The Social Responsibility of Operational Research

Ackoff, Russell L.

doi:10.2307/3007924

Cited by 14 publications

(13 citation statements)

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“…Freeman (1984a), in his original stakeholder theory, saw it as the "stakeholders in a system". Equally, Ackoff (1974) argued that to deal with system problems (especially soft systems problems involving human activities), all stakeholders should become participants. His view was that even when there were apparent conflicts between different stakeholder groups, it should be possible with open debate and discussion, to design a system that could be acceptable to all.…”

Section: Ssm and Stakeholder Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

A systemic method for organisational stakeholder identification and analysis using Soft Systems Methodology (SSM)

Wei

Liu

Mingers

2015

European Journal of Operational Research

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a b s t r a c tThis paper presents a systemic methodology for identifying and analysing the stakeholders of an organisation at many different levels. The methodology is based on soft systems methodology and is applicable to all types of organisation, both for profit and non-profit. The methodology begins with the top-level objectives of the organisation, developed through debate and discussion, and breaks these down into the key activities needed to achieve them. A range of stakeholders are identified for each key activity. At the end, the functions and relationships of all the stakeholder groups can clearly be seen. The methodology is illustrated with an actual case study in Hunan University.

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Section: Ssm and Stakeholder Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

A systemic method for organisational stakeholder identification and analysis using Soft Systems Methodology (SSM)

Wei

Liu

Mingers

2015

European Journal of Operational Research

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“…From this developed frameworks (Jackson 1989;Jackson 1990) and a meta-methodology known as total systems intervention (TSI) (Flood and Jackson 1991) for choosing appropriate methods to use in a particular situation. The second dimension was more political and debated the nature and role of OR within society as a whole (Jackson 1991;Jackson 1993;Mingers 2000d) following on from earlier concerns about the social responsibility of OR (Ackoff 1974a;Chesterton et al 1975;Rosenhead and Thunhurst 1982).…”

Section: Recent Developmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A review of the recent contribution of systems thinking to operational research and management science

Mingers

White

2010

European Journal of Operational Research

353

229

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The systems approach, or systems thinking, has been intimately connected with the development of OR and management science initially through the work of founders such as Churchman and Ackoff and latterly through innovations such as soft systems. In this paper we have undertaken a review of the contribution that systems thinking has been making more recently, especially to the practice of OR. Systems thinking is a discipline in its own right, with many theoretical and methodological developments, but it is also applicable to almost any problem area because of its generality, and so such a review must always be selective. We have looked at the literature from both a theoretical and an applications orientation. In the first part we consider the main systems theories and methodologies in terms of their recent developments and also their applications. This covers: the systems approach, complexity theory, cybernetics, system dynamics, soft OR and PSMs, critical systems and multimethodology. In the second part we review the main domains of application: strategy, information systems, organisations, production and operations, ecology and agriculture, and medicine and health. Our overall conclusion is that while systems may not be well established institutionally, in terms of academic departments, it is incredibly healthy in terms of the quantity and variety of its applications.

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“…The only objectivity is consensus arrived at through open debate. Objectivity is the social product of the open interaction of a wide variety of individual subjectivities (Ackoff, 1974). This participating criteria also applies to the concept of validation.…”

Section: Soft Systems Methodology: Concepts and Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%