Systems Thinking
Purchase
Description
Key critiques of the leading writers allow the researcher to understand how and why paradigm breaks took place, and to grasp the extraordinary diversification of systems theory and practice we see today.
Systems Thinking will be an essential reference for all libraries of business, management and organization studies.
International Advisory Board
Peter Allen, Cranfield University, UK
Bela H Banathy, Saybrook Institute, USA & International Systems Institute, USA
Kenneth Bausch, Institute for 21st Century Agoras, USA
Richard Bawden, Michigan State University, USA
Søren Brier, Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University, Denmark
David Campbell, Tavistock Clinic, UK
Fritjof Capra, Center for Ecoliteracy, USA
Peter Checkland, Lancaster University, UK
José Córdoba, University of Hull, UK
Peter Corning, Institute for the Study of Complex Systems, USA
Donald de Raadt, Luleå University, Sweden
Eric Dent, University of Maryland, University College, USA
Peter Dudley, Integra Management Systems Ltd., UK
Robert Flood, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
Joyce Fortune, Open University, UK
Wojciech Gasparski, Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland
Wendy Gregory, University of Hull, UK
Jifa Gu, JAIST, Japan & Institute of Systems Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Enrique Herrscher, IDEA, Argentina
Kristo Ivanov, Umea University, Sweden
Mike Jackson, University of Hull, UK
James Kay, University of Waterloo, Canada
Lisl Klein, Bayswater Institute, UK
George Klir, Binghampton University, USA
Ervin Laszlo, Club of Budapest, Hungary
Harold Linstone, Portland State University, USA
Sid Luckett, University of Natal, South Africa
Gianfranco Minati, Italian Systems Society, Italy
John Mingers, Warwick University, UK
Heiner M ller Merbach, Universität Kaiserslautern, Germany
P N Murthy, Tata Consultancy Services, India
Yoshiteru Nakamori, Japan Advanced Institute for Science and Technology (JAIST), Japan
Harold Nelson, Advance Design Institute, Seattle, USA
Roger Packham, University of Western Sydney, Australia
Yong Pil Rhee, Seoul National University, South Korea
Kurt Richardson, Institute for the Study of Coherence and Emergence, USA
Fenton Robb, Independent Author, UK
Ricardo Rodríguez-Ulloa, Instituto Andino de Sistemas, Peru
Simanta Roy-Chowdhury, Barnet, Enfield and Harringay NHS Trust & University of East London, UK
John Sterman, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
Sytse Strijbos, Free University of Amsterdam, Netherlands
Stuart Umpleby, George Washington University, USA
John Van Gigch, California State University, USA
John Warfield, George Mason University, USA
Jennifer Wilby, The University of York, UK
Eric Wolstenholme, Cognitus Ltd., UK
Maurice Yolles, Liverpool John Moores University, UK
Contents
VOLUME ONE: GENERAL SYSTEMS THEORY, CYBERNETICS AND COMPLEXITY
- The Historical Necessity and Scientific Feasibility of Tektology
- General System Theory
- General Systems Theory
- The Skeleton of Science
- Definition of a System
- On the Concept of a System
- General Systems and Holism
- Systems Philosophy
- A Perspective on Systems Science and Systems Philosophy
- Explaining Emergence
- Towards an Ontology of Levels
- Living Systems
- Basic Concepts
- The Future of General Systems Research
- Obstacles, Potentials and Case Studies
- Cybernetics
- A Mathematical Theory of Communication
- Requisite, Variety and Its Implications for the Control of Complex Systems
- Form, Substance and Difference
- Science and Complexity
- The Architecture of Complexity
- Exploring Complexity
- Complex Adaptive Systems
VOLUME TWO: SYSTEMS THEORIES AND MODELLING
- Evolutionary Universals in Society
- Toward a Theory of Schizophrenia
- Emergent Attractors and the Law of Maximum Entropy Production
- Foundations to a Theory of General Evolution
- Self-Organization, Transformity and Information
- Gaia
- Counterintuitive Behavior of Social Systems
- Rationality in the Analysis of Behavioral Simulation Models
- Beyond the Limits
- An Executive Summary
- General Systems Theory
- Applications for Organization and Management
- The Systems Approach
- Three-Dimensional Morphology of Systems Engineering
- The Context, Nature and Use of Systems Analysis
- The Viable System Model
- Its Provenance, Development, Methodology and Pathology
- Characteristics of Socio-Technical Systems
- The Formal System Paradigm for Studying Failures
- Engineers as Analysts of Social Systems
- A Critical Enquiry
- Systems Theory as an Ideology
- Cybernetics and Organization Theory
- Epistemology or Technique?
