Sacred Headwaters #4: Introduction to Systems Thinking

Systems thinking is a way of viewing the world as it really is: a complex network of relationships where nothing exists in isolation.

Sacred Headwaters is a bi-weekly newsletter that aims to guide a co-learning process about the existential issues and planetary limitations facing humanity and about how we can reorient civilization in a way that will enable us to thrive for centuries to come. If you’re just joining us, consider checking out the first issue for some context and read through the other issues when you can. The newsletters are not strictly sequential, but this exploration is meant to build on knowledge and understanding over time. 

Sacred Headwaters #4: Introduction to Systems Thinking

Systems thinking is a holistic approach to understanding complex problems — and the world. Instead of trying to analyze the behavior of individual pieces by breaking a system apart into its smallest components — say, a protein; a single ant in a colony; a human; a corporation; or a species — we look at the whole system as a network where the relationships are as important as the components, and where the system — created by both the components and the relationships between them — has emergent properties that can’t be derived from the sum of the parts. The earth is a system. Human civilization is a system within that. Your body is a system, a network of human cells and components and non-human organisms all working together, receiving inputs from the environment and self-organizing within bounds. Those of you with an engineering background may be thinking at this point of system dynamics, the principles of modeling non-linear systems, but system dynamics is a subset of systems thinking, and the concept of numerically modeling complex systems with the goal of achieving deterministic conclusions about the system’s behavior is contrary to a truly systemic understanding, so I’d ask you to read on with an open mind.

In this newsletter, we’ll be learning the basics of systemic thinking and exploring why it is an important framework for thinking about human existence on earth, both from the perspective of understanding how humanity can live within the greater earth system without irreversibly disrupting thresholds and from the perspective of managing and evolving human culture and governance. A systemic view makes clear that these aren’t separate perspectives, but it’s important to clarify explicitly that the model of systems thinking applies just as much to the self-organization of human societies as it does to biophysical processes — and that in fact, the organization of human society is inherently intertwined with the biophysical processes within which it exists. If you’ve read the other newsletters so far, you’ll have seen elements of systemic thinking in much of the work we’ve looked at, and hopefully will have already realized its importance in pursuing a sustainable civilization.

An Introduction to Systems Thinking (10 minutes)

Note: this is a link to a book, but I’m only asking you to read pages 2-7 — the first part of the chapter, “An Introduction to Systems Thinking.”

This excerpt uses examples from sustainability and ecology to define systems thinking, introducing complexity, non-linearity, and the self-organizing nature of systems. Kay’s examples use technical terms, but are easy to understand even without knowing the difference between sclerophyllous and mesophytic vegetation. Systems thinking has its origins in biology (read past page 7 for more historical background), but the concepts underlying it transcend physical science and apply to all complex non-linear systems. The important concepts in this piece are, first: that a reductive analytic perspective cannot reveal the full behavior set of a non-linear system, and second: that systems are “self-organizing.” The latter concept is a bit harder to understand (and to explain), but fundamentally, it is captured by the idea that the internals of a system can change without being directed by the system’s environment (external input). Chapter 4 of the same book goes into a much deeper exploration of this concept (page 51).

Tools for Systems Thinkers: The 6 Fundamental Concepts of Systems Thinking (10 minutes)

This article identifies and explains some of the core concepts and terminology of systems thinking: interconnectedness, emergence, and feedback, among others. The concepts may seem obvious at first glance, but as you start to think about real world problems with these in mind, you’ll realize that many of our approaches to solving problems ignore the fundamental interconnectedness and complexity of the world. Instead, we tend to use a reductive mental model to identify incomplete causal relationships and attempt “solutions” without understanding the complete behavior of the system. Sustainability is a systemic problem and we need to think about it with that framework if we want to succeed.

An Interactive Introduction to Attractor Landscapes (5 minutes)

Traditional climate coverage talks a lot about tipping points and thresholds. “Climate emergency: world 'may have crossed tipping points;’” “UN Chief Warns of a Dangerous Tipping Point on Climate Change;” and so on. But what does it really mean? Tipping points are a systems concept that refer to how networks of feedback loops — and system organization — can change dramatically when one or more parameters or loops cross a certain threshold. Media coverage of climate change usually focuses on tipping points in arctic or antarctic ice mass (the Greenland ice sheet, etc.), permafrost melt, and Amazon deforestation, but there are many more embedded in the earth system. The planetary boundaries framework describes tipping points in a variety of systems all of which could have major impacts on human life.

Nicky Case’s linked interactive article provides an introduction to the concept of “attractor landscapes.” Attractor landscapes are a tool for describing the behavior of a system and its tipping points. Case’s game will help you grasp the dynamics of complex systems and feedback loops. The real world is (obviously) a network far more complex than the two-parameter system he visualizes, but the concept is important for understanding how systems work — and how they change.

Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System (45 minutes)

Note: the headline links to the HTML version of the article. It’s also available as a PDF here.

In this article, Donella (Dana) Meadows introduces the concept of systems leverage points — mechanisms for achieving system change — and attempts to classify them by effectiveness. Importantly, she contextualizes them throughout, discussing systems in a way that connects this abstract framework of thought directly with the human systems of governance and culture that define our experiences and lives. This way of thinking elucidates why certain types of actions tend to be insufficient for overcoming thresholds and achieving change — and why problems like climate change can’t be dealt with solely through “solutions” like a carbon tax or green energy subsidies. Meadows uses down-to-earth examples to demonstrate the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of each approach to systems change giving us a pragmatic way to think about what is needed to begin to move the needle on sustainability.

Meadows was an author of the 1972 Limits to Growth report. Even without the level of understanding of climate science that we have today, the authors predicted — through computer modeling of growth and resource depletion — that many metrics of modern civilization (i.e. life as we know it) would peak and begin a rapid decline over the course of the 21st century. We may end up spending an entire newsletter on this report later, but feel free to peruse it now.

Book Recommendation: The Systems View of Life, Fritjof Capra and Pier Luigi Luisi

I’ll just be up front here and say: this book is a textbook. So bear that in mind if you’re going to dive in. It’s a broad and in-depth introduction to systems thinking. It starts with a historic overview of the mechanistic and reductive perspectives that are pervasive in both our culture and our sciences, something similar to the historical analysis Raworth did in Doughnut Economics. It then dives into a deep exploration of the meaning of “life” from a biological perspective, deriving a definition for living systems through an exploration of microbiology, evolutionary theory, and cognitive science. The last few chapters bring the book’s mindset back to earth presenting a more practical way for analyzing humanity’s predicaments as systems problems — where the systems are both the earth system and the human system (within the earth system). Hopefully I don’t end up saying this too often, but: of the books I’ve recommended so far, I would recommend this one the most. It’s a long read, but it will give you new perspectives on a broad range of things, most importantly including how can we identify what we’re doing wrong and how to fix it. Climate change is a symptom of much broader systemic issues and we need to be able to think of it in that context if we’re going to “solve” anything.

Note: the image in this newsletter is a “stability landscape” diagram from “Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene” by Steffen, Rockstrom, et al. This paper will likely make an appearance in a future newsletter; I’m including the image because it’s a visualization of systems thinking concepts with direct application to anthropogenic climate change.