Why Building Effective Networks Leads to Building Healthier Communities.

Transformation that leads to healthy communities is the result of many interactions and collaborations among many people. When different people from different sectors get together, entirely new solutions can and do arise. This phenomenon is what scientists refer to as emergence. According to Wikipedia, emergence is when complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions. Emergence is what can and does happen among networks and it is the diversity of interactions that are critical to doing so.

So what does a vibrant, effective community network that fosters emergence look like? Scientists, sociologists, mathematicians and management consultants have all discovered similar characteristics about networks whether they be made up of people in organizations, cells in a nervous system, molecules in protein interactions, or routers and servers on the internet.

1. They share common attributes, goals or governance.
2. There is a diversity of connections that are vital for maximizing innovation.
3. There are several communication paths in order to maintain uninterrupted information flow in case any single path goes down.
4. There are prominent 'roles' that are critical to the health of the network that help to keep everything moving/ flowing.
5. They are fast to facilitate indirect linkages.

Clay Shirky, new media guru, says that networks are the new 'institutions' except without all the baggage. In the past, when groups of people wanted to organize in order to do stuff, they had to build the infra-structure to do so (i.e. organizations with staff, offices, management, flow charts, rules, hierarchy etc.). But now, you can organize to do stuff apart from the limits of institutions via 'networks' whereby people coordinate to do stuff not because they have to, but because they want to and because they can be more effective at getting stuff done.

According to social theorist Jonathon Zittrain, the internet is a massive network that relies on kindness and trust. Random people everywhere conduct random acts of kindness everyday by simply passing information along. And according to collective intelligence theorist George Por, networks help build the capacity of human communities to evolve towards higher order complexity and harmony (a.k.a. emergence).

Finally, it's important to note that the most effective networks have active leaders who take responsibility for building the network. Without active leaders, networks emerge very slowly or not at all and can end up as small groups with like-minds, with little or no diversity and no possibility for new ideas and innovation.

In order to build healthier communities, networks need to be fostered and supported so that emergence can truly occur.