- Dynamic Models of Evolving Systems
VOLUME THREE: SECOND ORDER CYBERNETICS, SYSTEMIC THERAPY AND SOFT SYSTEMS THINKING
- The Cybernetics of Cybernetics
- Reconstructing the Concept of Knowledge
- Reality
- The Search for Objectivity or the Quest for a Compelling Argument
- The Autopoiesis of Social Systems
- The Roots of Reductionism
- A Counter-Ontoepistemology for a Systems Approach
- The Self-Referential Structure of an Everyday-Living Situation
- A Phenomenological Ontology for Interpretive Systemology
- Paradoxes, Double Binds and Reflexive Loops
- An Alternative Theoretical Perspective
- Hypothesizing - Circularity - Neutrality
- Three Guidelines for the Conductor of the Session
- A Constructivist Position for Family Therapy
- Human Systems as Linguistic Systems
- Preliminary and Evolving Ideas about the Implications for Clinical Theory
- Human Systems are Different
- Operations Research as a Profession
- Assumptional Analysis
- A Methodology for Strategic Problem Solving
- Structural Thinking
- Organizing Complexity through Disciplined Activity
- Resurrecting the Future of Operational Research
- From Optimizing to Learning
- A Development of Systems Thinking for the 1990s
- The Leader's New Work
- Building Learning Organizations
- Learning in and about Complex Systems
- Group Model Building
- Tackling Messy Problems
- The VSM
- An Ongoing Conversation
VOLUME FOUR: CRITICAL SYSTEMS THINKING AND SYSTEMIC PERSPECTIVES ON ETHICS, POWER AND PLURALISM
- Towards an Appropriate Social Theory for Applied Systems Thinking
- Critical Theory and Soft Systems Methodology
- Critical Heuristics of Social Systems Design
- The Theory and Practice of Boundary Critique
- Developing Housing Services for Older People
- A Methodological Comparison of the Science, Systems and Metasystems Paradigms
- Towards a System of Systems Methodologies
- The Origins and Nature of Critical Systems Thinking
- Total Systems Intervention
- A Practical Face to Critical Systems Thinking
- What is this Thing called CST?
- Discordant Pluralism
- A New Strategy for Critical Systems Thinking
- Inquiry and Intervention in Systems Planning
- Probing Methodological Rationalities
- The Habermas\Luhmann Debate and Subsequent Habermasian Perspectives on Systems Theory
- Valuing the Epistemic in the Search for Betterment
- The Nature and Role of Critical Learning Systems
- Multi-Modal Systems Design
- A Concern for the Issues that Matter
- Towards Synergy in Multiperspective Management
- An American-Chinese Case
- Multimethodology
- Towards a Framework for Mixing Methodologies
- Interventive Interviewing
- Intending to Ask Lineal, Circular, Strategic, or Reflexive Questions?
- Theorizing about Power
- Intersecting the Ideas of Foucault with the `Problem' of Power in Family Therapy
- Love and Violence
- Gender Paradoxes in Volatile Attachments
Description
Key critiques of the leading writers allow the researcher to understand how and why paradigm breaks took place, and to grasp the extraordinary diversification of systems theory and practice we see today.
Systems Thinking will be an essential reference for all libraries of business, management and organization studies.
