Andrea Pitasi

Bio: Andrea Pitasi is an academic researcher from University of Chieti-Pescara. The author has contributed to research in topics: Sociology of law & Global citizenship. The author has an hindex of 5, co-authored 36 publications receiving 122 citations. Previous affiliations of Andrea Pitasi include University of Bologna.

Reframing the Systemic Approach to Complex Organizations as Intangible Portfolios

Abstract: The aim of this paper is to pave the way towards the inclusion of mainstream sociological approaches (based on Luhmann’s approach) for the studies of firms-organizations. In social sciences we can observe that the theoretic consequences of a paradigm shift is significantly represented by the evolution of systemic thinking from Parsons to Luhmann. This shift implies the change from the vision of systemic organizations as "structures" to that of systemic organizations as "communication lows". The milestone of systemic approach in management maybe found in the research and applied works of Anthony Staford Beer with his Viable System Model (VSM) that today faced a relevant reconfiguration by Golinelli and the Italian school on Viable Systemic Approach (VSA). The paradigm shift in this field has been smoother than in sociology, and didn’t imply the discard of the concept of organization as a structure. This because, in management sciences, the perspective and, consequently, the subject of study is the organization and its structure. We think this paradigm shift is possible also in management sciences, if we consider the whole organization as a structured information low creating a dematerialized structure. Our research question is: “Is it possible to apply in business sciences the fundamental concepts that caused the paradigm shift in sociology?” To answer to this question we discuss about ontology of the irm and of the concept of value in order to understand to what extent intangible communication lows are called upon to be involved in a new definition of structure.

Hypercitizenship and the Management of Genetic Diversity: Sociology of Law and the Key Systemic Bifurcation between the Ring Singularity and the Neofeudal Age.

Abstract: This article is essentially theoretical and is focused on the allocative function of the legal systems to attract/reject different capitals according to their procedures to shape norms and laws. This function of the legal systems is pivotal in our times as humankind is facing a systemic and evolutionary bifurcation between the heideggerian Gegnet of a strategic, high speed convergence (i.e., Singularity) among robotics, informatics, nanotechnologies, and genetics (RINGs) — which will reshape human life in terms of its life quality styles and standards especially regarding health and environment matters, and the so-called Neofeudal Scenario (NS) supported by those for whom the Industrial Model failed and the only way to save humankind and its environment would be a kind return to a Medieval life style based on a slow pace of life and austerity. This article provides an overview of the most important and recent international references regarding the two alternatives of bifurcation and describes a potential paradigm shift inside the systemic approach to reframe the conceptual map of global change through a systemic epistemology of the sociology of law.

"Hyper citizenship" and the Evolution of a Global Identity

Abstract: The idea of the paper moves from the consideration of autonomous agents and global flows eventually converging by means of autopoietic systems. This work reframes the topic of the reconfiguration in the evolving social scenarios within Pitasi’s concept of HYPERCITIZENSHIP, sketched out by designing a muldimensional and multipolar convergence among different kinds of citizenship. With its four conceptual dimensions, Hypercitizenship, features the strategic attitude of those areas in which capitalism is turning into turbogenetic capitalism. Its main features are the following: Cosmopolitan, scientific, societarian and entrepreneurial. The Hypercitizenship concept is focused on the fact that communication about key challenges of our times is increasingly meaning communication and public understanding of science and technology for governance and policymaking on a global, glocal and cosmopolitan scale. From this point of view, law becomes one of the a la carte products to be bought by browsing a global "catalogue" (Mundus) surfing on a technological global platform (Globus) of which the internet is the best metaphor and which can be seen as the most important platform for convergence developments and as a driver of several, key, changes. This new media platform is cosmopolitan and glocal while the mass media often still fall into the methodological nationalism trap. Indeed, the emerging scenarios are more and more shaped by supranational (UN, EU, NAFTA) or multinational (Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s…) entities and by new localisms which cannot survive outside a global network. Thus, the emerging glocality is witnessing that the “national state” citizenship is too big -bureaucratically speaking-, but too small -in competitive terms-, to be strategic in the merging scenarios. Hence, the importance of a new conception of citizenship in the glocal age is rising, which

Legislative innovation. Towards a global law. Making process: the case of global citizenship policy modelling

Abstract: The main reference for twentieth century politics is the Nation-state, whose territory-citizens were the unique and only target of norm production. Furthermore, the function of norm production was commitment of public bodies, whose legitimacy – at least in democratic countries – depends on the ‘people’. i.e. the citizens that were the target of the law production itself. An important fact, is that national production of norms slowly shifted from the legislative to the executive power. Too many were the decisions to be made in a brief term, and too fast were people’s emotional reactions, to let this commitment to an impersonal and procedural institution like the legislative power. In a globalized world, things have changed under many aspects. The multiplicity of decisional levels, e.g.: on one side, supranational bodies and entity are more and more frequently assuming this function; furthermore, more and more frequently, national commitments have shifted towards more restricted levels, such as regi...

