Ecological Thinking

Recently I've been thinking about the world in ecological terms. It’s an interesting change in perspective. [...] Instead of focusing on the players, who are waving their hands, making noise, and generally being conspicuous, ecology asks us to focus on the game -- the incentive structures and ground rules under which the players act.

Central to ecology is the concept of a niche. A niche is an abstract space in the environment which some actors may be able to exploit successfully for an extended period. [ref] A niche involves not just location but also behavior. "It is the behavioral space in which an organism moves and competes for resources" [ref].

Here are some examples of ecological thinking:

• There will always be cheaters because there is always a niche for cheating. No sooner does a species develop behavior X than other members of that species develop the ability to exploit X, or another species develops X-mimicry, allowing them to get benefits that they don't 'deserve.' [...] You will never be able to eliminate cheating; the best you can hope for is mitigation.
• In a democracy you get the government you deserve and you deserve the government you get. If a candidate for office makes a promise and breaks it once she's in office, blaming her misses the point. She's just playing a role in a system that allows people to make promises they can't keep. If she didn't make too many promises, someone else would, and we'd elect that guy instead.

So here is the core insight, in two parts:

1. In complex systems, niches exist. They are a property of the system, independent of the particular actors within the system.
2. Niches exert a constant pull on behavior. If there's a niche for a particular type of behavior, and if the space is crowded enough (competition), the niche will be filled.

When you put these two facts together, you start to see behavior as a property of the system rather than the individual. Of course the individual is still proximately responsible for the behavior — and morally responsible, if that's the axe you're trying to grind. But sometimes it's more productive to look at the system rather than the individual. Ecological thinking doesn't give the complete picture by any means. It just provides a different perspective. Sometimes the problem you're facing is one that requires story-thought (attention to the details of individuals), but sometimes it requires systems-thought. You need both weapons in your arsenal.

In biology, ecological thinking doesn't concern itself with individual organisms, but rather with entire species. This is because individual organisms aren't adaptive enough to change their behavior in meaningful ways. A tree, a shrub, a weed, a bacterium, even a snail or a bat — these individual organisms have behavior that is mostly determined by what their genes have programmed for them. If its environment changes, a single tree is going to keep doing what it’s always done; it can’t adapt (much). Species, in contrast, can significantly change their behavior, at least over evolutionary time scales.

What does this tell us about the kinds of systems that are 'ecological'? Let me propose this criterion:

A system can be analyzed as an ecosystem if it has independent, competing agents who can change and adapt to their environment.

So, besides the biosphere, what other systems fit this definition? Lots, it turns out. Communities of all sorts: corporations, agencies, committees, the student body at a high school, nations, online communities (think Reddit). Markets, where firms compete against each other to win resources (employees, customers, investment dollars). Financial markets, where traders try to outwit each other. The dating market. Academia. The media. A corporation is both an ecosystem unto itself (where employees are the agents who inhabit the ecosystem), and an agent within a larger ecosystem (the market, where it competes against other firms).

But in all these cases, remember, it's not actually about the agents. It's about the system and its niches. In ecological thinking, agent behavior is a property of the system, rather than the other way around.

What's powerful about this way of thinking is that it abstracts away from individuals, and allows us focus on the properties of the system that are causing different types of behavior. In the process, it suggests completely different types of solutions to a lot of big, thorny problems. It asks us to stop thinking about the players, and get to work reforming the game.

Let's see some applications of this new mindset.

Office Politics. To reduce the amount of politics in your workplace, it's not enough just to say, "We'll fire people who play politics." Instead you'll want to think about how, where, and why politics occurs. What gains do people feel they can achieve by playing politics, and how can you change the system to make politics less rewarding? If politics thrives where there is restricted information flow (secrets, back-room deals, information brokerage), work on increasing feedback and transparency. Use open floor plans, encourage CC habits, and force people who are avoiding each other to talk. Maybe your office ecosystem has room for politics because there's a leadership vacuum, in which case you should fill the void. Of course the threat of punishment (firing) is one way to narrow the niche, by increasing the costs associated with politicking. It's just not the only way.

Drug violence. Ultimately, drug-related violence isn't caused by drugs or even by drug users or dealers, but by drug policy.Because there will always be buyers, there will always be a niche for selling drugs. Putting pressure on that niche, by criminalizing it, isn't making it go away (this is an empirical fact I hope we can agree on). Instead, it's only making the niche riskier. Since the stakes are so high — jail time or death on the one hand, big big money on the other — the 'drug dealer' niche can support only people who are desperate and/or ruthless. Inevitably the result is violence. And like all niches, the drug-dealing niche exists independent of any actors who might be filling it. Take out the kingpin and the niche is unfazed; someone else will soon step in to replace him. The only way to win is to change the game — treat drug abuse as a medical issue rather than a criminal one, for instance.

How to reform elementary school bullies? On Quora, Yishan proposes an ecological solution to this problem: punish the bully's peers.

One major determining factor about whether bullying is repeated is the reaction of the bully's peers. Often bullies are validated by friends or peers for identifying a victim and leading the bullying. Therefore, authority figures would be well-advised to set up a countervailing social dynamic that discourages bullying through social pressure.

In ecological terms: the niche for bullying exists because the bully gets recognition and reward from his peer group. Turn the peers against the bully and the niche will dry up, along with its corresponding behavior.

Why is there so little originality in Hollywood? Sean Hood gives us an ecological answer: "Hollywood makes more of what audiences pay to see. When more people start showing up for original movies, more originality will come out of Hollywood." In other words, the audiences define the niche, and behavior (of the studios) is determined by the niche. This inversion of blame — from producers to consumers — can be seen in politics (why do politicians lie?), internet culture (why is content so inane?), and all forms of pop culture. The producers are only giving the people what they want.

In complex systems, niches exist. A niche is a property of the system, independent of any agents who happen to be filling the niche. Agent behavior is explained by the niche, rather than by properties of the agents themselves (at least when using the ecological mindset). And finally, when looking at problems that arise in a system, it's often more productive to think about solutions at the niche level rather than the agent level. -- Kevin Simler