International Advisory Board
Peter Allen, Cranfield University, UK
Bela H Banathy, Saybrook Institute, USA & International Systems Institute, USA
Kenneth Bausch, Institute for 21st Century Agoras, USA
Richard Bawden, Michigan State University, USA
Søren Brier, Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University, Denmark
David Campbell, Tavistock Clinic, UK
Fritjof Capra, Center for Ecoliteracy, USA
Peter Checkland, Lancaster University, UK
José Córdoba, University of Hull, UK
Peter Corning, Institute for the Study of Complex Systems, USA
Donald de Raadt, Luleå University, Sweden
Eric Dent, University of Maryland, University College, USA
Peter Dudley, Integra Management Systems Ltd., UK
Robert Flood, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
Joyce Fortune, Open University, UK
Wojciech Gasparski, Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland
Wendy Gregory, University of Hull, UK
Jifa Gu, JAIST, Japan & Institute of Systems Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Enrique Herrscher, IDEA, Argentina
Kristo Ivanov, Umea University, Sweden
Mike Jackson, University of Hull, UK
James Kay, University of Waterloo, Canada
Lisl Klein, Bayswater Institute, UK
George Klir, Binghampton University, USA
Ervin Laszlo, Club of Budapest, Hungary
Harold Linstone, Portland State University, USA
Sid Luckett, University of Natal, South Africa
Gianfranco Minati, Italian Systems Society, Italy
John Mingers, Warwick University, UK
Heiner M ller Merbach, Universität Kaiserslautern, Germany
P N Murthy, Tata Consultancy Services, India
Yoshiteru Nakamori, Japan Advanced Institute for Science and Technology (JAIST), Japan
Harold Nelson, Advance Design Institute, Seattle, USA
Roger Packham, University of Western Sydney, Australia
Yong Pil Rhee, Seoul National University, South Korea
Kurt Richardson, Institute for the Study of Coherence and Emergence, USA
Fenton Robb, Independent Author, UK
Ricardo Rodríguez-Ulloa, Instituto Andino de Sistemas, Peru
Simanta Roy-Chowdhury, Barnet, Enfield and Harringay NHS Trust & University of East London, UK
John Sterman, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
Sytse Strijbos, Free University of Amsterdam, Netherlands
Stuart Umpleby, George Washington University, USA
John Van Gigch, California State University, USA
John Warfield, George Mason University, USA
Jennifer Wilby, The University of York, UK
Eric Wolstenholme, Cognitus Ltd., UK
Maurice Yolles, Liverpool John Moores University, UK
Contents
VOLUME ONE: GENERAL SYSTEMS THEORY, CYBERNETICS AND COMPLEXITY
- The Historical Necessity and Scientific Feasibility of Tektology
- General System Theory
- General Systems Theory
- The Skeleton of Science
- Definition of a System
- On the Concept of a System
- General Systems and Holism
- Systems Philosophy
- A Perspective on Systems Science and Systems Philosophy
- Explaining Emergence
- Towards an Ontology of Levels
- Living Systems
- Basic Concepts
- The Future of General Systems Research
- Obstacles, Potentials and Case Studies
- Cybernetics
- A Mathematical Theory of Communication
- Requisite, Variety and Its Implications for the Control of Complex Systems
- Form, Substance and Difference
- Science and Complexity
- The Architecture of Complexity
- Exploring Complexity
- Complex Adaptive Systems
VOLUME TWO: SYSTEMS THEORIES AND MODELLING
- Evolutionary Universals in Society
- Toward a Theory of Schizophrenia
- Emergent Attractors and the Law of Maximum Entropy Production
- Foundations to a Theory of General Evolution
- Self-Organization, Transformity and Information
- Gaia
- Counterintuitive Behavior of Social Systems
- Rationality in the Analysis of Behavioral Simulation Models
- Beyond the Limits
- An Executive Summary
- General Systems Theory
- Applications for Organization and Management
- The Systems Approach
- Three-Dimensional Morphology of Systems Engineering
- The Context, Nature and Use of Systems Analysis
- The Viable System Model
- Its Provenance, Development, Methodology and Pathology
- Characteristics of Socio-Technical Systems
- The Formal System Paradigm for Studying Failures
- Engineers as Analysts of Social Systems
- A Critical Enquiry
- Systems Theory as an Ideology
- Cybernetics and Organization Theory
- Epistemology or Technique?
- Dynamic Models of Evolving Systems
VOLUME THREE: SECOND ORDER CYBERNETICS, SYSTEMIC THERAPY AND SOFT SYSTEMS THINKING
- The Cybernetics of Cybernetics
- Reconstructing the Concept of Knowledge
- Reality
- The Search for Objectivity or the Quest for a Compelling Argument
- The Autopoiesis of Social Systems
- The Roots of Reductionism
- A Counter-Ontoepistemology for a Systems Approach
- The Self-Referential Structure of an Everyday-Living Situation
- A Phenomenological Ontology for Interpretive Systemology
- Paradoxes, Double Binds and Reflexive Loops
- An Alternative Theoretical Perspective
- Hypothesizing - Circularity - Neutrality
- Three Guidelines for the Conductor of the Session
- A Constructivist Position for Family Therapy
- Human Systems as Linguistic Systems
- Preliminary and Evolving Ideas about the Implications for Clinical Theory
- Human Systems are Different
- Operations Research as a Profession
- Assumptional Analysis
- A Methodology for Strategic Problem Solving
- Structural Thinking
- Organizing Complexity through Disciplined Activity
- Resurrecting the Future of Operational Research
- From Optimizing to Learning
- A Development of Systems Thinking for the 1990s
- The Leader's New Work
- Building Learning Organizations
- Learning in and about Complex Systems
- Group Model Building
- Tackling Messy Problems
- The VSM
- An Ongoing Conversation
VOLUME FOUR: CRITICAL SYSTEMS THINKING AND SYSTEMIC PERSPECTIVES ON ETHICS, POWER AND PLURALISM
- Towards an Appropriate Social Theory for Applied Systems Thinking
- Critical Theory and Soft Systems Methodology
- Critical Heuristics of Social Systems Design
- The Theory and Practice of Boundary Critique
- Developing Housing Services for Older People
- A Methodological Comparison of the Science, Systems and Metasystems Paradigms
- Towards a System of Systems Methodologies
- The Origins and Nature of Critical Systems Thinking
- Total Systems Intervention
- A Practical Face to Critical Systems Thinking
- What is this Thing called CST?
