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The more I work in corporate and learn about office politics, the more I see parallels to geopolitics and diplomacy. If I squint, I can even see the parallels t

The more I work in corporate and learn about office politics, the more I see parallels to geopolitics and diplomacy. If I squint, I can even see the parallels to social and romantic relationships as well. Maybe it's the mathematician in me who enjoys building models of abstraction.

lanyard-textile 1y ago
We humans love to make patterns out of everything.
- fruitplants 1y ago
  > We humans love to make patterns out of everything. Not sure in which vein you meant: 1. Humans exhibit some behavioral patterns. 2. Cognitive bias where the brain thinks that there is a pattern when no such pattern exist. I think you meant the second one. I used to think I am good at noticing patterns. But then I realized that this perception about myself clouded my vision of looking at a given problem or system because my brain tried to pattern match problems and solutions. While it worked in some cases, it did not in others. And just telling myself that while I think that there's a pattern here, there may or may not be a pattern helped- just being aware of cognitive bias.
6510 1y ago
The larger the group the more refined qualities are lost. It's terrifying!
godelski 1y ago
Is it not natural for that? I think less so between social and romantic but larger businesses and governments have definitely share many of the same problems. Though I think businesses tend to be much more autocratic. Maybe feudal is a better term? There's definitely a lot of differences but I think the larger a business becomes the more government like it becomes. Or at least it appears that way to me. I mean they're both very bureaucratic
- bruce511 1y ago
  Govts are typically "large enterprise". In most cases the largest enterprise in a country. In some countries they also have the burden of being legible to outsiders. Between the shareholders (voters) and journalists etc there's a lot of process that has to be transparent. This transparency is legibility driven to extremes. If an enterprise kills a project (think Windows Phone) its done, and we move on. If a govt kills a project there's a lot of external attention on what went wrong, who's getting fired (or going to jail) and how "our money got wasted". So yes, as things get bigger they matter to more people. The more people involved the more every single thought and action has to be meticulously detailed. Which is party why (democratic) govt is soooo bad at actually getting anything done. Feudal govts, and autocratic businesses, get a lot done - much of it quickly. It might not be good. It might be motivated my enrichment not care, but it gets done fast. A good autocrat moves the needle, and things get a lot better very quickly. A bad autocrat achieves his goals, often at enormous cost to the organization (which may not survive. )
  - lelandbatey 1y ago
    Eh, autocrats get away with looking like they move fast due to their lack of transparency; slow things can be dismissed or not propagandized, fast things will be shouted from the rooftops. Autocrats don't automatically execute faster.
    - godelski 1y ago
      Autocrats also had thousands of years and generations to give their citizens freedom of expression, the freedom to innovate, to eat, have access to clean drinking water, to solve child mortality, to extend life expectancy for those who lived through childhood to be past 60, to put a man on the moon. Yet the progress of civilization was far slower before democracy. Similar to what you suggest, many say history is written by the victors. But instead history is written by those who can write and survive. There's not much written from the perspective of a commoner for most of history. But where those writings survive, the situations do not appear pleasant.
15155 1y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_theory
harrall 1y ago
One of my favorite subjects is politics. I enjoy reading books about politics, and keeping up on (geo-)politics, subscribe to political magazines and honestly don’t mind navigating office politics. Because at the heart of it it’s all the same. It’s humans acting like humans. Every person (and organization) has desires and fears. When two parties get together, balancing everyone’s wants is fun. It’s like a complicated engineering problem, except with people requirements instead, and politics is the architecture. I think people are rad and genuinely enjoy these kinds of problems.
- rukuu001 1y ago
  This is great. A group I used to work with framed it as needs and fears, and would produce a ‘conflict map’ when heading into a situation with multiple stakeholders. The conflict map set out the needs and fears of each group, and indicated where they were incompatible. That information was used to proactively resolve, or at least plan around those areas of conflict.
  - dotancohen 1y ago
    I'd love to hear more about the conflict map. It sounds like a useful strategy. How was it a map?
    - homarp 1y ago
      https://css.ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/special-interest/gess/cis/center-for-securities-studies/pdfs/Conflict-Analysis-Tools.pdf https://css.ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/special-interest/gess/c... has an entry on 'Needs-fears mapping'
      - dotancohen 1y ago
        Thank you. There is a lot to absorb there.
      - rukuu001 1y ago
        That's an awesome resource thank you. The conflict maps I was exposed to were much simpler - just a bunch of wobbly circles surrounding a centra issue or event. Wobbly circle intersections denoted needs/fears incompatibility implying potential conflict.
rossant 1y ago
I only recently realized this. I was seeing geopolitics as an intricate, emergent behavior of complex systems made of hundreds of diplomats. I realized it was merely interpersonal relationships between a few country leaders who happen to have power over their respective states, military etc. This is not as different as kindergarten playground drama and squabbles, to some approximation of course.
- joarxpablo 1y ago
  I think that's the wrong lesson to take. The realist approach to international relations where states are controlled from the top as you describe is more legible. Instead I agree that it's really based on interpersonal relationships, but that those relationships are between CEOs, diplomats, immigrant communities, military officers, and of course also country leaders. This illegible network is what guides actually guides policy.
  - rossant 1y ago
    For sure, the decisions and actions of national leaders are deeply intertwined with this illegible network.
linhns 1y ago
Considering modern day politicians are more likely than ever to come out from their daily office jobs, this would not be much of a surprise.
immibis 1y ago
Physicists think the strongest force in the universe is the one that holds protons and neutrons together, but the real strongest force in the universe is game theory.
- nrclark 1y ago
  Game theory has its place. But most game-theory explanations that I see fail to take humanity into account. People are irrational actors way more often than they are rational ones.
  - godelski 11mo ago
    The study gets much more complex after you past the basics > People are irrational actors I think you misunderstand, but I don't blame you. "Rational actor" would mean something else in normal language. In game theory it does not mean that they are smart or even reasonable. It means they have some logic which can be tracked or quantified. An irrational actor is one who is logically incoherent. I don't mean illogical, I mean something closer to incomprehensible. Maybe an example helps. Let's say our actor expresses that they want to live and is trying to get to work. An irrational action would be for them to pick up a gun, point it at their head, and fire under the condition that they are fully aware that this will kill them. But instead, if the actor believes shooting themself will teleport themselves to work, then it is a rational decision. Or another example, an actor trying to win a game of chess knowingly marches their king into a capture position. But instead if they were unaware that such a move leads to a checkmate, then they're still rational. An irrational actor has a logic that cannot be understood. It's not about the quality of their logic, it's about the existence. Even an actor acting probabilistically has some logic, as we can quantify it (using a density function). Basically an irrational actor is one who knowingly undermines their own goals. It's a very narrow definition. Irrational actors are logically incoherent. So
    - nrclark 11mo ago
      Understood. Even in keeping with your definition - people are irrational actors. We make incomprehensible choices all the time, with no real reason at the moment of decision. Then our brains backfill and rationalize later. Keep in mind that our brains are made of meat that talks to itself via chemical reactions. Brains are not digital computers, and are very much an analog thing. Brains can and do make actual mistakes all the time. Like straight up "this computed incorrectly" or "there was a transmission error" kinds of mistakes. Humans are not rational actors, and never have been. That's why economic theory so frequently fails to predict behavior in spectacular ways.

