SYSTEM (Nearly decomposable)
| Collection | International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics |
|---|---|
| Year | 2004 |
| Vol. (num.) | 2(2) |
| ID | ◀ 3383 ▶ |
| Object type | General information, Methodology or model |
A system “in which the interactions among the subsystems are weak, but not negligible” (H. SIMON, 1965, p.69).
The subsystems and their interactions can generally be represented in a matrix divided into submatrixes, wherein most intersections between columns and lines are void.
SIMON enounces the following propositions relative to these systems:
- “a) … the short run behavior of each of the component subsystems is approximately independent of the short-run behavior of the other components;
- “b) in the long run, the behavior of any one of the components depends in only an aggregate way on the behavior of the other components” (Ibid).
SIMON adds: “intra-component linkages are generally stronger than intercomponent linkages. This fact has the effect of separating the high-frequency dynamics of a hierarchy — involving the internal structure of the components — from the low-frequency dynamics — involving interaction among components” (p.72).
According to SIMON, the nearly decomposable system model can be widely used, for social and economic systems, as well as for many physico-chemical systems, whose parts are very imperfectly connected.