Social relations

Building on Ludwig von Bertalanffy

Bibliographic Data

ID8070916
AuthorsWolfgang Hofkirchner (0000-0003-1267-3504, Emergent Systems, Information and Society Research Group The Institute for a Global Sustainable Information Society Wien Austria, corresponding author)
Year2019
Volume36
Issue3
Pages263-273
Publication date2019-04-29
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSystems Research and Behavioral Science (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1092-7026 • E-ISSN: 1099-1743
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1002/sres.2594
OpenAlexW2942554601
LanguageEN
Citations received7
References cited26

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

Dialectic · Epistemology · Hierarchy · Political science · Social hierarchy · Social organization · Social relation · Social science · Social system · Social theory · Sociology · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Critical Realism in Sociology · Management and Organizational Studies · Law · Philosophy

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Open DOISci-HubOpen Access