Critical Heuristics of Social Planning

Citation

Elstob, M. (1998), "Critical Heuristics of Social Planning", Kybernetes, Vol. 27 No. 5, pp. 578-580. https://doi.org/10.1108/k.1998.27.5.578.1

Ulrich is well known in the systems community. He was a founding co‐editor of Systems Practice and a former director‐at‐large of the International Society of the Systems Sciences. He has also published widely including five books. The book reviewed here has come to be recognised as a seminal work in the field of critical systems thinking. It was written when Ulrich was working with C. West Churchman at Berkeley between 1976 and 1980 and owes much to Churchman’s influence and inspiration.

The conceptual framework that Ulrich develops he names as “critical systems heuristics”. This rather awkward phrase is intended to mark the three main aspects of Ulrich’s approach for dealing with the realm of rational social planning, or more generally the field of social inquiry and design. He sees social planning as primarily involving practical rather than theoretical reason: in his view it is concerned with what ought to be or ought to be done and therefore with human purposes and will. It is not primarily concerned with gaining knowledge or understanding or how the world is.

The first, and central idea, in his framework is that he advocates that a radical critical activity be introduced into social planning. He intends this critical activity to go deep in the sense of revealing, exploring, examining and re‐working the norms and values that underlie the supposedly rational foundations of social planning. The important point Ulrich is making is that it is not simply the norms and values at the obvious political level of decision making that need to be critically examined but also those that underlie the rational principles and methods of the sciences and the various professions that contribute to social planning. He is suggesting that we put up for critical reflection many of the most cherished and protected tenets of twentieth century rational practice.

The second main idea in Ulrich’s framework is that of a system. This idea is to be understood in a Kantian sense, and is introduced as a key heuristic concept for use in the critical activity Ulrich is advocating. Kant understood the systems idea as referring to the totality of relevant conditions on which theoretical or practical judgements depend, including basic metaphysical, ethical, political, and ideological a priori judgements. In his writing Kant reminds us of the unavoidable selectivity that has been exercised whenever we describe or distinguish a system. Every act of rational social planning assumes, explicitly or implicitly, some system, or complex of interacting systems. Recognising that there is always a system and that each profession and each science (system science included) is always making a selection, always counting things in and out, forces us to inquire into the norms and values that are being assumed when this system‐making is done. Most practitioners, scientists included, do not spend much time critically reflecting on the foundational assumptions, norms, and values that influence how they build their system view. And in consequence they are usually not aware of the particular deception or blindness they are prone to. In Ulrich’s view it is never an excuse for professionals to claim that they merely provide tools and that others must take responsibility for how these tools are used.

The third term of Ulrich’s framework is heuristics, used in the normal sense of something that aids discovery, but with emphasis on methods that will aid the activity of discovering and critically examining the values and norms operative within social planning. Heuristics are needed to help participants expose, unravel, and appreciate their values, norms, problems, disquiets, concerns, interests and aims. Ulrich’s emphasis on the use of the term “heuristic” is to be seen as in direct contrast with the term “theoretical”. Since he is advocating a critical activity, an activity that sets out to challenge norms and values, he is comfortable with methods justified and retained solely on the grounds of their value in use, rather than those that must be justified on theoretical grounds, grounds which in turn rest on norms, values and assumptions which themselves are in need of critical reflection. Of course, Ulrich’s framework rests on its own norms, values and assumptions, but he would accept this and be happy to see his scheme subjected to critical activity itself by use of either its own methods or others.

The book, aside from a lengthy preface, is split into three parts. Part I considers contemporary models of rational discourse. Ulrich takes Popper’s work and subjects it to a thorough critique: a critique aimed at undermining the norms and values that he claims support scientism, positivism, and decisionism. He follows this study of Popper’s work with another lengthy piece this time directed at an evaluation of Habermas’ attack on an objectivistic or positivistic basis for rationality. Ulrich identifies closely with Habermas’ critique and approach but nonetheless finds fault with it and proposes his own “critically‐heuristic turn” as a way forward and an escape from having to justify a theoretical foundation, as he argues Habermas is forced to do. In Part II Ulrich devotes himself: over many pages, to the task of making a sound case for his critical‐heuristic approach. In Part III, the part most likely to appeal to the less philosophically inclined reader, Ulrich presents an application‐oriented consideration of his conceptual framework. In particular he uses his framework to critically examine Stafford Beer’s “Project Cybersyn” in Chile during 1971‐73, and the US Health Systems Plan for Central Puget Sound in 1976.

This book is undoubtedly an important work. I think the key principle it offers of adopting a heuristic as opposed to a theoretical, basis for exploring and examining norms and values is correct and has been largely overlooked. But, I fear, many people in the systems community will stick with a very familiar heuristic, the one that says that what has worked for them in the past will work for them in the future, and will not change their ways through attempting to carry out the sort of critical system heuristic approach that Ulrich advocates so forcefully in this book.