SOCIAL SYSTEMS MODELING
Charles François (2004). SOCIAL SYSTEMS MODELING, International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics, 2(2): 3085.
| Collection | International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics |
|---|---|
| Year | 2004 |
| Vol. (num.) | 2(2) |
| ID | ◀ 3085 ▶ |
| Object type | Human sciences, Methodology or model |
According to P.M. ALLEN, “we find three basic issues that must be addressed in modeling social systems:
- “A social system is firmly embedded in an environment with which it exchanges matter and energy, and it also has an internal complexity. Both these realities can, at certain moments, modify the average behavior of the system.
- “The evolution of such a system is an interplay between the average behavior and rationality of its actors, and the fluctuations, deviations and perturbations around this average caused by the environment and by individuals within the system. Such an evolution involves both determinism and chance. The former is associated with the variables contained in the reduced description, and the latter with perturbations that probe the stability of the system continually, but which are not contained in the reduced description.
- “The evolution is described by a branching tree of possibilities in a space of increasing dimensions representing the qualities which are associated with the system. The branches are merely self-consistent or stable expressions of the organization and interactions of the elements. The structure becomes unstable and changes when it cannot cope with either internal of external fluctuations. (1982, p.35-37).