- Discordant Pluralism
- A New Strategy for Critical Systems Thinking
- Inquiry and Intervention in Systems Planning
- Probing Methodological Rationalities
- The Habermas\Luhmann Debate and Subsequent Habermasian Perspectives on Systems Theory
- Valuing the Epistemic in the Search for Betterment
- The Nature and Role of Critical Learning Systems
- Multi-Modal Systems Design
- A Concern for the Issues that Matter
- Towards Synergy in Multiperspective Management
- An American-Chinese Case
- Multimethodology
- Towards a Framework for Mixing Methodologies
- Interventive Interviewing
- Intending to Ask Lineal, Circular, Strategic, or Reflexive Questions?
- Theorizing about Power
- Intersecting the Ideas of Foucault with the `Problem' of Power in Family Therapy
- Love and Violence
- Gender Paradoxes in Volatile Attachments
February 2003 | 1492 pages | Sage UK
| Format | Published Date | ISBN | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hardcover | 31/03/2026 | 9780761949596 | $1307.00 |
Key critiques of the leading writers allow the researcher to understand how and why paradigm breaks took place, and to grasp the extraordinary diversification of systems theory and practice we see today.
Systems Thinking will be an essential reference for all libraries of business, management and organization studies.
International Advisory Board
Peter Allen, Cranfield University, UK
Bela H Banathy, Saybrook Institute, USA & International Systems Institute, USA
Kenneth Bausch, Institute for 21st Century Agoras, USA
Richard Bawden, Michigan State University, USA
Søren Brier, Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University, Denmark
David Campbell, Tavistock Clinic, UK
Fritjof Capra, Center for Ecoliteracy, USA
Peter Checkland, Lancaster University, UK
José Córdoba, University of Hull, UK
Peter Corning, Institute for the Study of Complex Systems, USA
Donald de Raadt, Luleå University, Sweden
Eric Dent, University of Maryland, University College, USA
Peter Dudley, Integra Management Systems Ltd., UK
Robert Flood, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
Joyce Fortune, Open University, UK
Wojciech Gasparski, Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland
Wendy Gregory, University of Hull, UK
Jifa Gu, JAIST, Japan & Institute of Systems Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Enrique Herrscher, IDEA, Argentina
Kristo Ivanov, Umea University, Sweden
Mike Jackson, University of Hull, UK
James Kay, University of Waterloo, Canada
Lisl Klein, Bayswater Institute, UK
George Klir, Binghampton University, USA
Ervin Laszlo, Club of Budapest, Hungary
Harold Linstone, Portland State University, USA
Sid Luckett, University of Natal, South Africa
Gianfranco Minati, Italian Systems Society, Italy
John Mingers, Warwick University, UK
Heiner M ller Merbach, Universität Kaiserslautern, Germany
P N Murthy, Tata Consultancy Services, India
Yoshiteru Nakamori, Japan Advanced Institute for Science and Technology (JAIST), Japan
Harold Nelson, Advance Design Institute, Seattle, USA
Roger Packham, University of Western Sydney, Australia
Yong Pil Rhee, Seoul National University, South Korea
Kurt Richardson, Institute for the Study of Coherence and Emergence, USA
Fenton Robb, Independent Author, UK
Ricardo Rodríguez-Ulloa, Instituto Andino de Sistemas, Peru
Simanta Roy-Chowdhury, Barnet, Enfield and Harringay NHS Trust & University of East London, UK
John Sterman, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
Sytse Strijbos, Free University of Amsterdam, Netherlands
Stuart Umpleby, George Washington University, USA
John Van Gigch, California State University, USA
John Warfield, George Mason University, USA
Jennifer Wilby, The University of York, UK
Eric Wolstenholme, Cognitus Ltd., UK
Maurice Yolles, Liverpool John Moores University, UK
Table Of Contents:
- VOLUME ONE: GENERAL SYSTEMS THEORY, CYBERNETICS AND COMPLEXITY
- The Historical Necessity and Scientific Feasibility of Tektology
- General System Theory
- General Systems Theory
- The Skeleton of Science
- Definition of a System
- On the Concept of a System
- General Systems and Holism
- Systems Philosophy
- A Perspective on Systems Science and Systems Philosophy
- Explaining Emergence
