Yurttas/PL/OOL/docs/kn.html
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
/>
From: kristen@ifi.uio.no (Kristen Nygaard)
Subject: Opening Speech at the IRIS 19 Conference, Part 1
Dear friends,
This as a greeting from a friend who just has passed the seventy year-mark.
My contact with many of you has been rather intermittent in recent years,
since 1988-94 was rather busy because of the battle against a Norwegian
EU-membership.The funding authorities now have got still another argument
against me: I am too old, and do not need research or travel funding. But,
we have e-mail.
I enclose (in this and a following e-letter) the manuscript for the speech
I was asked to give at the Reception Party for the 19th IRIS conference.
IRIS (Information Research in Scandinavia) is an annual meeting place for
researchers around the world, but mainly from Scandinavia, who are in the
tradition of PD (Participatory Design) and the approach that started with
the Scandinavian Trade Union oriented projects in the 1970s.
The conference is very much oriented towards ongoing research, and
contributions are given a thorough discussions in working groups. Most
useful, and many young people attend.
I was asked to give a completely subjective account of those aspects of my
research and the research process that I would not usually include in a
lecture, but that I thought in some way would be useful for young
researchers. I was also asked to include som material about how "the
Scandinavian School" in system development started.
As you will find out, I have at least succeeded in being subjective.
(Manuscript to be published in
The Scandinavian Journal of Information Systems, Vol. 8.2, 1996)
"THOSE WERE THE DAYS"?
OR "HEROIC TIMES ARE HERE AGAIN"?
By Kristen Nygaard
Opening Speech at the IRIS 19 Conference
(The 19th Information Research in Scandinavia Conference)
in Loekeberga Sweden, August 10th, 1996
(With Additions and Also Some Improvements after the Event)
INTRODUCTION
Bo Dahlbom has given me detailed specifications for this introductory
event: It shall not be a lecture. In fact, in an e-mail he referred to our
last meeting at a conference in Grimstad in Norway, where I gave a lecture
and also participated in a panel discussion, contributing with a number of
far-fetched guesses and highly questionable points. He stated strongly that
he enjoyed my intervention in the panel much more than my lecture. And he
would not at all see any slides. Nor any manuscript.
He also stated clearly that he wanted me to speak for two or three hours.
"We now have all these stubborn bastards collected," he said, "and we have
a golden chance of forcing them to listen, and this opportunity should not
be missed." I begged for mercy on your behalf, however, and finally was
allowed to speak for only one hour.
I should speak about the future, he said, since that is the subject of this
IRIS conference. Or about the past, where I myself belonged. Or both, or
something in between.
The event would be informal. To ensure this, the audience would be served
champagne. But not too informal. To ensure that, the speaker would only be
served a single glass.
The title of the speech, as it now stands, is added after the conference.
It is ambiguous, as many parts of the speech itself.
I assume that you all by now have a clear idea about the content of my
speech, and I will start reading from my manuscript without further ado.
LIVING IN MANY DIFFERENT WORLDS
Some words about my own background that may be of some relevance to what I
will say.
I have had the advantage of living in many different worlds. My mother's
family were farmers, my father's family were city dwellers. My grandfather
an industrial lawyer, my father a painter who got his Master's with
classical Greek, Latin and French, and later became a stage director at the
theatre in Bergen. Much later Johanna and I for a number of years staged
hand puppet theatre performances for our children, their friends and their
parents.
In Bergen I had to fight in the streets all the time, since I was from Oslo
and was not willing to be mobbed into talking the local dialect. I had to
learn to fight and not give up even when treated rather resolutely. Apart
from this, I liked Bergen. I attended a very good and inspiring Rudolf
Steiner school, and I got friendly with the skippers and the crews of the
fishing boats in the harbour. I soon understood that it was too tough for
my mother and father to be told what I learned onboard about adult life.
The theatre in Bergen played an important role in the fight against nazism
in Norway in the 1930s. The difference between nazism and democracy, and
between aggressive nationalism and loving your country in a tolerant way
was explained to us by our teachers. That they were right was demonstrated
by the Nazis when they attacked Norway in April 1940. The drastic
difference between independence and being dominated from the outside as
well.
I lived in Oslo and was 13 years old at the time. I did not participate in
any particularly heroic activities, but, as many, many others, I was thrown
into situations demanding a choice. I will tell you about one such
incident. In the spring of 1944 I met an older friend on the street. He was
carrying two apparently rather light suitcases. After some chat, he asked
me to help me with one of the suitcases. Yes, of course. The suitcase was
extremely heavy. There could be no doubt, it was filled with guns and
ammunition. We walked up to a house close to a German military camp within
the city. Then my friend got the suitcase and disappeared into the house. I
felt quite relieved.
The point in telling the story is this: It never occurred to me that I had
the option of refusing to help him. I think nearly all my friends would
have felt the same way. In the situation something was right, and something
was wrong. Regardless of dangers. You chose the right alternative, period.
I do not believe in any religion. The closest I get is exemplified by this
absence of choice in critical situations, which is what I have experienced
confronted with other important choices in my life.
Another aspect of the war was that work on my uncle's farm had priority
over school. I had to participate in the production of the food we needed
to survive. I always wanted to become a scientist, but I also know much
about what it is to be a farmer.
What is the relevance of what I have said so far for becoming a researcher?
