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Chapter 7. Systems and Ecological Practice
Systems and ecological ideas aid the integration of interpersonal interventions with interventions that
engage families, communities, and social organizations. This approach focuses on the interaction of
personal factors with social factors. The goal is to help people adapt themselves and their reactions to their
social environment. These interventions evolve as show by the rise in importance of ‘green’ policy issues
such as sustainability in society that in turn has been reflected in innovations in social work and care
services in the social environment.
Terminology
Systems The idea of systems focuses on the web of connections between, and the resources of, families
and groups and on helping those connections to function at the highest possible level. Systems are entities
with boundaries within which physical and mental energy is exchanged internationally more than they are
across the boundary.
Life stressors Stressors bring energy to a system—a person, family, or community—in the form of stresses.
Life stressors are transitions and events that disturb the fit and adaptedness between the person and
environment, leading to stress that is beyond coping ability.
Fit and adaptedness Individuals and their social environments may be seen as having a degree of fit
between them as well as having a degree of adaptation between the individual and the environment.
Networks Systems ideas suggest that part of social functioning is to initiate, maintain, and improve social
networks and social support; social networks are an important component of systems and ecological
practice.
Resilience A practice objective emerging from ecological thinking is resilience, or the capacity to bounce
back from adversity.
Energy In the context of systems ideas, energy is actions, resources, and information; the resources may
include effort or money or time. In effect, if help or information or money is provided for a family, energy
is provided in the family system.
Levels of systems Larger systems contain smaller systems; these may be referred to as macrosystems,
mesosystems, and microsystems. The focus of concern in social work may vary among the systems
depending on the situation.
Closed systems Some systems are closed either completely or virtually; one can think of a thermos being a
closed system containing food or drink which is relatively unchanged in the short term.
Open systems When energy crosses a system’s boundary, the system becomes an open or permeable
system. Some open systems are very permeable but the boundaries still define an area where the
interactions are more common within the boundary than across the boundary.
Input Systems receive energy via inputs across the boundary. For example, social work interventions may
give information or resources, and the system changes because of this input.
Throughput When energy is used within a system, the energy changes what is going on in the system and
thus there is throughput, or change due to energy being used.
Output When energy is passed from inside to outside the boundary, that energy has some effect on people
or things; the system changes when energy leaves and so do the recipients of the energy.
Feedback loops Outputs often lead to further inputs into the system; this linkage between outputs and
inputs into the system is referred to as feedback loops.
Entropy Systems use their own energy to maintain themselves thus meaning that without inputs from
outside the boundaries the system will eventually run down and die.
Steady state Systems that receive input and thus incorporate change without changing their fundamental
identity are said to be in steady state. This may be referred to as being resilient in the face of change.
Equilibrium A system that is able to maintain its fundamental nature even given changes due to input is
said to be in homeostasis or equilibrium.
Differentiation As systems receive inputs, change and grow more complex, and generate more kinds of
more components over time they are said to differentiate them.
Non-summativity The idea that a system is more complex than the individual components is often
described by the term ‘the whole is more than the sum of its parts.’
Reciprocity When one part of a system changes, that change tends to affect all of the other parts and in
turn they change. This may happen within a system or between systems.
Equifinality and multifinality Systems ideas help social workers understand how the same result may be
achieved in more than one way (equifinality) while similar circumstances may lead to different results
(multifinality) as parts of the system interact in different ways. As a result, these ideas help the social
worker understand the complexity of human relationships and why outcomes for similar actions vary.
Synergy Social systems may possess synergy, or the ability to create their own energy to maintain
themselves. Marriage is an example of potential synergy whereby the persons build up bonds within the
marriage and make it stronger.
Key Ideas
Systems theory spread after the merger of social work into a single professional entity.
In the USA and the UK the merger of multiple separate professional organizations within social work in
the 1950s and 1960s was followed by the growth of systems theory as part of a reaction against
psychodynamic theory in the 1970s. Another factor that encouraged the growth of systems theory included
the merger of separate government agencies into integrated social work organizations throughout Europe
that provided a context for understanding how the public and the private interact and how various change
agents might be involved. Other factors included systems theory’s acceptance and analysis of existing
social orders rather than analyzing and attacking them as with radical and critical theory.
Systems theory integrates individual help into broader social interventions.
Systems theory integrates social interventions with those that deliver individual help and provides for
psychological practice as well as social reform. However, the systems theory focuses on trying to maintain
the status quo rather than bringing about radical social change. These systems ideas provide a way to
bring into play multiple factors but the resulting complexity is a barrier to clear prescriptions for action.
Systems theory uses complex, multifactorial explanations.
Social work applies systems approaches to allow the inclusion of a broad range of factors, interacting in
different ways, in the particular system that they are working in. However, systems theory says that all of
these factors are interconnected and thus the elements in the system could readjust to a change in any
single factor. As a result, it is hard to predict how all of the interactions in a system will work to achieve
the desired outcome.