- Towards an Ontology of Levels
- Living Systems
- Basic Concepts
- The Future of General Systems Research
- Obstacles, Potentials and Case Studies
- Cybernetics
- A Mathematical Theory of Communication
- Requisite, Variety and Its Implications for the Control of Complex Systems
- Form, Substance and Difference
- Science and Complexity
- The Architecture of Complexity
- Exploring Complexity
- Complex Adaptive Systems
- VOLUME TWO: SYSTEMS THEORIES AND MODELLING
- Evolutionary Universals in Society
- Toward a Theory of Schizophrenia
- Emergent Attractors and the Law of Maximum Entropy Production
- Foundations to a Theory of General Evolution
- Self-Organization, Transformity and Information
- Gaia
- Counterintuitive Behavior of Social Systems
- Rationality in the Analysis of Behavioral Simulation Models
- Beyond the Limits
- An Executive Summary
- General Systems Theory
- Applications for Organization and Management
- The Systems Approach
- Three-Dimensional Morphology of Systems Engineering
- The Context, Nature and Use of Systems Analysis
- The Viable System Model
- Its Provenance, Development, Methodology and Pathology
- Characteristics of Socio-Technical Systems
- The Formal System Paradigm for Studying Failures
- Engineers as Analysts of Social Systems
- A Critical Enquiry
- Systems Theory as an Ideology
- Cybernetics and Organization Theory
- Epistemology or Technique?
- Dynamic Models of Evolving Systems
- VOLUME THREE: SECOND ORDER CYBERNETICS, SYSTEMIC THERAPY AND SOFT SYSTEMS THINKING
- The Cybernetics of Cybernetics
- Reconstructing the Concept of Knowledge
- Reality
- The Search for Objectivity or the Quest for a Compelling Argument
- The Autopoiesis of Social Systems
- The Roots of Reductionism
- A Counter-Ontoepistemology for a Systems Approach
- The Self-Referential Structure of an Everyday-Living Situation
- A Phenomenological Ontology for Interpretive Systemology
- Paradoxes, Double Binds and Reflexive Loops
- An Alternative Theoretical Perspective
- Hypothesizing - Circularity - Neutrality
- Three Guidelines for the Conductor of the Session
- A Constructivist Position for Family Therapy
- Human Systems as Linguistic Systems
- Preliminary and Evolving Ideas about the Implications for Clinical Theory
- Human Systems are Different
- Operations Research as a Profession
- Assumptional Analysis
- A Methodology for Strategic Problem Solving
- Structural Thinking
- Organizing Complexity through Disciplined Activity
- Resurrecting the Future of Operational Research
- From Optimizing to Learning
- A Development of Systems Thinking for the 1990s
- The Leader's New Work
- Building Learning Organizations
- Learning in and about Complex Systems
- Group Model Building
- Tackling Messy Problems
- The VSM
- An Ongoing Conversation
- VOLUME FOUR: CRITICAL SYSTEMS THINKING AND SYSTEMIC PERSPECTIVES ON ETHICS, POWER AND PLURALISM
- Towards an Appropriate Social Theory for Applied Systems Thinking
- Critical Theory and Soft Systems Methodology
- Critical Heuristics of Social Systems Design
- The Theory and Practice of Boundary Critique
- Developing Housing Services for Older People
- A Methodological Comparison of the Science, Systems and Metasystems Paradigms
- Towards a System of Systems Methodologies
- The Origins and Nature of Critical Systems Thinking
- Total Systems Intervention
- A Practical Face to Critical Systems Thinking
- What is this Thing called CST?
- Discordant Pluralism
- A New Strategy for Critical Systems Thinking
- Inquiry and Intervention in Systems Planning
- Probing Methodological Rationalities
- The Habermas\Luhmann Debate and Subsequent Habermasian Perspectives on Systems Theory
- Valuing the Epistemic in the Search for Betterment
- The Nature and Role of Critical Learning Systems
- Multi-Modal Systems Design
- A Concern for the Issues that Matter
- Towards Synergy in Multiperspective Management
- An American-Chinese Case
- Multimethodology
- Towards a Framework for Mixing Methodologies
- Interventive Interviewing
- Intending to Ask Lineal, Circular, Strategic, or Reflexive Questions?
- Theorizing about Power
- Intersecting the Ideas of Foucault with the `Problem' of Power in Family Therapy
- Love and Violence
- Gender Paradoxes in Volatile Attachments