ABSTRACT
The transition (i.e., deployment) of the Solution-System (i.e., product of the project) into the Context-System, into its intended operational environment creates challenges in terms of its impact both on the business/operational environment and on the broader environment. While the project is intended to deliver beneficial changes to the operational environment, it is understood from the Systems Thinking (ST) perspective that such a project might cause (unintended) negative impacts on adjacent environments.
Chapter 3 submits that the unintended impacts of System Deployment on the operational and broader environments are particularly manifest in large-scale infrastructure projects (e.g., pollution, destruction of species and ecologies, exacerbation of social ills). Such adverse (albeit unintended) impacts could only be ignored (in large projects) at the peril of the unsuspecting public to whom the “burden” of detrimental effects will be shifted. Many examples of LIPs in Europe and Africa attest to this sad reality. Hence, their business case ought to reflect any negative socio-economic externalities.
