Exploring Systems Thinking Typologies and Paradigms

Today’s agriculture, food, and natural resources (AFNR) sectors face many wicked problems like climate change. Addressing these complex problems will require people to have both social and technical knowledge. However, having knowledge is insufficient. Individuals must be able to think about things as they occur in complex systems. Systems thinking has been proposed as a way of tackling complex problems. The purpose of this study was to determine if there is a continuum of systems thinking paradigms, beyond the hard systems thinking and soft systems thinking dichotomy proposed by Checkland. A novel research method called Q methodology was used, which included two steps: (a) the collection of data that forms the Q-sorts and (b) the by-person factor analysis of the Q-sorts. Overall, the findings from this study support the idea that systems thinking occurs on a continuum which includes (a) Hard systems thinking, (b) HARDsoft systems thinking, (c) SOFThard systems thinking and (d) Soft systems thinking. HARDsoft and SOFThard systems thinking were newly discovered in this research. The four systems thinking paradigms identified in this study better reflect the nuances and complexities that are associated with human thought and can provide a more specialized approach to solving complex issues.