Social work includes general systems theory and ecological systems theory.
The growth of systems theory provided two systems in current social work. General systems theory
developed earlier and became more widespread and strongly influenced US social work and to a lesser
degree non-US. Ecological systems theory grew based on systems approaches and had a more limited
influence outside of the US.
General systems theory posits that macrosystems are made up of smaller systems.
An essential concept in systems and ecological practice is the idea that there are systems within systems.
The largest system—the macrosystem—has within it meso- and microsystems. The definition of these
boundaries and the level of most importance to the social worker depend on the situation.
Systems interact with each other via complex processes.
Systems interact with each other by means of complex processes that involve information flows of energy
within a system and across system boundaries. Because systems approaches try to include all of the factors
involved in a system’s functioning, the interaction among systems is seen as a highly complex process.
One important application of systems ideas is social networking.
A social network among individuals allows transfer of ideas, resources, and energy. Each of these transfers
affects both of the systems that are involved (or multiple systems); thus social networks are one form of
the functioning of systems. Networking tries to connect interpersonal work developing people’s
relationships with community work or macro practice. Practitioners focus on client’s networks and agency
links that form a pattern in their lives. The aim is to identify formal and informal social networks, extend
them, and maintain or increase their usability to the client. Network analysis approaches suggest that the
world is composed of networks rather than groups.
Ecological systems theory focuses on psychological/individualist equilibrium.
This approach argues that ecology is about conserving the existing environment rather than looking at
social change to respond to ecological problems. As a result, there is a limited use of ecological ideas in
much of the ecological theory in social work.
Ecological ‘life’ models of social work bring ecological ideas into social work practice.
These models seek to incorporate an awareness of social concepts including life stressors, life course,
adaptedness, and other elements that have been drawn from ecological ideas into practice.
Eco-social work suggests that the person-in-environment is an integrated whole.
People’s entire life context should the focus. As a result, the main approaches in eco-social work include
holistic analysis; promoting the positive use of natural resources and environmentally respectful lifestyles;
concern for the social environment and cooperative networks; adventure pedagogy; and networking and
social support systems to work with the disabled, mentally ill, and older persons.
Values issues include overassessment and limited access to information.
Looking holistically at a wide range of systems in a client’s life may lead to examining matters beyond a
client’s understanding and genuine consent. Looking broadly at systems in a client’s life may come up
against limited access to information due to refusal to give consent.
Social justice is an important argument for including social factors in systems work.
On of the most important arguments for including social factors in environmental concern and
environmental sustainability witin social work practice is that of social justice; that is, if social workers are
to act justly, they must connect the help to clients with the needs of all human beings to achieve the same
life objectives. In addition, social workers must also consider how the resources used in their present
helping might damage future generations.
To include the wider world into social work requires ‘sustainable social work’.
Rather than a reductionist view where social work knowledge has concentration on evidence that a
particular intervention will achieve certain results with a particular individual, many now argue that
changes such as globalization require sustainable social with four main themes: long-term sustainability
by abandoning quick fixes and being instead in harmony with the planet; seeing the world as an
interactive, interconnected web of life where everyone is reliant on everyone else; linking science and
spirituality; and creating a partnership model of human relations and society that focuses on living with
other people as being the most important in life rather than ourselves.
Issues
Systems ideas bring social into social work but not the full implications of social change.
Critical theory proponents argue that there is only a limited usage of systems and ecological ideas in social
work. Systems ideas in social work tend to focus on how systems maintain, reproduce, and adapt
themselves rather than on the possibility, desirability, or inevitability of widespread change. This appears
in part due to social works limited use of cybernetics, biology, and the social sciences. However, existing
systems theory does benefit social work by incorporating social factors as well as psychological functioning
thus examining individuals in the context of their family and social environment. Social work’s emphasis
on the interconnectedness of individuals with other individuals and groups is in contrast to practitioners
in fields such as healthcare, clinical psychology, and counseling.
Some systems ideas such as adaptation suggest the desirability of a status quo.
Many social work practitioners are cautious about assuming their task is to get people to adapt to the
expectations of others. They identify three problems. One is that by stressing adaptation clients may be
pushed into believing that they need to adapt to the realities of the pressures on them; a second is that
total adaptation may be seen as possible and desirable; and the third is that persons may adapt too readily
to the expectations around them while there may be better resolutions. Alternatively, systems-oriented
practitioners suggest that broader systems ideas suggest that looking at the appropriateness of the
surrounding reality and that total adaptation does not address the realities of conflicts and inconsistencies
in life.
The complexity of multifactorial explanations may be a barrier to clear prescriptions.