Primarily that I am convinced that it is very useful to be exposed to a
wide range of different ways of relating to the world. Also, I was
extremely fortunate in always being encouraged in my very diverse
interests, without anyone trying to interfere when I did not want it. The
adults were willing to listen when I wanted, and if not, they ended up in
some corner, having to listen anyhow.
I started at the University of Oslo in 1945, with computing in 1948,
programming around 1950, and with Operational Research (OR) in 1952. I got
my cand real. degree in Mathematics in 1956, having worked at the Norwegian
Defence Research Establishment (NDRE) since 1948. From 1956 on I had the
task of building up the use of OR in the Norwegian Defence. I was active
politically from 1945 on in the non-socialist but left-oriented party
"Venstre" ("The Left", corresponding to e.g. the left wing of the British
Liberals).
With this as background, I proceed to comment upon some aspects of my
scientific and political work.
THE RESEARCH PROCESS
Inspiration
The second part of my speech will relate to the research process itself.
We teach students very little about the production of new knowledge, and
many believe that important new ideas somehow descend upon us through
"inspiration". It is true that you may get euphoric when something suddenly
is understood or created in your mind. I remember very, very clearly the
exact moment, around two o'clock in the night at the desk in the bedroom at
Nesodden, January 1967, when the concept of "inheritance" (or classes and
subclasses) had been created. I realised immediately that this was the
solution to a very important problem Ole-Johan Dahl and I had been
struggling with for months and weeks. I also realised that the solution
introduced for the first time in a programming language a strong and
flexible version of the notions of generalisation and specialisation, with
all the power embedded in those concepts. And sure enough, inheritance has
become a key concept in object oriented programming, and thus in
programming in general.
But was it created at that desk, at that moment? Yes and no. Yes, because
the idea was not there before two o'clock. No, because in my opinion it
could not have been created without all the previous weeks, with discussion
after discussion producing only half-baked solutions. Through that work
Ole-Johan and I had built up:
1. a large amount of information useful in blocking unpromising avenues=
,
2. understanding of what criteria a solution would have to satisfy,
3. visualisation of what the implementation problems would be,
4. families of mental models that could be used for analysis of ideas.
I am certain that Ole-Johan have similar experiences from other parts of
the SIMULA development.
There are many techniques for use in the production process, useful for
most researchers, but of course people are different. If you want to
achieve results, and do so throughout your career, you must continuously
try to improve your most important tools: yourself and your thinking
equipment. In my opinion you should always keep a sharp, watchful,
thoughtful and questioning eye on yourself. This attitude is somewhat risky
to expose openly, since it by most will be seen as a sign of an overdose of
egocentricity. The danger is, of course, that this interpretation after a
while may hold much truth. Despite this, I feel that it is more dangerous
not to observe closely and reflect critically upon ones own way of working.
One example: The use of parallel processing. Most of you will have observed
that in a brainstorming session you arrive at a stage when your creativity
seems to have dried up. Then there is no point in continuing. You switch to
another issue, and leave it to the "background processing" in your brain to
work on the previous problem. Returning to that problem later, you will
very often find that you quickly solve some of the difficulties not
understood in the earlier session. Or you wake up at night with the
solution, as I am certain that many of you have done. I always note down
the new knowledge, but never have had the need to lean on the notes next
day. I remember. You should be conscious about such processes and exploit
this insight. I nearly always work on more than one major project at a
time. In this way I may create and explore more ideas in a number of
different fields, and I get a better use of the time resources by working
with several teams.
In a research team the function of the executioner is important. The
executioner in this context is a person (or persons) trying to kill ideas
that are not robust enough. In many teams a new idea is cherished, cuddled
and shielded so it may grow. Grow up to become a weak attenuated result or
finding, being alive only through the fierce protection by its parents. New
ideas should be confronted with the executioner, with cruel attacks, with
subtle attempts to prove them faulty or useless. Ideas surviving such a
fight are worth building upon.
But. There is a "but". How many of you read science fiction? Do you read
science fiction in order to become a better researcher? You should, and if
you get unnerved and irritated by the impossibility of what is described,
you should read on. You should read on and reverse your attitude: "If this
is the truth, what are the consequences? What has now become possible on
the next page?" The best science fiction employs the least amount of
gadgetry, and explores worlds resulting from one or two crucial factors
being different from what we are accustomed to. Ursula K. LeGuin's "The
Left Hand of Darkness" is the best illustration that I know of, but Isac
Asimov's "The Naked Sun" is perhaps more directly relevant to our field,
when we discuss the impact of networks.
When you are brainstorming, ideas may turn up that are interesting in some
respect, are fun, or are utterly different from those you have pursued till
now, but ideas that obviously are wrong, in the sense of being incorrect,
not corresponding with reality. A well behaved, realistic, no fuss-oriented
researcher will relegate such ideas to their proper place in the trash can,
and quickly so, to avoid throwing away important time.
The science fiction reader is better trained and will behave differently,
as described above: "If this is the truth, what are the consequences? What
has now become possible on the next page?" The idea must of course meet the
final test of correctness in the confrontation with the executioner, but
only after having been played around with. "It is not correct, but how
could we modify it to become correct, and still keep its usefulness?" The
willingness of keeping your mind open in such processes is an important
asset in a research team.
Teams, Conflicts and Criticism
Most of the work that I have done that people seem to regard as useful, has
been made in teams. I work best in teams, and I have tuned my research
production processes to the setting of the team.
