Grants+&+Presentation+Opps

This is a place to post info regarding grants, RFPs and workshops / conferences that provide opportunities to present.

**International Conference on Chaos, Complexity & Conflict** June 5- 7, 2008 Omaha, NE  Please visit [|http://law.creighton.edu /wernerInstitute/complexityconf erence/] for more information. Hosted by: The Werner Institute for Negotiation & Dispute Resolution Creighton University, School of Law This first-of-its-kind-conference will focus on applying chaos theory, complexity, and emergence to the field of conflict resolution. Experts on complexity studies will come together with practitioners and educators of alternative dispute resolution. Together we will discuss how an understanding of complexity can bring the field of conflict resolution to a higher level. This interactive conference will focus on the integration of theory and real world applications for practitioners of alternative dispute resolution who are working with complex organizations. This forum is designed for anyone who is interested in improving the effectiveness of conflict resolution practices through integration of complexity principles and for those studying complexity and chaos who are interested in the theories and practices used by conflict resolution professionals. Due to the interactive nature of the format, the conference will appeal most to those who are interested in participatory learning through a variety of formats. "Organisational & Social Dynamics" November 21 - 22 Ambassadors Hotel, upper Woburn Place, London WCI Keynote Speakers: Gilles Amado & Marina Warner
 * OPUS International Conference:**

The Fourth //Organization Studies// Summer Workshop: “Embracing Complexity: Advancing Ecological Understanding in Organization Studies” June 5 - 7 Pissouri, Cyprus submission deadline: January 31 [|**www.egosnet.org/os**]

International Conference on Social Entrepreneurship & Complexity April 24-26 Adelphi University Garden City, New York submission deadline: February 15[|http://complexityleadership.wikispaces.com/Complexity%2C+Leadership+%26+Social+Entrepreneurship]

Draft Letter of Interest in response to RFP posted by Duke Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health (see http://www.dukespiritualityandhealth.org/proposals/) Please see the message I posted under the "discussion" tab of this page for further context...

Letter of Intent The proposed research will aim to “generate scientifically new and societally transforming information” by engaging with people in local communities to explore how religion and spirituality relate to cultivating healthy lives. Adopting the assumptions and methods of complexity science, this research will develop an approach to identify the most meaningful among many possible questions that could be asked regarding the inter-relationships between religion, spirituality and health – questions that paradoxically cannot be pre-specified but rather will emerge as researchers and participating community members co-create the investigation over time. This approach will facilitate an evolving, holistic understanding, grounded in lived experience, generating knowledge to promote “human flourishing” even while studying it. Research has not yet clarified the “deeper reasons for the religion – health relationship” because traditional science is not sufficient to address the complexity of spirituality, health and human systems. Traditional research methods are reductionistic and deterministic. They assume normal distributions and focus on linear, predictable change. As such, they cannot accurately describe phenomena manifesting in a highly interdependent, quickly changing and often unpredictable, nonlinear world -- a world characterized by the continual evolution of networked systems within ever-changing environments (McKelvey, 2007; Agar, 2004a,b; Cilliers, 1998). Complexity science makes it possible to study both spirituality and health as emergent and dynamic systems phenomena. It is a holistic science that focuses attention on self-organization as the core process underlying spirituality and health at all scales, from individuals and families to communities and societies. It assumes that health is promoted by facilitating the ability to self-organize in continually adaptive, flexible and responsive ways. This involves cultivating relationships and flows of information, energy and support to enable perpetual “goodness of fit” within a system, in relation to an ever-changing environment. It also involves increasing the potential for the spread and amplification of tiny innovations that can transform an entire system (MacGuire, McKelvey, & Mirabeau, 2006; Gell-Mann, 2002; Holland, 1995). Case studies will be conducted with neighborhood and faith communities in Hillsborough and Sarasota counties in west-central Florida to identify patterns and dynamics of self-organizing occurring at multiple scales. Ethnography and story gathering approaches will be used to gather information within each community. Various modeling approaches will be used to clarify relationships among individual and community characteristics and to visualize relationships between religion, spirituality and health. These will include agent-based modeling, social network analysis, story modeling, and geographic information systems (GIS) modeling. Companion modeling will be adopted to ensure that the research process itself supports the healthy self-organizing of the researched / researching communities. Interdependent teams of multi-disciplinary complexity scientists, religious studies scholars, and community members will engage in cycles of sensemaking to facilitate holistic understanding as the process develops. This research will be conducted by the Community & Complexity Initiative, a collaborative funded by the University of South Florida (USF) to develop complexity approaches to community sustainability. Partners include the Sarasota County Government, the Children’s Board of Hillsborough County, SCOPE, the MacDill Air Force Base Family Advocacy Program, and faculty from various departments at USF, including Anthropology, Architecture & Urban Planning, Business, Communication, Government & International Affairs, Mental Health Studies and Public Health. The chair and associate chair of the USF Department of Religious Studies will be joining the Initiative as well. The $200,000 grant will be used for research team member salaries, travel costs, digital audio-recorders, story-modeling software, and communications.