Systems theory allows social work to include a great variety of factors based on the concept that everything
is connected and so prediction is very difficult. Systems theory by its nature does not tell the practitioner
what is going to happen but rather suggests that by giving the system a push in one part other changes will
occur. One way of understanding systems theory is to think about the contrast between systems theory
and cognitive-behavioral therapy and other theories that use a linear cause-and-effect explanation. One
argument for the cause-and-effect approach rather than systems theory is that it may be more efficient to
look at resolution rather than trying to explain or understand the situation.
Ecological systems theory focuses on psychological and individual equilibrium.
Systems ideas in social work often treat the physical environment as a backdrop to traditional views of
service. The role of the physical environment in constructing interpersonal relationships and how human
behavior affects the environment does not allow for the complexity of interdependence and the value of
diversity in both human and natural forms. For example, the individualistic approach to ecology focuses
on conserving the existing environment rather than looking at social change to solve ecological problems.
Alternatively, the eco-social approach uses ecological ideas to politically combat social exclusion; ecofeminism uses ecological systems theory to understand how existing political and social systems oppress
women’s concern for sustainable and sustaining environments.
Americans and Europeans have adopted systems and ecological practice in much different ways.
General or ecological systems theory is in virtually universal use in the U.S. and thus almost all
introductory and generalist textbooks assume this perspective; American texts on systems and ecological
practice tend to become introductory texts. On the other hand, systems and ecological approaches are not
significant models of practice in Europe even though European texts use some systems concepts. While
European countries exhibit awareness of systems theory, such as in family therapy, the literature related
to ecological systems has much less influence on the profession. Therefore, there are few connections
between systems and ecological ideas with other social work theory in the non-US theoretical literature
while in the US these ideas are central to most forms of practice.
Looking holistically may lead to over-assessing.
By looking holistically at a wide range of systems in the client’s life may take in too broad a range of factors
and matters beyond the client’s understanding and genuine consent. Examining a broad range of factors
may be in conflict with the limited access to information faced by the social worker; in addition, the social
worker may not be able to involve those factors in treatment. Finally, the client may not accept or
understand the inclusion of some factors in treatment, such as family interactions rather than a child’s
responsibility for problems.
Social justice is one of the most importance arguments for including social factors in social work practice.
Social workers must relate the help they provide to clients to achieve a secure, health, and satisfying life
with the need of all human being to achieve those objectives as well as to make sure to balance present
support for client with resources available in the future—if resources used now help might that use hurt
future generations? Social work and the environment literature includes three common themes: seeing
people in their physical place integrates human activity and well-being with the physical environment;
sustainability and living well in our place; and using multidisciplinary processes that include practitioner
at every level of services needed to respond to environmental crises.
Family therapy illustrates the contributions of systems theories.
Family therapy practice examines interactions between people as part of their family group and includes
structural family therapy that attempts to alter family relationships by observing patterns and altering
malfunctioning structures; strategic family therapy that focuses on people’s day-to-day strategies for
influencing other family members and maintaining their own identity; and systemic family therapy that
explores possible hidden social rules within the family that are adversely affecting relationships.
Residential care practice also illustrates the contribution of systems theories.
Residential care facilities are self-regulating systems that are to some degree closed, establish norms, and
attempt to minimize risk and so establish homeostasis. Residents are part of a complex system embedded
in a larger community system and containing smaller systems within the residential care facility. The
systems idea of boundaries helps with limiting the complexity of particular issues or relationships.
Similarly, the idea of feedback loops helps with identifying interaction among factors.
Final Thoughts…
Systems and ecological practice provides assistance to social workers in a number of ways.
Interacting with persons from other professions: In communicating with persons whose professional focus
emphasizes individuals, such as healthcare and education, systems and ecological ideas can be used to
help point out how changing the dynamics and resilience of the family or community can help individuals.
Clarifying options: Systems and ecological ideas aid in identifying systems that affect the individual client
and so are appropriate for indirect intervention by the social work or colleagues.
Exploring intervention with just a part of the system: Systems and ecological idea help with understanding
of how changing just one part of an individual’s behavior can influence others or help them better cope,
such as by strengthening their spirituality in order to better cope with illness.
Explore adaptations by the client and by the environment: Systems and ecological ideas aid the social
worker in seeing ‘both sides’ of the relationship between the client and the environment and thus are
better able to work with both the client and the eco-systems in which the client is located.
Better see the potential and limits of sustainability: Systems and ecological ideas help the social worker in
seeing whether the proposed changes in a client will be support, or not supported, by resources in the
surrounding environment. For example, if their behavior changes will the workplace or family accept
them?
Better understand the differences in social work around the globe: By reading and critiquing textbooks,
social workers can better understand the social work profession’s assumptions and patterns of practice in
other countries from which they may receive or send clients or they themselves might practice. In
addition, understanding the differences in social work among different countries strengthens the
intellectual foundation of the social worker.