3.3 Distributed Collective Activity
3.3.3 Levels of Collaborative Activity
Activity theory provides useful concepts for analyzing different levels of a col-lective activity, according to the status of the activity’s objective, i.e. whether it is common to the participants or not, or whether it is stable within the activity, or subject for change and development. These levels help us distin-guish different types of collaboration. I change terminology from collective to collaborative activity here, in order to underline that collaboration does not always need to have a common objective, which often is implicit assumed
in the term collective activity.
Following Fichtner (1984), Engestr¨om (1987), Engestr¨om et al. (1997), and Raeithel(l996) we can identify a three level hierarchical structure of a col-laborative activity. These are labeled the co-ordinated, co-operative, and co-constructive level of activity, and correspond to the level of operation, action, and activity respectively.
Co-ordinated Activity:
The first and most rudimentary form of inter-subjective collaboration is called co-ordinated work activity:
“Individuals are gathered together to act upon a common object, but their individual actions are only externally related to each other. They still act as if separate individuals, each according to his individual task.” (Engestr¨om, 1987; p. 333)
In coordinated work the various actors are following their scripted roles, each concentrating on the successful performance of the assigned actions ac-cording to the conditions of work. The script is coded in written rules, in plans, in schedules or in tacitly assumed traditions and norms. These scripts coordinate the participants’ actions as if from behind their backs, without being questioned or discussed (Engestr¨om et al., 1997). In this sense the co-subjects are passive participants – not active subjects but “wheels in the organizational machinery” (Kuutti, 1994; p. 58). Co-ordination ensures that an activity is working in harmony with its surrounding activities. Charac-terizing the relationship among the activities as external means that each actor might actually be working together to achieve a common objective, e.g. treatment of a patient, butthey are not aware of this common objective of their activity. The subject (or the co-subject) only realizes the whole of the activity from the point of view of an individual activity. Hence, there is a subjective concealment of the common objective of the work and the individual actor performing his action does not see this action as part of a bigger picture.
Co-operative Activity:
Co-operation is a mode of interaction in which the actors focus on a common object and thus share the objective of the collective activity, instead of each focusing on performing their assigned actions and roles.
“The common aim resp. the common task are placed above the individual actions and their aims; they may only be attained in co-operation. [. . .] Each individual has to relate the over-individual task to the over-individual aim of the action and he has to maintain this relationship. With regard to the common task, he has to balance both actions and action results of his partner with his own actions and their results. In addition to this, he must influence actions and results of his partner if necessary, again with regard to the common task.” (Fichtner, 1984; p. 217)
In cooperative activity the object is stable and generally agreed upon. How-ever, the means for realizing the activity might not be present or known.
Such means are primarily the script revealing a distribution of the activity into several actions and actors, and the mediating artifacts. This does not mean that the artifact necessarily has to be constructed (fabricated) as such.
It merely means that an artifact is not recognized as a mediator in the ac-tion but merely exists as an object in the world. As a part of realizing a cooperative activity these means have to be established, i.e. finding an ap-propriate distribution of the activity and finding apap-propriate artifacts that can be turned into mediating tools.
The important difference between coordinated and cooperative work is the common objective, which enables the participants in the distributed activity to relate to each other and make corrective adjustment to own and other’s actions according to the overall objective of the collective activity. In this sense the participants are active subjects within the collaborative activity (Kuutti, 1994; p. 58). In a hospital, for example, the collaboration between the ward and the kitchen concerning the food for patients can take form as both coordinated as well as cooperative work. If the kitchen only responds to the requests from the ward, without taking into consideration the objec-tive of the health-care professionals of treating the patient, we talk about coordinated work activities. However, if the kitchen shares the objective of
treating the patient with the ward we talk about cooperative work. In the latter case, the kitchen can adjust their activity not only to the request but also according to this overall objective. Hence, if the ward orders the normal dinner for a patient with a cardiological illness and the kitchen knows that the menu is rather fat, the kitchen staff is able to make an ad hoc correction of the request or contact the ward to discuss whether this is a good diet according to the overall objective of treating the patient.
Such kind of ad hoc or situated adjustments have been subject to intense focus in the field of CSCW (c.f. Suchman, 1987) and are central within hospitals as well (Symon et al., 1996) [3, 4, 6]. However, any sensible form of situated and ad hoc adjustment of an activity needs to be done according to the overall objective of the activity – such as when the kitchen adjust the menu according to the treatment of the individual patient. In such cases, where many actors are involved in an activity, this means that these actors need to have this objective in common, if their individual situated actions are not to result in chaos. This insight has some fundamental implication for design of computer support for collaborative work activities.
Co-constructive Activity:
The third and final level of collaborative work is called co-construction fol-lowing Raeithel (1996). Engestr¨om (1987; Engestr¨om et al., 1997) calls this level reflective communication following Fichtner (1984) and writes:
“By reflective communication [i.e. co-constructive activity /jb]
we mean interactions in which the actors focus on reconceptual-izing their own organization and interaction in relation to their shared objects. Both the object and the script are reconceptual-ized, as is the interaction between the participants.” (Engestr¨om et al., 1997: 373).
At this level of collaborative activity the object of work is not stable – or is not even existing – and hence has to be collective constructed, i.e. co-constructed. The community asks questions like; “What is the meaning of this problem in the first place? Why are we trying to solve it – and who benefits from its solution? How did the problem emerge – who created it and
for what purpose? Is it relevant or has it become obsolete?” Transitions to the co-constructive level of collaboration are rare in the ongoing flow of daily work actions (Engestr¨om et al., 1997).
Attempts to re-organize and re-construct work typically take place on an or-ganizational level. For instance, by introducing the concept of “Patient Fo-cused Hospitals” (PFH) at the University Hospital, the patient treatment and care were being re-conceptualized from a rational administrative-economic model of patient treatment organized around separated departments to a more holistic and systemic oriented model of patient treatment organized around teams of healthcare professionals. External intervention from e.g.
action researchers or consultants can provide the platform for a development and co-construction of a working community by e.g. introducing new com-puter technology.
In the analysis of collaborative activities according to these three levels it must be emphasized that an activity cannot be said to exist on one level alone. The levels of co-ordinated, co-operative, and co-constructive activity areanalytical distinctions of thesamecollaborative activity. This means that an analysis of even the most routinized work, seemingly only realized as co-ordinated individual actions, must also be analyzed in terms of co-operation and co-construction. Hence, the routinized work has been constructed by someone at some point of time as a way to achieve an objective through collaboration. There are examples of work actions that seem totally without purpose and without any common objective – for instance, filling out forms in a bureaucracy. But this does not mean that the levels of co-operation and co-construction do not exist. It only means that the common objective and the means for work have achieved a tacit status within an organization. This also emphasizes the need for analyzing collaborative activities in a cultural-historical perspective in order to reveal its different components, and how the common objective, the means for work and the use of these means are established within a community over time.