Many people have observed that the research teams in which I have been
active, usually have contained people much younger than me. I have been
asked if that is so because I prefer to work with young people. The answer
is no. I prefer to work with people who believe that my newest ideas are
worth while working on, and themselves have ideas that fit in. Older, more
established people usually did not believe that, and don't. There are
exceptions, like the people in the BETA team. In the EU battle I was
working in many teams, most teams composed by people from a wide age
bracket. In research it has been different, as I have told.
Team work is a social process, in which career interests, conflicts and
prestige frequently may be elements. You may feel more comfortable for a
while by denying this postulate, but you will be better off by assuming the
postulate as a matter of course. If this is done, you may arrive at well
considered behaviour in conflict situations. Usually your response should
aim at keeping the team in good shape. There is much to be said, but in
this brief, one hour version of my speech, I will confine my remarks to the
following points.
=46irst, if you are a man, which in research from a statistical point of vie=
w
is highly likely, then learn from most women that it is better to confront
and solve conflicts immediately along the road, as they turn up. Don't do
what men usually do: wipe conflicts under the carpet, and get the big
explosion later. The female behaviour is more tiresome in the short run,
but more safe in the long run.
Secondly, a main contribution to reducing the effects of conflicts is to
dissociate your prestige from silly factors like seniority, rank,
faultlessness, etc. And as you grow older, show in practice that you listen
to criticism, all criticism, and also from younger people, and adapt to it
visibly when you think it is right.
It is often said that criticism is worth its weight in gold, but then it
must be a positive, constructive criticism. My own experience is on this
point completely unambiguous: Nearly all criticism that I in retrospect can
see that I really learned from, I felt as negative and destructive, and as
deeply unjust, when I got it.
When a new member joins a team, or you get a new student to tutor, you must
immediately find out how she/he reacts to criticism. It is obvious that
criticism may hurt, may be regarded as unjust, or outright invalid. The
person criticised may well be right in these reactions. However, if the
person then becomes secluded, angry, vengeful or stubborn, you (and the
team) have a problem that must be remedied. The person must carefully and
gradually, but inevitably be exposed to a treatment that will harden
her/him to the life conditions in a successful team. Those who cannot
endure this process, should not work in teams.
Both the sender and the receiver ought to have the basic attitude that
criticism first and foremost should be useful, not just or correct. You
should use it as a resource, and be happy that you may consider it within
the team. If your work is really interesting, you will receive plenty of
criticism to handle anyway after your results have been published.
Solutions Are Always Related to Objectives
Informatics (ZCubes) and Operational Research (planning research,
OR) emerged as sciences in the wake of the last world war. For me
informatics and OR have always been closely related, and I tend to see many
tasks in informatics from the perspective of OR. I left OR in the
mid-1960s, however, mainly because the OR community in my opinion became
too obsessed with optimisation and too little with decision support, and
because it failed to realise that a thorough knowledge and mastery of the
computer is a necessary part of competence in OR.
A main and, at the time, largely undebated assumption in the development of
the post-war culture was that "technological progress happens, it is
politically neutral - and good!". (The concern about atomic weapons was one
of the exceptions.) In Operational Research, however, the situation was
somewhat different: The task was to find the best use of men and equipment,
dependent upon a stated set of objectives. If the objectives were modified,
the "best use" changed. Also, the development of new equipment had to be
fine tuned to a proper understanding of the objectives of the
decision-makers. And those objectives could be highly political,
particularly in the military field. The application of OR techniques to
conflicts between interest groups within organisations was an idea dear to
an OR researcher.
RESPONSIBILITY
The Role of Science in Decision-Making
The Norwegian Defence Research Establishment was the cradle of both
informatics and operational research in Norway. I had the fortune of
arriving there in 1948, and was the first assistant of Jan V. Garwick, the
founding father of Norwegian informatics. He was brilliant in programming
and applied mathematics. He also to some extent was interested in
observations and facts, since he needed them as input to his calculations.
To experiment, collect and evaluate observations, to "get inside" the
systems analysed, however, he thought was boring. In the defence, we had
the officers to do such tasks for him, in his opinion. This attitude
resulted in some surprising results, and contributed to the NDRE decision
to ask me to switch from computing to OR in 1952.
My ambition was to build up OR as an experimental and theoretical science
in Norway. In 1956 I was asked to build OR groups both for the Army and for
the Air Force. I wanted our groups to be reckoned as being among the top
groups in the world in three to five years, and selected jobs and job
strategies accordingly. That was risky, but I said openly that if we did
not succeed, that would be no tragedy. It only meant that another mediocre
group did not make it.
In 1960 The International Federation of Operational Research Societies
asked the Norwegian OR Society (which I chaired) to arrange the third
international OR conference in Oslo in 1963. I think most people regarded
that as strong evidence of international recognition. The strategy had
turned out to be successful. I tried it later, at the Norwegian Computing
Center, and it worked out once more. This time I gradually was forced to
realise that I could expose myself to the perils and rewards of such a
strategy, but that I did not have the right to put my younger team members'
professional career at stake. Since then I have become much more careful to
create research strategies that are more safe, but still ambitious.
