Defining A System

The origin of the word system comes from the Ancient Greek "synistanai" meaning "to bring together or combine." (2002, Washington University Press). There are many similar definitions (Appendix A) but essentially a system is a collection of organised interrelated parts/elements that function as one single entity within a boundary to achieve a specific objective.

A group of friends is an example of a system. The objective of a system is the reason it exists for this argument we will assume its objective is "Social interaction for mutual benefit". The elements that make up this system of friends would be the individual people.

The Boundary of a system is where the system ends and the environment begins. Systems usually exist in an environment and the boundary is important because it defines what elements are parts of the system and what are parts of the environment. The importance of this is more apparent in information systems. Boundaries do not necessarily need to be tangible entities such as a wall or even a national boarder. For our group of friends the boundary would be a detailed list of people who are friends'. The boundary could not be something such as language because it does not accurately define who is in the group of friends and who is not.

A Human Being is a system it contains elements such as arms, legs, muscles etc. that function as a whole to achieve an objective, which is "self preservation". The boundary of this system is the skin or outer layer.

So far only tangible things have been discussed as systems but systems do not necessarily need to be entirely tangible take information systems such as the stock market. It contains elements such as buyers and sellers not always people sometimes the buyer or seller maybe a computer acting as an agent. In any case it still contains many elements tangible and intangible that work together to achieve a specific objective. In this case the objective it "To facilitate the transfer of stocks" that is the function of the stock market.

The System properties outlined have focused on the elements or parts and their objective and boundary. Studying the parts of the system cannot lead us to a greater understanding of a system as was thought before the mid 20th century

System thinking started mud 20th century and drives away from the previous academic vies of studying

the parts to understanding the abstract whole.