MODELING AND SUPPORTING TASK-ORIENTED GROUP PROCESSES - PURPOSEFUL COMPLEX ADAPTIVE SYSTEMS AND EVOLUTIONARY SYSTEMS-DESIGN

Evolutionary Systems Design (ESD) is a universal general problem solvi ng, formal modeling, design framework for purposeful complex adaptive systems (PCAS) and processes, i.e., task-oriented group processes. The se processes constitute policy making, group decision, negotiation, an d multiagent problem solving with human and/or artificial agents. ESD is also a framework for computer group support systems (GSS) that supp ort these processes. The ESD general framework can be applied to defin e and solve specific problems. In this article the ESD framework is pr esented and illustrated by example. The article provides background fo r ESD computer implementations discussed in two other related articles (Lewis and Shakun 1996; Bui and Shakun 1996).