"Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System" (essay by Donella Meadows)
In this essay, systems scientist Donella Meadows ranks twelve places to intervene in a system, from simple numerical tweaks up to the most powerful levers: a system's goals, its underlying paradigm, and the ability to transcend that paradigm.
An essay by Donella Meadows, the systems scientist who led the 1972 Limits to Growth study, first published in Whole Earth in winter 1997 and issued in full by the Sustainability Institute in 1999. It ranks twelve places to intervene in a complex system, from the least effective (adjusting constants, parameters and numbers) up through buffers, stocks and flows, feedback loops, information flows and rules to the most effective: the goals of the system, the paradigm it springs from, and the power to transcend paradigms.
Her subsequent contributions bestowed a profound insight upon those striving for change, particularly through her pivotal essay "Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System." In this work, she articulated that not all interventions are created equal, proposing a hierarchy of effectiveness.
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Books and references
- Design for the Real World: Human Ecology and Social Change · discussed together in section 046
Examples
- Design for the Real World (book by Victor Papanek) · discussed together in section 046
- Dymaxion House and Dymaxion Car (Buckminster Fuller) · discussed together in section 046
- Geodesic Dome (Buckminster Fuller) · discussed together in section 046
- Interactive Planning (Russell Ackoff) · discussed together in section 046
- The Limits to Growth · discussed together in section 046
- Systems Dynamics (Jay Forrester, MIT) · discussed together in section 046
- The Fifth Discipline (book by Peter Senge) · discussed together in section 046
- Viable System Model (VSM, Stafford Beer) · discussed together in section 046
In the framework
- Leverage Points · concept
In the book
- Chapter 5, section 046 · Pioneers of Systemic Application in Design
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Examples