Complexity theory and change management in sport organizations

This paper employs complexity theory and the principle of emergence as a construct to explain some forms of change observed during the analysis of research concerning change in Australian sport organizations. Although a consortium of well-established theories proved advantageous in revealing the nature of change attempts within a sample of eight case organizations, some changes remained inexplicable. Upon further investigation, these changes were observed to have properties associated with emergence. Several examples are presented to explicate the emergent behavior. This paper presents evidence to suggest that complexity theory has utility as an alternative perspective explaining certain types of organizational change.