Our OR success created an unexpected conflict. I wanted OR to be a science
and our work to be research, providing support for decisions made by those
having the responsibility for the activities we analysed. I discovered that
many in the military establishment were only too happy to have the
researchers point out "the correct solution" to some of the hot issues, and
that my Director at the NDRE was even more happy to see a development that
gave more power to his institute. I tried to counter this by being very
careful in pointing out which conclusions could be validly drawn from our
work and also the factors that we had not taken into account. I felt that
unless we did, both OR as a scientific activity and the decision structure
in the defence would be undermined.
The military people appreciated this attitude after some clarifying
discussions. The conflict with the Director developed further. He wanted to
introduce a variant of OR that we today would label "OR Light", named at
the time "systems analysis", staffed with people that I felt did not share
my views on responsibility structures and validation of results. One such
study I saw at the time contained a table from which you could read that
under the assumption of 30 bombers attacking Oslo, and a given strength of
the missile defence, 32 bombers out of the 30 would be shot down.
I did not want my groups to join this new department. The director wanted
that. I did not give in. He did not give in, and he was the boss. As a
consequence I left the NDRE in 1960 to build up the Norwegian Computing
Center as a research institute in computing and OR. My six best researchers
followed me, leaving a very big bang and a not very pleased director. The
director, by the way, was very influential within the power elite in the
Norwegian military-industrial research complex.
The conflict also made me aware of corresponding problems in keeping
democratic control in the planning processes in Norwegian politics, both at
the local and at the national level. As a result, a debate was initiated
among planners about our professional role, and I once more went into party
politics. At the time when SIMULA was finished, I was the chair of my
party's Strategy Committee. Soon after I became a member of the 5-person
leader group of the party whose parliamentary group then participated in
the Norwegian coalition government.
Object-Oriented Programming
The building up of the Norwegian Computing Center went on as planned. I
started developing the SIMULA language, and Ole-Johan Dahl joined me. That
development and the history of object-oriented programming are described
elsewhere. The main problem in introducing advanced information technology
in Norway was, however, that we did not possess a very large and modern
computer. We were forced to order an excellent medium-sized Danish
computer, named GIER, which would secure that Norway would stay in the
second division among nations in relations to information technology for
many years to come.
In May 1962 UNIVAC invited ca. 100 European computer people to the US to
have a look at the new UNIVAC 1107 computer and some other models. We had
bought a computer, so instead I brought with me the first version of SIMULA
to sell to UNIVAC. The outcome of the tour was that UNIVAC offered the one
1107 computer it had set aside for a show stand in Europe to the Norwegian
Computing Center, at a 50% discount, on the assumption that SIMULA would be
made available on the 1107 computer, according to a software contract. When
I returned from the US and told this, people thought that my megalomania
had taken a turn for much worse.
However, in August 1963 (after rather dramatic conflicts) we got the UNIVAC
1107 to the Norwegian Computing Center, at the time by far the most
powerful computer in Northern Europe. (Only the German Secret Service had a
more powerful machine in Europe.) We had very important industries and
institutions as customers. SIMULA was ready in January 1965, and Norway
made its "long jump forward" in the use of information technology. These
are the kind of results that give you many enemies. Power structures had
changed, important people had lost battles, other people had become more
powerful. As for myself, I was at the end of the fight overworked, had to
have three months leave of absence to recover, and had lost a considerable
amount of money in terms of expenses incurred that the NCC board on
beforehand had promised to reimburse, but never did.
SIMULA had full support within the Norwegian Computing Center and in its
board, and almost nowhere else in Norway. What was wrong? Four main points:
1. There would be no use for such a language as SIMULA.
2. There would be use, but it had been done before.
3. Our ideas were not good enough, and we lacked in general the compete=
nce
needed to embark upon such a project, which for these reasons never
would be completed.
4. Work of this nature should be done in countries with large resources=
,
and not in small and unimportant countries like Norway.
Being Engulfed in the Research Jungle
=46rom 1963 on I was very unpopular in the research-industrial power elite
and the research bureaucracy. I believe I must keep the Norwegian record in
number of refused research applications. I have a number of interesting
anecdotes to tell in this area. And when I occasionally got funds, it could
be the result of arm-twisting, e.g. when I was subject to treatment these
people did not want exposed. A main problem within the modern research
administrative structures, public or private, is that their decision-making
is semi-secret. They are not obliged to defend their decisions openly, but
the system is wide open to the spreading of rumours about those not
supported. All the results I have participated in producing that today are
regarded as reasonably useful, have been achieved against the wishes of the
people in power. The top research administrator even called our largest
(and conservative) newspaper at the time and warned them against
criticising the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, because
"that would give support to Kristen Nygaard and the left extremists at the
Norwegian Computing Center". The journalist, however, exploded with anger
and never since got a call from the director. But you may be sure that many
other calls were made.
Some people believe that scientists lead a noble life, aloof and relieved
from conflicts, escaping annoying decisions, only guided by the quest for
new discoveries and truths, so different from the tumultuous and hazardous
existence of a businessman. Other people, like myself, would rather state
that being engulfed in the research and development jungle, one is
sometimes longing for the peace and safety of the marketplace.
May be I am conveying to you an impression of my life as depressing,
entangled in endless conflicts, suffering from lack of recognition. This is
not the truth. Very much of the time was spent in doing research, the most
exciting activity there is. When I think back upon those years, what I
first remember are the ideas and the solutions coming to us, the
understanding created, the excitement, the friendship and the cooperation
in the teams. In order to prepare you for the research jungle, however, I
have to tell you about the conflicts. Without being alert, without ability
to fight and dedication to the task, you are not likely to achieve much.
