Systemic principles of value co-creation: Synergetics of value and service ecosystems

While most investigations of value and value co-creation empirically focus on either the individual micro-level or the collective macro-level, a systemic perspective asserts that investigations at one level, in isolation from the other, are incomplete. Based on synergetics and its core principles of emergence and enslavement (consensualization), we argue that value is a systemic property (i.e. an order parameter) that emerges from micro–macro links in service ecosystems. We propose a framework that begins to unravel the complexity of value co-creation and the dynamics of service ecosystem evolution. We introduce nine systemic principles of value co-creation: critical distance, stability, amplification, internal determination, nonlinearity and feedback, phase transitions, symmetry-breaking, limited predictability, and historical dependence. Based on these, we outline future research opportunities in three areas: the moralization of markets, an acceleration of societal dynamics, and the increasing embeddedness of service in society.