lanyard-textile 1y ago

We humans love to make patterns out of everything.

fruitplants 1y ago
> We humans love to make patterns out of everything. Not sure in which vein you meant: 1. Humans exhibit some behavioral patterns. 2. Cognitive bias where the brain thinks that there is a pattern when no such pattern exist. I think you meant the second one. I used to think I am good at noticing patterns. But then I realized that this perception about myself clouded my vision of looking at a given problem or system because my brain tried to pattern match problems and solutions. While it worked in some cases, it did not in others. And just telling myself that while I think that there's a pattern here, there may or may not be a pattern helped- just being aware of cognitive bias.

6510 1y ago

The larger the group the more refined qualities are lost. It's terrifying!

godelski 1y ago

Is it not natural for that? I think less so between social and romantic but larger businesses and governments have definitely share many of the same problems. Though I think businesses tend to be much more autocratic. Maybe feudal is a better term? There's definitely a lot of differences but I think the larger a business becomes the more government like it becomes. Or at least it appears that way to me. I mean they're both very bureaucratic

bruce511 1y ago
Govts are typically "large enterprise". In most cases the largest enterprise in a country. In some countries they also have the burden of being legible to outsiders. Between the shareholders (voters) and journalists etc there's a lot of process that has to be transparent. This transparency is legibility driven to extremes. If an enterprise kills a project (think Windows Phone) its done, and we move on. If a govt kills a project there's a lot of external attention on what went wrong, who's getting fired (or going to jail) and how "our money got wasted". So yes, as things get bigger they matter to more people. The more people involved the more every single thought and action has to be meticulously detailed. Which is party why (democratic) govt is soooo bad at actually getting anything done. Feudal govts, and autocratic businesses, get a lot done - much of it quickly. It might not be good. It might be motivated my enrichment not care, but it gets done fast. A good autocrat moves the needle, and things get a lot better very quickly. A bad autocrat achieves his goals, often at enormous cost to the organization (which may not survive. )
- lelandbatey 1y ago
  Eh, autocrats get away with looking like they move fast due to their lack of transparency; slow things can be dismissed or not propagandized, fast things will be shouted from the rooftops. Autocrats don't automatically execute faster.
  - godelski 1y ago
    Autocrats also had thousands of years and generations to give their citizens freedom of expression, the freedom to innovate, to eat, have access to clean drinking water, to solve child mortality, to extend life expectancy for those who lived through childhood to be past 60, to put a man on the moon. Yet the progress of civilization was far slower before democracy. Similar to what you suggest, many say history is written by the victors. But instead history is written by those who can write and survive. There's not much written from the perspective of a commoner for most of history. But where those writings survive, the situations do not appear pleasant.

