To Design or Not to Design (Part Three)
To Design or Not to Design (Part Three):
Metacognition: How Problematizing Transforms a Complex System towards a Desired State
by Ben Zweibelson
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FM5-0 Chapter 3 Design describes design's purpose as a methodology used to "make sense of complex, ill-structured problems." The term 'make sense' deals with explanation of the open system. The previous article of 'To Design or Not to Design' demonstrated how military institutions have a strong propensity for describing an open system instead of explaining it. To make sense of a complex system, humans instinctively attempt to categorize information through descriptive monikers and reductive classifications. Knowledge is usually "pursued in depth in isolation…Rather than getting a continuous and coherent picture, we are getting fragments- remarkably detailed but isolated patterns." FM5-0 Chapter 3 Design follows military institutional preference for reconstructive and mechanical methodology prevalent at the tactical level of war by misapplying it to the operational level with design. Army design doctrine does not articulate why and how to transform a complex system into a desired one.
To understand something conceptual requires thinking about thinking, also known as metacognition. FM5-0 Chapter 3 Design implies metacognition by stressing the requirement of thoroughly understanding the nature of the problem and prescribing three frames through which planners operate to transform the system. Design doctrine graphically depicts the environmental frame, problem frame, and operational approach with minimal insight on how they function, or how operational artists actually 'transform the system.' Ironically, design doctrine stresses the importance of clear and illustrative graphics with explicit narratives for conveying understanding, yet the below vague and generally incomprehensible graphic is all that design doctrine offers for conveying design methodology.
Download The Full Article: To Design or Not to Design (Part Three)
Major Ben Zweibelson is an active duty Infantry Officer in the US Army. A veteran of OIF 1 and OIF 6, Ben is currently attending the School for Advanced Military Studies at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. He has a Masters in Liberal Arts from Louisiana State University and a Masters in Military Arts and Sciences from the United States Air Force (Air Command and Staff College program). Ben deploys this June to support Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan as a planner.
Editor's Note: This is part two of a six part series on design. Parts one and two can be found here and here.