Particularly if your work contributes to changing important thinking
patterns and power structures in your field.
Why Are Pioneering Project Proposals Turned Down?
Why are so many projects among those that in the end produce really
significant results, turned down by review boards, even when the review
board bears no grudges against the research people applying? I think the
explanation is very simple, and does not necessarily imply that the
reviewers are stupid or in other ways incompetent.
Review boards may be qualified for evaluating proposals that are well
within the current framework of a science. Proposals for projects that, if
successful, will change or importantly extend the existing framework,
probably will not be understood by the review board. (Lack of review board
understanding cannot be used as a criterion for support, sadly enough,
since many crazy proposals also will satisfy that criterion.) If a proposal
is well understood, this is a strong indication that the new insights
produced by the projects are mainly extensions within the earlier known
framework. There is no remedy for this kind of situation, except to greatly
reduce the funding of projects after reviews by evaluation boards, and to
increase the amount of money to be used by research institutions according
to their own internal fuzzy decision procedures. May be more useless
projects will get support that way. On the other hand, it will improve the
chances for support of really new ideas. And that is an important
consideration for a country's research.
This being said, I can tell that I have some almost incredible horror
stories about third and fourth rate review boards members. Why this state
of affairs? One must understand that first rate people prefer to use their
time on producing new research results.
Research administrators, industrialists and reviewers in Norway are similar
to their counterpart in USA in one respect. In the US, these people will
reason: "The project ideas in this proposal are originated in USA. This is
a strong argument for giving support." In Norway, people will reason the
same way. Verbatim.
Are You Responsible for the Uses of Your Own Research?
When the first version of SIMULA (SIMULA I), was made available in the
spring of 1965, it was immediately used in a series of jobs in Norway and,
even more, in Sweden. It was of course fascinating to see the tool we had
developed being put to practical use and influencing the design of
organisations and production facilities.
It was evident that the SIMULA-based analyses were going to have a strong
influence on the working conditions of the employees: job content, work
intensity and rhythm, social cooperation patterns were typical examples.
The impacts clearly tended to be negative. Not surprising, since the
analyses were founded upon a Tayloristic view of management.
My own sympathies were with the employees, and the question was
unavoidable: Should I continue to support the propagation of a tool that to
a large extent was used against those I wanted to show my solidarity?
As I have told, it was not at all a new experience for me that research had
implications in politics. But these had mainly been consequences from one
world into another, relating to commonly hailed democratic ideals. I was
active in the research world and in the political world, but they were
separate.
Now matters were different: The demand I had to make was that analyses
should be made as in Operational Research. The "best use" of labour and
equipment ought to be evaluated both from the objectives of management and
from the objectives of the employees, taking into account that these
objectives normally were at least partially conflicting. The alternative
"best" solutions should then, in my opinion, be communicated to both
management and labour.
I realised of course that this demand would not be accepted by the users
controlling the resources for the applications of SIMULA in business and
production planning. When I tried to state my views to representatives for
the employers, I was not taken seriously, as expected. The question then
became: Could more realistic alternatives be created?
(IRIS 19 Conference Opening Speech, Part 2)
(Manuscript to be published in
The Scandinavian Journal of Information Systems, Vol. 8.2, 1996)
THE IRON AND METAL PROJECT
Trade Union Contacts.
Politically, the end of the 1960s were quite eventful for me. I started
doubting my engagement in traditional party politics, and left the Liberal
Party when I realised that I had become a socialist. I was the chair of the
committee on environment problems within the Norwegian Association for the
Protection of Nature for a couple of years, and I worked closely with
socially outcast alcoholics in an alternative institution experiment. Both
tasks showed me other realities, very different from those I had known
before.
=46rom 1967 on I became a member of a Trade Union discussion group on
information technology. It is interesting to note that a large fraction of
the young trade unionists in the group since became top leaders of the
Norwegian trade unions.
The group members came from a wide range of sectors in the society: Job
shops, chemical plants, transportation, white collar work, hotels and
restaurants, the public sector. I was the only researcher in the group and
had for that reason special functions in our work. But the other members
had their own areas of competence, equally important for the task.
We first discussed possible consequences of the imminent introduction of
information technology in various sectors, then how we should build up our
own competence. We never considered building that competence by teaching to
union members the curriculum used by programmers, engineers or managers.
Knowledge is organised for a purpose and reflects the world view of the
authors in terms of corporate values, power structures, objectives to be
achieved etc. Uncritical acceptance of such material would make us
brainwash ourselves. What we needed was a re-examination of information
technology based upon the world view of the union members, emphasising
solidarity, industrial democracy, safe employment, safe working conditions,
decent wages etc.
The Project Is Established
Since no such exposition of information technology did exist, we concluded
that it was a research task to produce one. In Norway the Royal Norwegian
Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (now a part of the Norwegian
Research Council) was supporting a wide range of projects in information
technology, and the Norwegian Iron and Metal Workers' Union decided on its
convention in 1970 to apply for money to "evaluate planning, control and
data processing, based upon the perspective of organised labour" and to ask
the Norwegian Computing Center (where I was working) to carry out the
project.
This was the first project application of its kind to the Research Council.
