparently haphazard. It provides, sometimes supported by mathematics, guidance that can structure certain disorderly looking, dynamic, and nonlinear systems (i.e., where outputs are not directly proportional to inputs).

Weather, for instance, is a dynamic system; it is difficult to predict and nonlinear in that many consecutive days of sunshine can be succeeded by a sudden storm. However, since 2007 meteorologists have a 95% accuracy record in 3-day forecasting of global weather and earlier weather research stimulated a wider interest in chaos theory. While running computer weather predictions, meteorologist Edward Lorenz found that seemingly trivial rounding differences in input data led to huge variations in outcome forecasts. He popularized his research by asking, “Does the Flap of a Butterfly's Wings in Brazil Set Off a Tornado in Texas?” and his findings, on the need to be sensitive to initial conditions and to be aware of the possibilities of disproportionate outcomes, fused into the term the butterfly effect and stimulated widespread research into tremendous changes arising out of tiny variations. In public relations, chaos theory was first applied to such unpredictable matters as issues, risks, and crises.

Chaos theory is complemented by complexity theory. Both form part of the so-called sciences of uncertainty and share orientations relevant to wider public relations practice and research. Both, for example, foreground the loss of control by [Page 104]conscious entities, which is a recurring feature in crises and news releases; both acknowledge persistent unpredictability, which relates to adaptability in mindsets and tactics for addressing turbulent change (e.g., radical media restructuring); and both work with nonlinear behavior, which can massively influence everyday activities from event management to investor relations. Both also contribute to the management trend away from imitating the traditional sciences of certainty that motivates the search for measurable behavioral prescriptions for managers to deliver universally predictable outcomes. Instead, they approach organizations and societies as complex response processes in which people engage in multiple communication interactions culminating in collective actions that they may not have intended.

Accordingly, although possible parameters for activist publics and corporate crises can be outlined, neither the result of the activities of the former nor the unfolding events of the latter can be completely controlled or predicted. This sets limits on how much public relations—an organization-centered and purposeful process ostensibly able to strategically manage communication and its outcomes—can succeed. It implies that practitioner claims for assured outcomes should be modest. More positively, complexity's identification of key intervention moments and phases of change in other uncontrollable real-life situations offers pointers on how to reduce, and respond to, disorder in public relations. Its theories liberate practitioners to adjust overly rational management approaches, such as adherence, to plans based on earlier risk uncertainty with contextual awareness and history-sensitive knowledge. Complexity foregrounds the potential for those experiential assets to be effectively combined with the patience to watch and wait for the right moments to act (i.e., where intervention can have large effects). This may involve shifting between spells of smart surrender, and doing virtually nothing, and periods of intensive intervention. Well-timed actions can leverage accumulated local knowledge and assist real-time responses to specific events and agent behaviors, and so achieve more than the prepre-pared rationale and sustained proactivity.

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