Isomorphism in General System Theory

Towards an Ontological Foundation for Critical Systems Intervention

Abstract

This paper revisits the role of General System Theory (GST) within Critical Systems Thinking (CST) and Critical Systems Practice (CSP), arguing that GST has been too narrowly interpreted as a functionalist and regulation-oriented approach associated primarily with hard systems thinking. Drawing on Ludwig von Bertalanffy’s original concern with isomorphism, the paper proposes an alternative reading in which GST is understood as a general framework for relating structurally comparable models across different domains and paradigms. Inspired by van Fraassen’s pragmatic philosophy of science and the use of isomorphism in abstract algebra, the paper argues that isomorphism should be understood primarily as a relation between epistemological models rather than between real-world systems themselves. On this basis, the paper develops Critical Systems Intervention (CSI) as a model-centric approach to multimethodological intervention. CSI maintains coherence across paradigmatic shifts by introducing an explicit intervention ontology in the form of a game model representing the evolving socio-technical situation under study. Different systems methodologies associated with the Burrell–Morgan paradigms are then treated as generating structurally related representations of the same underlying intervention situation. The paper illustrates this argument through a reinterpretation of the Health Information Systems Programme (HISP) and concludes that GST can be repositioned as the broader ontological and epistemological framework within which critical and plural systems interventions become theoretically integrated.