Designining Hypercitizenship Methodologically

Abstract: This paper is essentially epistemological and methodological and is aimed at designing the hyper-citizen methodological tool kit. It is not merely through an indicator based approach but also on a modelling based approach and a metatheoretical one (Stepanic et al., 2005: 858). Conceptually, it evolves by reframing the key global changes of our times under the emergence of hyper-citizenship from a multidimensional convergence among different kinds of citizenship (Pitasi, 2013; Pitasi-Angrisani , 2013): cosmopolitan (Beck, 2006), scientific (Nowotny, 2008), societarian (Donati, 1993), entrepreneurial (I evolved by reinterpreting Audretsch, 2007 who, properly, copes with the entrepreneurial society not the entrepreneurial citizenship). The four dimensions are shaped systemically (Luhmann, 1990, 1997) through a social free energy/social entropy coding (Stepanic et al., 2005: 860).

The knowledge-creating company : how Japanese companies create the dynamics of innovation

Abstract: How has Japan become a major economic power, a world leader in the automotive and electronics industries? What is the secret of their success? The consensus has been that, though the Japanese are not particularly innovative, they are exceptionally skilful at imitation, at improving products that already exist. But now two leading Japanese business experts, Ikujiro Nonaka and Hiro Takeuchi, turn this conventional wisdom on its head: Japanese firms are successful, they contend, precisely because they are innovative, because they create new knowledge and use it to produce successful products and technologies. Examining case studies drawn from such firms as Honda, Canon, Matsushita, NEC, 3M, GE, and the U.S. Marines, this book reveals how Japanese companies translate tacit to explicit knowledge and use it to produce new processes, products, and services.

The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined

Abstract: THE BETTER ANGELS OF OUR NATURE: WHY VIOLENCE HAS DECLINED. Steven Pinker, Penguin, New York, NY 2011. ISBN 978-0-670-02295-3.There's been a shooting in a Sikh Temple this morning. A lone gunman entered a Colorado theater and opened fire. Syrians are now engaged in civil war. Faced with daily news stories of death and destruction, it is easy to believe that things are getting worse. Not so, explains Harvard psychologist, Steven Pinker in his new work, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence has Declined.Pinker combines in-depth historical research with rigorous psychological research to argue the case for a decline in global violence. As Pinker aptly points out, many people look at our age as one of unprecedented violence and terror to be viewed with pessimism. Drawing on historical analysis, psychological research and findings from related sciences such as anthropology, sociology, and economics Pinker argues that the data paint a very different picture. In the first chapter, Pinker takes the reader on a quick journey through the history of the world pointing out that the ancient and medieval worlds were very different than the world we live in today. Numerous prehistoric skeletons bear evidence of very violent deaths. Ancient people destroyed entire tribes. Romans carried out violent executions. Medieval Knights led lies of violence and other Europeans meted out horrendous punishments for acts which might not even be judged worthy of condemnation in today's democracies. Finally, the early 20th century saw two World Wars before the long peace ensued. In light of that history, Pinker argues that perhaps we should reconsider our assumptions about our own world.In the first section of the book, Pinker identifies six historical trends which could have led to declines in violence. The first trend he calls the Pacification Process by which people gave up nomadic hunting and gathering lives for lives of agriculture in cities. Competition and anarchy in the prehistoric world made violence necessary for survival. The development of agriculture called for greater cooperation between individuals and the formation of governments to impose order created a world where violence was not always in one's best interest. Statistical analysis supports the idea that the emergence of states lead to a decline in violence. The second trend, the Civilizing Process, is an idea he developed from the work of Norbert Elias. In the late medieval and early modern periods, etiquette and social norms began to be important in social interactions, economics and technology began to advance, and governments began to become more centralized. This trend was also accompanied by a decline in violence. The third trend is the Humanitarian Revolution during which people began to increasingly find practices, such as torture, capital punishment, war and slavery, morally questionable. Empathy, compassion, and peace became important characteristics. The fourth trend is the Long Peace, which stems from the realization that since World War II no two major world powers have gone to war and, in spite of predictions to the contrary, nuclear weapons have never been used. …

The cosmopolitan vision

Abstract: Sociology was born as an attempt to delimit an object of investigation offered by society as a social reality. The ambition was that of “treating the social facts as things” (Durkheim) or of understanding and explaining the social relations by respecting an “axiological neutrality” (Max Weber). Today, however, we are in the presence of a new kind of sociologists, and they are by no means the less popular ones, who are not trying to avoid assessments in their analysis of the present social world. I have in mind especially two sociologists, Ulrich Beck (Munich) and David Held (London). I will discuss in particular the view of sociology presented in a recent book of Ulrich Beck (Macht und Gegenmacht im globalen Zeitalter, 2002, translated into French under the title Pouvoir et contre-pouvoir a l’ere de la mondialisation, 2003), and I will show some analogies between Beck and Held. Finally, I will try to identify the points hat make the present sociological epistemology different from that of the great founders of this science.