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

SOCIO-HISTORIC SYSTEM 4)

Any organized (i.e. structured and functional) human group whose duration supersedes the individual life of its members.

The socio-historic system is largely autopoietic: it remains constantly able to replenish its membership and to maintain its internal organization.

This model applies to tribes, countries, nations, enterprises, political parties, clubs, civic organizations, etc… J.G. MILLER's descriptions of groups, organizations and societies are very helpful to understand structures and functions in the socio-historic system.

The following quotes may apply to socio-historial systems. A. RAPOPORT and W.J. HORVATH wrote: "Quasi-biological functions are demonstrable in organizations. They maintain themselves: they sometimes reproduce or metastasize: they respond to stresses; they age and they die. Organizations have discernible anatomies and those at least which transform material inputs (like industries) have physiologies" (quoted by L.von BERTALANFFY from 1959, in 1962, p.18).

In the same quite more than analogic sense, G. VICKERS wrote: "Institutions grow, repair themselves, reproduce themselves, decay, dissolve" (1957, p.4).

Another important aspect of socio-historic systems is their evolutive succession and the progressive emergence of more complex ones. This could be considered the basic frame of the whole of human history.

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]


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