IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/srbeha/v36y2019i3p263-273.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Social relations: Building on Ludwig von Bertalanffy

Author

Listed:
  • Wolfgang Hofkirchner

Abstract

Ludwig von Bertalanffy did not leave us a legacy of a social systems theory. Nonetheless, reconstructing his general approach to systems provides us with several ideas on how to build a theory of social systems. The concept of social relations easily connects to Bertalanffy's concept of relations of organization. His way of thinking underlines that social relations, as any relations of organization, are unobservables that long for theoretical means of understanding. His conception of the world would assign social relations a special place in a hierarchy of processes internal to a social system—they represent the whole of the system that nonetheless emerges from the interaction of the actors as parts thereof. Last but not least, his world view would orient us towards an organization of social systems in which the dialectic of social relations and actors balances unity and diversity as an Ought. These three main ideas of Bertalanffy offer system theoretical pillars that can inspire current social theory.

Suggested Citation

  • Wolfgang Hofkirchner, 2019. "Social relations: Building on Ludwig von Bertalanffy," Systems Research and Behavioral Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(3), pages 263-273, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:srbeha:v:36:y:2019:i:3:p:263-273
    DOI: 10.1002/sres.2594
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/sres.2594
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/sres.2594?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Roberto Aprile & David Alexander & Federica Doni, 2023. "Enhancing the materiality principle in integrated reporting by adopting the General Systems Theory," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(5), pages 2219-2233, September.
    2. Krzysztof Kasianiuk, 2021. "On a system–environment relationship in scientific inquiry: A response to ‘Definition of System’ by A. D. Hall and R. E. Fagen," Systems Research and Behavioral Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(4), pages 517-526, August.
    3. Francesco Tramonti & Franco Giorgi & Annibale Fanali, 2021. "Systems thinking and the biopsychosocial approach: A multilevel framework for patient‐centred care," Systems Research and Behavioral Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(2), pages 215-230, March.
    4. Bruno Garcia Oliveira & Lara Bartocci Liboni & Luciana Oranges Cezarino & Nelson Oliveira Stefanelli & Irene Kazumi Miura, 2020. "Industry 4.0 in systems thinking: From a narrow to a broad spectrum," Systems Research and Behavioral Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(4), pages 593-606, July.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:srbeha:v:36:y:2019:i:3:p:263-273. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/1092-7026 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.