Abstract
Donella Meadows’ concept of leverage points - places in complex systems where small shifts may lead to fundamental changes in the system as a whole - is gaining attention for developing a 'leverage points perspective' on systems transformation. Distinguishing a 'system of interest' as well as identifying 'where' and 'how' to intervene for 'whom' are all matters of practical relevance which remain to be properly addressed. We contribute an inquiry protocol to identify opportunities for design actions aiming to trigger transformation in complex human systems. Our system of interest for empirical study is the informal trade ecosystem at the borderlands of the East African Community. We describe the rationale and logic for methodological development of an inquiry protocol which sequentially integrates contextual research and user inquiry with open-ended exploration at inception to identify and describe intervention points. This deepens a previously contributed study from the same project to DRS 2018.
Keywords
leverage points perspective, fuzzy front-end, inquiry protocol, informal economy
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.921
Citation
Bhan, N., and Rytilahti, P. (2026) The Fuzzy Front-End of Transformation: An Inquiry Protocol for Intervention Design, in Simeone, L., Gray, C. M., Verhoeven, A., de Götzen, A., Bakırlıoğlu, Y., Zohar, H., Stead, M., and Buwert, P. (eds.), DRS2026: Edinburgh, 8–12 June, Edinburgh, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.921
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Included in
The Fuzzy Front-End of Transformation: An Inquiry Protocol for Intervention Design
Donella Meadows’ concept of leverage points - places in complex systems where small shifts may lead to fundamental changes in the system as a whole - is gaining attention for developing a 'leverage points perspective' on systems transformation. Distinguishing a 'system of interest' as well as identifying 'where' and 'how' to intervene for 'whom' are all matters of practical relevance which remain to be properly addressed. We contribute an inquiry protocol to identify opportunities for design actions aiming to trigger transformation in complex human systems. Our system of interest for empirical study is the informal trade ecosystem at the borderlands of the East African Community. We describe the rationale and logic for methodological development of an inquiry protocol which sequentially integrates contextual research and user inquiry with open-ended exploration at inception to identify and describe intervention points. This deepens a previously contributed study from the same project to DRS 2018.