Panarchy

I debated saying anything on this topic...it just doesn't seem significant enough.

About the time Noah Raford's video discussing panarchy and Cynefin came to my attention, I had an e-mail exchange with a professor who has a long-time interest in panarchy (per Gunderson & Holling), but had never heard of Cynefin (he was, BTW, quite excited by Cynefin when I suggested he take a look at it).

Regardless, I must say that I'm a bit underwhelmed by panarchy, at least what I've seen in Raford's videos & slideshares. At the risk of oversimplifying, my initial reaction is that it seems like a synthesis of 3 concepts: (a) S-shaped growth curves, (b) the dis-integration of a system that occurs when the context to which it is adapted changes enough that the system ceases to be self-sustaining., and (c) fractals.

• S-shaped growth curves - these are well known, at least in systems circles (I feel obliged to offer that caveat since it seems like someone is always kicking up a fuss by using an exponential growth curve to forecast either utopia or doom....like the concept of infinity, exponential growth curves that never flatten are found only in metaphysics).
• Systems that fail to adapt and dis-integrate (not disintegrate) - this sort of thing always triggers TRIZ (the innovation framework) for me; a well-known business example is the Silicon Valley churn of resources and knowledge...most companies that become successful go through a classic S-shaped growth curve with an initially successful configuration, then fast growth, then stagnation, consolidation, and dis-integration...with the dis-integrated knowledge and resources made available for a new configuration. This cycle is shown in panarchy as a figure "8" on its side (or an infinity sign...a perhaps not-so-subtle hint (or perhaps ironic wink) that panarchy might very well be the sort of secret knowledge that appears in Dan Brown novels).
• Fractals - panarchic infinity symbols can be nested and as a context traverses the curve of the infinity symbol, it can both be part of a larger & slower curve traversal (at a different scale), and it can contain smaller & faster curve traversals within it.

I hope that my initial reaction reflects ignorance, but panarchy seems a bit too linear/wooden to encompass contexts that are truly complex. I like each of the pieces (discussed above), but the combination as seen in panarchy seems like a case where the whole is less than the sum of its parts.