It was handed over to its Committee for the Mechanical Industry which, no
surprise, had its offices in the building of the association of the
employers in that industry. Their responses, internal discussions and
attempts at getting control of the project have recently been published in
a research report. They are interesting, but the end result was that the
Iron and Metal Workers' Union got the funding and the Norwegian Computing
Center got the contract.
The Iron and Metal Project turned out to be very different from other
projects. Not only did the shift from a managerial to a labour perspective
generate a range of new observations and insights, even the basic criteria
for achievement had to be reconsidered.
Associated with the project were four local unions at four companies,
distributed over the country. They were intended to function as reference
fora, sources for information and criticism. The group at the Norwegian
Computing Center consisted of two researchers (Olav Terje Bergo and
myself), and we had a very active and helpful contact person in the
national union offices (Jan Balstad) acting as our most important advisor.
The Meaning of the Term "Result"
In our first plan for the project we intended to examine the planning
systems being used in the four companies, interview the local union
members about what they wanted (and did not want) from the systems. Then we
would examine the possibilities for modifications of the systems to make
them conform better to union objectives. From this we wanted to extract
guidelines both for system design and for trade union policies relating to
new systems.
During the summer 1971 I felt more and more uneasy about this plan, but I
could not spot what was wrong. Gradually it dawned upon me that our
strategy would produce some reports about systems, and two researchers who
had knowledge on behalf of the union members. The reports and the knowledge
would not be linked directly to the action possibilities of the local
unions, and no action strategy would be developed and tested by the unions
themselves. No comprehensive learning process was incorporated, and the
interviews would be of limited value when no serious knowledge had been
built among the members.
The reorientation was painful, but eventually we chose to tell the steering
committee that we had to completely change the project plan. I hope that
similar choices will not turn up too often in the future.
The key decision was the acceptance of the following statement:
"In most research projects the results of the project may be said to be
what is written in the project reports. In this project another definition
will be applied: We will regard as results actions carried out by the trade
unions, at the local and national levels, as a part of or triggered off by
the project."
The statement was even, at the insistence of the researchers, made subject
to vote and passed unanimously.
The immediate consequence was that the local unions got a new and pivotal
role. The task was to create knowledge-building processes locally, and to
initiate action relating to the local situation, supported by analyses made
by the researchers and working groups of local union members and elected
shop stewards. The researchers became consultants and participants in a
mutual learning process.
Each of the four local unions formed working groups. Approximately 30
members participated at each site, split into groups of 6-8 members. Each
local union selected tasks they wanted done, and the results of their work
appeared in reports, to a large extent also written by the unionists. The
reports were presented at meetings with the rest of the members, and
important decisions were subjected to ordinary decision-making procedures.
One of the unions made a "Company Policy Action Program", concentrating
upon the planning of work within the union itself. Another made a
comprehensive study of a production control information system, and
succeeded in modifying the system in a number of important ways. The other
two unions also produced interesting results, according to the above
definition.
The main result of the project was a self-sustaining process which did not
depend upon the presence of external researchers and project money. In 1975
an agreement (the "Data Agreement") was signed between the Trade Union
Congress (corresponding to e.g. AFL/CIO) and the National Federation of
Employers, stating the right for the trade unions to be informed and
participate in the development and introduction of computer-based system
impacting upon their working conditions. They got the right to elect
specialised shop stewards ("data shop stewards") to work with information
technology issues.
The "Conflict Strategy"
=46or me the project was a part of a wider, more far-reaching strategy for
building up trade union power in Norwegian industry. I wanted the unions to
place themselves in conflict situations, by carefully selected actions,
that demanded more insight and improved strategies. This should trigger of
new actions, and so on. The main objective was to enter a spiral of moves,
each move increasing the insight and the power of the workers.
I used the term "conflict strategy". That was used by the conservatives in
the unions, telling everyone that Kristen Nygaard wanted to launch series
of wildcat strikes around the country. I quickly had to rename the strategy
to "action strategy".
By the beginning of the 1980s, the situation in the unions changed,
however. The important consideration became to keep the jobs, not to
improve them. And associated with this, other issues became in my opinion
more urgent politically.
After the Project
After the Iron and Metal Project it became important to make what had been
understood about the system development process and the societal
implications of information technology a part of academic teaching and
research on information systems. As a part of that process I ended up as a
university professor (there were additional reasons) working in teams with
students - many now colleagues - trying to build up an alternative
curriculum in system development. Including insight from the social
sciences was an important part.
I also decided that I would have to stay active both in traditional
informatics (the BETA programming language) and in system development, and
also acquire and keep updated "hands-on" familiarity with important new
developments (workstation hardware and software). If I succeeded, everyone
would have to admit that we at least had some real qualifications. (In
addition all three areas are great fun.) Or, more seriously: My work in
languages could be used to legitimise our work on system development. This
may sound silly, and perhaps it is. But it has worked.
Conflicts and the Iris Audience
How many basic choices were really made during these years, from 1958 to
1988? How many were difficult? When I try to remember, I feel that most
choices were consequences, and that those remaining seldom were difficult.
I had been careful to burn bridges behind me. As a result, few options for
retreats were available - a remarkably good strategy for keeping yourself
in shape under pressure.
And the pressures will be there if you try to go against the power
structures. You have to build a defence and a self defence. A defence
against others trying to stop you or destroy you as a researcher. My wife
was in 1963 told by people in power that they were opening up a most
interesting and rewarding position for me in the US. She got very angry,
since she knew that the completion of the SIMULA work was my main concern.