15155 1y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_theory

harrall 1y ago

One of my favorite subjects is politics. I enjoy reading books about politics, and keeping up on (geo-)politics, subscribe to political magazines and honestly don’t mind navigating office politics. Because at the heart of it it’s all the same. It’s humans acting like humans. Every person (and organization) has desires and fears. When two parties get together, balancing everyone’s wants is fun. It’s like a complicated engineering problem, except with people requirements instead, and politics is the architecture. I think people are rad and genuinely enjoy these kinds of problems.

rukuu001 1y ago
This is great. A group I used to work with framed it as needs and fears, and would produce a ‘conflict map’ when heading into a situation with multiple stakeholders. The conflict map set out the needs and fears of each group, and indicated where they were incompatible. That information was used to proactively resolve, or at least plan around those areas of conflict.
- dotancohen 1y ago
  I'd love to hear more about the conflict map. It sounds like a useful strategy. How was it a map?
  - homarp 1y ago
    https://css.ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/special-interest/gess/cis/center-for-securities-studies/pdfs/Conflict-Analysis-Tools.pdf https://css.ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/special-interest/gess/c... has an entry on 'Needs-fears mapping'
    - dotancohen 1y ago
      Thank you. There is a lot to absorb there.
    - rukuu001 1y ago
      That's an awesome resource thank you. The conflict maps I was exposed to were much simpler - just a bunch of wobbly circles surrounding a centra issue or event. Wobbly circle intersections denoted needs/fears incompatibility implying potential conflict.

rossant 1y ago

I only recently realized this. I was seeing geopolitics as an intricate, emergent behavior of complex systems made of hundreds of diplomats. I realized it was merely interpersonal relationships between a few country leaders who happen to have power over their respective states, military etc. This is not as different as kindergarten playground drama and squabbles, to some approximation of course.

joarxpablo 1y ago
I think that's the wrong lesson to take. The realist approach to international relations where states are controlled from the top as you describe is more legible. Instead I agree that it's really based on interpersonal relationships, but that those relationships are between CEOs, diplomats, immigrant communities, military officers, and of course also country leaders. This illegible network is what guides actually guides policy.
- rossant 1y ago
  For sure, the decisions and actions of national leaders are deeply intertwined with this illegible network.

linhns 1y ago

Considering modern day politicians are more likely than ever to come out from their daily office jobs, this would not be much of a surprise.

immibis 1y ago

Physicists think the strongest force in the universe is the one that holds protons and neutrons together, but the real strongest force in the universe is game theory.

nrclark 1y ago
Game theory has its place. But most game-theory explanations that I see fail to take humanity into account. People are irrational actors way more often than they are rational ones.
- godelski 11mo ago
  The study gets much more complex after you past the basics > People are irrational actors I think you misunderstand, but I don't blame you. "Rational actor" would mean something else in normal language. In game theory it does not mean that they are smart or even reasonable. It means they have some logic which can be tracked or quantified. An irrational actor is one who is logically incoherent. I don't mean illogical, I mean something closer to incomprehensible. Maybe an example helps. Let's say our actor expresses that they want to live and is trying to get to work. An irrational action would be for them to pick up a gun, point it at their head, and fire under the condition that they are fully aware that this will kill them. But instead, if the actor believes shooting themself will teleport themselves to work, then it is a rational decision. Or another example, an actor trying to win a game of chess knowingly marches their king into a capture position. But instead if they were unaware that such a move leads to a checkmate, then they're still rational. An irrational actor has a logic that cannot be understood. It's not about the quality of their logic, it's about the existence. Even an actor acting probabilistically has some logic, as we can quantify it (using a density function). Basically an irrational actor is one who knowingly undermines their own goals. It's a very narrow definition. Irrational actors are logically incoherent. So
  - nrclark 11mo ago
    Understood. Even in keeping with your definition - people are irrational actors. We make incomprehensible choices all the time, with no real reason at the moment of decision. Then our brains backfill and rationalize later. Keep in mind that our brains are made of meat that talks to itself via chemical reactions. Brains are not digital computers, and are very much an analog thing. Brains can and do make actual mistakes all the time. Like straight up "this computed incorrectly" or "there was a transmission error" kinds of mistakes. Humans are not rational actors, and never have been. That's why economic theory so frequently fails to predict behavior in spectacular ways.