ABSTRACT
Chaos theory offers nonlinear models and ways of mapping them. Chaotic attractors, the butterfly attractor being the most prominent, are bounded, but internally, trajectories are unpredictable. This chapter reviews some criminology literature and hypothesizes some key dimensions at play. It presents alternative, more postmodernist ways of conceptualizing dynamic systems. The chapter explains the phase space of the “simple” swinging pendulum with frictional and non-frictional forces at play. It provides two examples, one dealing with D. Matza’s theory of delinquency and “drift,” the other as to how a cultural revolutionary may be a catalyst in the generation of a new discourse, a replacement discourse that counters hegemonic practices. It analyses the key “control parameter,” the dominant factor at play in having an effect on some phenomena under investigation. Complexity analysis necessitates the development of better conceptual tools than are currently being offered by the modernist sciences.
