Epistemological Considerations of VSM Case Studies

摘要

@@ I. Introduction In this paper I discuss key concepts that explain case studies which use the Viable System Model (Beer, 1979, 1981, 1985).I will first explain the idea of organisation, then explore the concept of communications, in particular communications between autonomous systems, and finally 1*11 discuss the idea of structural embodiment of policies supported by the distinction between the informational and operational domains.To illustrate these concepts I use a particular case study, Trident Ltd., a British company (Espejo and Bowling, 1996, Espejo, 2011).This was a Company that attempted, unsuccessfully, to transform its hierarchical structure to a cellular non-hierarchical structure over a decade from the mid 1990s.