You also need a self defence against yourself and the temptations to choose
a comfortable but wrong way out in critical situations. But compromises may
be necessary. The greatest danger then is not the acceptance of a dubious
compromise, but in not being cynical and honest about it. Your mental
processes will try to justify your actions to yourself, making the
compromise the desired solution. And you will change yourself, if you are
not very honest and astute.
Bo Dahlbom asked me to talk about the Iron and Metal project. Why? Many
people do not know it properly, he said. And some have forgotten those
aspect that ought to disturb them as their environment is pushing them
softly - to the right. Perhaps I should ask some questions to those in the
audience who believe that they have been influenced by that project and its
successors:
Has anyone resented the content of your work recently? If not, what is your
excuse?
Have you had any real conflict in your research activities lately, or does
such conflicts only belong to your now romanticised, glorious radical past?
Will your recent research to any extent increase the power to influence
their own fate for people with whom you feel solidarity?
I am afraid that I personally have to answer "No" to these questions. My
excuse is that I have been engaged in other, political activities that in
my opinion to a very large extent have produced these desired results.
I could go on, but since this is a friendly occasion, I only want you to
get the gist of what kind of questions ought to be asked. And demonstrate
to my pupils and colleagues that I still am able to be rude. (Being an
optimist, I assume that you realised that I was rude a few moments ago.)
THE FUTURE
Is the Information Gap Widening?
A very frequently repeated warning, even from rather establishment oriented
people is that the gap between the "information rich" and the "information
poor" is widening, and that this makes the situation for the latter even
more gloomy. How should this gap be bridged? Ambitious plans are discussed
to educate the "information poor". I think these plans mostly are an excuse
for not addressing the real problem: the deplorable and increasing poverty
of an increasing percentage of the population. Poor people need more food,
well paid jobs at sensible working hours, improved health services, in
short: a better living. These resources must be taken first from the rich
and the criminals, who must be made much less rich in order to reduce their
power in the society, but mostly from people in the middle income brackets,
who must be willing to reduce their present excessive consumption. Given
improved living condition, "information poor" people will start building
the surplus that later will give them resources to become "information
rich".
The Environment
We use the term sustainable development for a development that may go on
without depleting the resources of the world for future generations and
that is not destroying the ecological balance, neither locally or on the
global scale. Or rather, we used the term that way many years ago. Now the
politicians have decided that the definition is dangerous, because it is
correct. When applied, it tells us that even the promises of the
politicians will not bring us much closer to sustainable societies, and the
policies the politicians practice even much less.
Thus, the definition has been doctored. Instead they talk (in the
Maastricht Treaty) about "a sustainable and non-inflationary growth that
pays respect to the environment". Even the notion of sustainable growth,
not development, is (in the Maastricht Treaty) made contingent upon price
stability. This is very, very different from sustainable development. Why
is this done? Because we, the voters want something we realise is necessary
for survival. Our politicians want to be reelected, and at the same time do
not believe that we really are willing to pay the high costs for what we
say we want. They feel that it is necessary to make us believe that we may
get both growth and sustainability in order to get our votes. The sad point
is that they may be right.
In the developing countries no such deceptions are even attempted. The
poverty is so appalling and the demand for a decent living so pressing that
ecological considerations are not understood by voters, unless it relates
to changes in production structures that may benefit large groups.
We now see the effects of globalisation in many ways, e.g. through species
(including diseases) crossing boundaries. The effects of a ruthless
capitalistic agro-industry, with the use of food cosmetics and, soon, large
scale genetic manipulation of organisms, all creates new, poorly understood
but possibly very serious health risks for entire populations. At the same
time fertile soil is taken out of production or is rendered infertile.
In addition we have the effects of aggressive nationalism, ruthless
multinational capitalism and the rapid expansion of large scale organised
crime infiltrating also the hitherto non-criminal sectors of business.
These are the real problems of the future. We know it, and we all know that
we are not addressing these problems, except in uncommitted terms.
=46or this reason, the EU battle did consume all my political efforts for si=
x
years. I stopped working with the trade unions on industrial democracy and
my research in system development (but not in languages) because the EU
battle was more important, also for trade union members, and because I, as
the leader of "No to EU", could do something to secure a victory.
Looking forward, we have of course to maintain the operation and routine
expansion of our current economies and societies. But this is only
postponing the day when no further delay is possible, if we will survive as
a civilised species. There is a very real chance that we will not make
choices that may save us.
The most important consideration now, when deciding upon where to invest
one's political energy, is to contribute to the saving of a civilised world
for the next generations.
Very serious such catastrophes have already happened, with Rwanda and
Bosnia as grim examples. And we are not even generating and examining
seriously scenarios that may become a nightmarish reality any year. How
would we handle three successive years' very low wheat harvests in the
world? What about a major nuclear reactor disaster in France, making food
produced in Western Central Europe impossible to eat? What about major
social upheavals in Germany, France and Belgium caused by reductions in
living standards, resulting from government attempts to enforce the
so-called convergence criteria on the economy, necessary to introduce the
Economic and Monetary Union?
What Next?
I am seventy years old in seventeen days. During the EU battle I had to
work even harder than at any time earlier in my life. I did not check my
health during these six years, for obvious reasons. My doctor is puzzled,
because he afterwards did not find any significant damages. I intend to
work until I become senile, and even longer, since I hope that my
colleagues will have the decency not to tell me when I have arrived at that
stage.
