leverage points

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planted: 19/02/2023last tended: 04/04/2025

how do we change the structure of systems to produce more of what we want and less of that which is undesirable?

Thinking in Systems

These are points within a complex system, such as an economy, an ecosystem, or a community, where a small shift in one place can produce major changes elsewhere.

Leveraging Digital Disruptions for a Climate-Safe and Equitable World: The D2S Agenda

Leverage points as listed by Donella Meadows in Thinking in Systems:

  • 12. Numbers—Constants and parameters such as subsidies, taxes, standards
  • 11. Buffers—The sizes of stabilizing stocks relative to their flows
  • 10. Stock-and-Flow Structures—Physical systems and their nodes of intersection
  • 9. Delays—The lengths of time relative to the rates of system changes
  • 8. Balancing Feedback Loops—The strength of the feedbacks relative to the impacts they are trying to correct
  • 7. Reinforcing Feedback Loops—The strength of the gain of driving loops
  • 6. Information Flows—The structure of who does and does not have access to information
  • 5. Rules—Incentives, punishments, constraints
  • 4. Self-Organization—The power to add, change, or evolve system structure
  • 3. Goals—The purpose or function of the system
  • 2. Paradigms—The mind-set out of which the system—its goals, structure, rules, delays, parameters—arises
  • 1. Transcending Paradigms

with the caveat:

But complex systems are, well, complex. It’s dangerous to generalize about them. What you read here is still a work in progress; it’s not a recipe for finding leverage points. Rather, it’s an invitation to think more broadly about system change.

Thinking in Systems

A process for leverage point analysis 1-s2.0-S0308521X21000056-gr2.jpg

1. Elsewhere

1.2. In the Agora

1.3. Mentions

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