Sustainability and Scalability of Self-Organisation
(SaSSO)

Firstly, on the one hand, the sustainability of self-organisation, given the features of path dependency (where prior decisions significantly constrain present choices); the iron law of oligarchy, which identifies the tendency of self-organisation to slide into oligarchy; and the avoidance of tyranny at the core of Ober’s Basic Democracy. And conversely, on the other hand, self-organisation for sustainability, building on the pioneering work of Ostrom’s self-governing institutions for common-pool resource management, but also considering self-sustainability, e.g. in the form of cooperative survival dilemmas.

Secondly, on the one hand, the scalability of self-organisation, especially in dynamic environments, for example as the number of components in a system changes over time, how are structures and processes for decision-making, dispute resolution and monitoring affected by such changes, even with new `generations’. And conversely, on the other hand, the self-organisation for scalability, both for pro-active management of anticipated growth or contraction, but also how the values or incentives implied by self-organised rules change over time (the rule-based equivalent of concept drift).