What should the remaining years be used for?
I am now assembling a reasonably powerful multimedia workstation, and I am
busy teaching myself multimedia technology. I feel that it is necessary in
order not to get outdated. It is fun, and I may link it to one of my main
hobbies: photography.
In straight forward research in informatics, I will work on some language
ideas that originally date from the late seventies and early eighties. They
are supplemented with ideas that I came up with in projects in which I
unsuccessfully participated around 1990. There was no interest at that
time. They will be now be used together with other ideas from the members
of a new team being built at the Department of Informatics at the
University of Oslo. We have applied for research money, but since I believe
that the ideas are rather powerful, I do not think we will get any funding.
Which once more leaves me with the task of getting money from other
sources. And this is probably getting more and more difficult, since
funding agencies now have an additional argument for refusal: I am too old.
As you well know, the winners write the history. You may regard this
insight as resulting from observation of the past, or as an obligation
towards future generations. The latter interpretation implies that I have
write to the book about the EU battle in Norway. Consequently I am now very
busy at this task. Bo Dahlbom and Lars Mathiassen are rather inistent that
I should write a book about my own research when the first book is
finished.
Will I in the future return to the political aspects of system development,
in the sense of the content of the Iron and Metal Project? Only if I find a
way of relating this activity to what I just have labelled "the real
problems of the future". Just now I may feel that I have all the time I
need ahead of me. But I have at least become old enough to be very careful
with the use of my time. I know that certain tasks must be finished and
thus have priority.
Some Words on Politics - at the End of the Conference
Some people misunderstand the nature of the political content of system
development. I remember a lecture about the Iron and Metal Project, around
1974, for a group of very promising and very career-oriented executives in
their mid-thirties. The atmosphere was reeking of hostility, and I got the
question: "Does not what you have done belong in politics rather than in
science?". "This question may be answered with "Yes" or with "No"," I said.
"If you regard what you have learnt at the Norwegian Institute of
Technology in Trondheim and the Norwegian School of Business Administration
in Bergen as belonging to politics, then what I have told you also belong
to politics, and the answer is "Yes". If you do regard what you have learnt
there as science and not politics, then what we have done also belong to
science, and the answer is "No". Please pick the answer you want." I must
admit that the answer was not appreciated.
People feeling at home in the IRIS environment do not need to share
political views. They may be socialists, believers in the benefits of the
market forces, or people in intermediate positions. We share the insight,
however, that information systems will impact upon the interests of people
affected. We agree that the evaluation of the impacts will depend upon the
evaluators' perspectives on the system and its context. These perspectives
may differ considerably, e.g. between management and labour. Also, the
perspectives entered into the development process may significantly
influence the properties of the finished system.
We also agree that a choice of perspective or perspectives to be entered is
a necessary and legitimate part of any system development process. The
choice of a management perspective is, e.g., from a scientific point of
view, just as legitimate as the choice of a labour perspective, and vice
versa. Consequently, the agenda of system development research must include
the creation and the evaluation of methods for system development,
including tools, techniques and methods of organisation, based on a range
of different relevant perspectives.
To deny these points of view we regard as unscientific.
Our own political views or the views of the organisation for which we are
working may also legitimately influence our own research agenda and the
methods we prefer to use. It is important to be aware of the perspectives
one has chosen in a given situation or project. One should also be open
about them. The scientific standards for evaluation of research results
will, however, be independent of the perspectives used in the research. The
IRIS community should have no problems in accommodating researchers coming
from more conventional management oriented environments, as long as the
newcomers accept and adapt to what I have said just now.
The IRIS community has its roots in the trade union-related Scandinavian
projects, starting with the Iron and Metal Project in 1971-73.
Participatory Design (PD) has as a result been at the centre of interest
for many researchers in our community. The agenda and conditions for
revitalisation of PD and related research is now being discussed. That is
an important discussion. My hope is that such a discussion will consider a
wider range of concerns than those addressed at the inception of PD around
1970.
Music in the Air
IRIS 19 is finished. The Scandinavian School has convened. It has,
sometimes reluctantly but often boldly, considered the Future, and it has
paid tribute to its Past. The Past is delighted by all the warm words from
the Present and by the friendly reception by the Future, that is by all the
young people at the conference.
Sounds from hit tunes of the past have been hanging in the air. Claudio
Ciborra mentioned "Those were the days", and we all understood the allusion
to primeval times, when the Scandinavian school was born in famous battles
now remembered with awe and nostalgia. Myself, I felt the conference
humming "Hello Kristen, welcome back Kristen, it is good to have you back
where you belong". As the conference gained pace, criticism got more
pointed and suggestions more constructive, a feeling of optimism caught
momentum. And now, listening, we seem to hear people in our near future
singing happily "Heroic times are here again".
___________________________________________________________________
Professor Kristen Nygaard,Institutt for informatikk,
Universitetet i Oslo(Department of Informatics, University of Oslo)
Gaustadall=E9en 23. Postboks 1080 Blindern,0316 Oslo, Norway
Tel.(Work): +47-22.85.24.32 . Fax (Work): +47-22.85.24.01
E-mail: kristen @ ifi.uio.no
Home: Niels Juels gt. 6A, 0272 Oslo, Norway
Tel.(Home): +47-22.43.19.01 . Fax (Home): +47-22.43.19.01
__________________________________________________________________=20