BCSSS

International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics

2nd Edition, as published by Charles François 2004 Presented by the Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science Vienna for public access.

About

The International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics was first edited and published by the system scientist Charles François in 1997. The online version that is provided here was based on the 2nd edition in 2004. It was uploaded and gifted to the center by ASC president Michael Lissack in 2019; the BCSSS purchased the rights for the re-publication of this volume in 200?. In 2018, the original editor expressed his wish to pass on the stewardship over the maintenance and further development of the encyclopedia to the Bertalanffy Center. In the future, the BCSSS seeks to further develop the encyclopedia by open collaboration within the systems sciences. Until the center has found and been able to implement an adequate technical solution for this, the static website is made accessible for the benefit of public scholarship and education.

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W Y Z

EMANCIPATORY SYSTEMS APPROACH 1)2)4)

M. JACKSON writes: "The concept of emancipation is a much contested one in systems thinking, as it is in social theory more generally. There are arguments about whether we should be seeking human emancipation, or individual emancipation or, indeed, whether nonhuman elements such as other species or the environment should be considered as well… "(2000, p. 291)

After describing a number of versions of the emancipatory concept, Jackson adds: "All emancipatory systems approach are suspicious of the current social order and seek to radically reform it. They see society as presently constituted, as benefiting some groups at the expense of other groups, which are suffering domination or discrimination".

And "Usually the process of emancipating he oppressed can also be seen to have benefits for the oppressors in the new social order"(Ibid)

This is of course a trend universally verified in the whole history of humanity.

Jackson proceeds thereafter, presenting various proposals, among them:

- Habermas' critical systems approach

- Interpretive systemology

- Freire's critical psychology

- MacIntyre and the moral community

- Capra's ecological sustainability

Most of these proposals, save possibly Capra's are quite weak in their deeper (i.e. not merely ideological, descriptive or mechanistic) description of the domination process in whatever culture or Society of the past or the present.

Jackson's conclusion- at least provisional- is that "Emancipatory thinkers may be inviting the oppressed simply to enter into new relations of domination"(Ibid, p. 309)

Having stated what "should" be done- namely to "emancipate" - it would be necessary first to make clearer what is meant exactly by "emancipation "and secondly, what should be efficient and practical ways to reach such a desirable state.

Assumptional analysis; Action theory; Awareness; Dominance; Frankfurt School; Search conferences; Social systems theory and design; Sociality; Sociobiology; Sociogenesis; Sociognosis; Sociolysis; Sociotechnical system

Categories

  • 1) General information
  • 2) Methodology or model
  • 3) Epistemology, ontology and semantics
  • 4) Human sciences
  • 5) Discipline oriented

Publisher

Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science(2020).

To cite this page, please use the following information:

Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science (2020). Title of the entry. In Charles François (Ed.), International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics (2). Retrieved from www.systemspedia.org/[full/url]


We thank the following partners for making the open access of this volume possible: