All Our Publications by ISI

A curated index of ISI’s public work—foundational papers, frameworks, and institute updates on governance failure, system drift, accountability, and decision-making under stress.

All Publications

This page brings together the Institute for Systems Integrity’s published work — papers, frameworks, and updates examining how systems behave under pressure and how integrity erodes through governance and design.

We publish selectively, focusing on decision-making, accountability, and system drift in complex institutional environments.

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Featured / Foundations

Foundation Article#1

Latest Publication:

The Systems Integrity Toolkit — Phase I
Why most integrity failures are not visible in time — and how systems allow harm to accumulate before anyone intervenes

Foundation Toolkit #1

This paper introduces the Systems Integrity Toolkit — Phase I, a governance architecture that consolidates ISI’s foundational research into a practical framework for identifying integrity risk before outcomes harden, showing how system stress, decision degradation, governance mediation, and failure dynamics interact long before harm becomes visible.

Most systems don’t fail because they can’t see the problem.
They fail because they can’t change the things they’ve learned to protect.

As a companion to the Systems Integrity Toolkit — Phase I, this paper examines why integrity risks persist even after they become visible. It explores systemic refusal — the quiet protection of certain variables from change — and shows how governance under pressure can stabilise harm rather than correct it. Together, the Toolkit and this analysis describe a familiar condition in complex organisations: clarity without permission to change.

The Failure Taxonomy: How Harm Emerges Without Malice - Why most disasters are not caused by bad people — but by predictable system drift

Foundations Article #4

This paper introduces the Failure Taxonomy — a structural model showing how harm accumulates in complex systems through drift, signal loss, and accountability inversion, without anyone intending it.

The ISI Pause Principle explains why governance fails when reaction replaces reflection. Under pressure, systems that remove space between signal and response degrade judgment, suppress warning signs, and invert accountability. Pause is not a leadership trait — it is a governance control condition.

Integrity is a System Property. Why outcomes reflect design, not intent

Foundations Article #3

Integrity is often treated as a personal trait. This paper shows why it is better understood as a system property — shaped by how authority, accountability, and information are aligned under stress, and why outcomes reflect design rather than intent.

When the Constitution Becomes a Weapon
How governance drift turns compliance into a liability under system stress

This paper examines how constitutions, delegations, and oversight structures can remain legally intact while drifting out of alignment with real decision-making, allowing compliance to persist even as governance control erodes.

Why Oversight Fails Under Pressure

How system stress distorts visibility, weakens governance, and produces predictable outcomes

Foundations Article #2

When Resilience Appears, Governance Has Already Failed. Why frontline heroics are a warning signal — not a success story

A companion paper to Why Oversight Fails Under Pressure examining how human resilience conceals system failure.

Frameworks

The Pause Principle | Governance Control Condition – ISI

A governance framework explaining how the loss of pause accelerates failure under pressure — and why calm must be designed into systems, not demanded of individuals.

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