How systems govern us and how systems thinking can change it

Are you wondering how someone like Donald Trump ended up at the helm of what is (still) the most powerful country in the world? The answer lies in a scientific and management discipline that we urgently need to learn: systems thinking.

This text is the English translation of the German article by the author, which was published here on March 22, 2025.

I am the state

When Louis XIV said, “I am the state,” he meant that he alone determined how the greatest social system possible at that time, a state, was to be structured and governed. His statement was true because one did not become king through professional or social advancement, nor as the result of a political career, but by virtue of birth. And so Louis was born into a system that gave him absolute power, independent of everyone and everything he ruled. The social system he led therefore had to adapt to his ideas.

If Donald Trump were to say today, “I am the state,” this statement would describe a completely different situation: He is an (almost) perfect child of the system he is allowed to govern. It is not the system that has adapted to him, but he who has adapted to the system. And if he is now overturning the administration of his country, it is because the structures of the state, as they have developed over the last 50 years, no longer serve the changing system of power in an optimal way. The nature and concentration of capital are different today, and an authoritarian, ruthless government can better serve this capital, this power structure. The system has put him in the position of president because he represents the goals and mechanisms of the system better than Kamala Harris or the presidents before him.

The fish stinks ... towards the head

This mechanism works in any sufficiently complex social system: in a company, in a government agency, in an organization, in a political party. The larger the system, the stronger the mechanism. The CEO is not the smartest or most capable man (more on why it is mostly men below), nor the most brilliant strategist or the most inspiring leader, but the one who best embodies the rules of the system. That is why he makes a career within that system. And as he does so, he increasingly adapts his thinking and behavior to the prevailing goals and rules. Ultimately, the system elevates him to a position of leadership.

Conversely, if you want to understand a social system, if you want to know how it works and why, you can look at the men who lead it.

Social systems assert themselves in their environment by creating rules and developing enduring dynamics. These dynamics then produce leaders who best serve the preservation and expansion of the system.

But how is it that men like Mikhail Gorbachev or Pope Francis rise to the top of a state or a global institution? They seem to act or speak out against the rules of the system that brought them to power.

Yes, there are sometimes individuals who contribute to changing their system (or try to), just as a brilliant strategist can rise to the top of a corporation. Social systems are made up of people, and a boss's personality can also include kindness, humility, or strategic intelligence. But these apparent exceptions have one thing in common: they have made their careers in accordance with the rules of the system. They also probably embody a new dynamic within the system that is not yet visible to everyone. In any case, they are children of their systems.

And why are they almost exclusively men? Because our social systems exhibit characteristics, ways of thinking, and behaviors in which men are simply better: determination, assertiveness, ruthlessness, accumulation of wealth and power... If we had social systems that set compassion, consideration, balance, and leniency as goals, the majority of those promoted would be women.

How do goals and rules come about in society?

Our societies, our countries, our economy, our civilization were not consciously and deliberately designed: only in parts or only reactively, to correct individual developments that were unwanted by those in power. After industrialization, these social systems became so complex and their dynamics so powerful that the patchwork no longer serves us well as human beings or as a society. In recent decades, the rapid development of (increasingly networked) technologies has added a new dimension to this complexity and the dynamics that accompany it. That is our real problem. We are trying to rebuild a system whose complexity far exceeds our imagination with pliers and hammers.

The rules of these social systems (the economy, society, the state) are therefore a sum of prohibitions and injunctions that have been created for limited social contexts and not with a view to the overall picture of society and civilization. In addition, they follow something that is not laid down in law but is just as powerful: culture. In the modern media society, a new, powerful force has been added: the influence of public opinion. Taken together, all of this determines what is acceptable and what is not, what is considered right and what is considered wrong.

Only when we learn systems thinking will we elect systems thinkers to government. Only when our governments apply systems thinking will we have a chance to live in peace on a sustainable planet.

The law, the formal rules of the state, culture, and manipulation by the media create dynamics that define how the economy, the exercise of power, and society function. We have never systematically thought about the purpose of it all. We simply follow the dynamics and regard them as given, as a kind of natural law—'the world is just the way it is, and we cannot change it'.

The fact that we lack an overall picture of the system and an explicit goal is exploited by those who have the means to influence governments, rules, and public opinion in their favor. The unimaginable concentration of wealth and the power that comes with it has led, over the last ten to twenty years, to states that, while still formally ours, increasingly serve the interests of fewer and fewer individuals. These dynamics, influenced by the super-rich, have brought Donald Trump to power. The super-rich are also behind attempts to further reshape the world (dis)order. They are securing more and more influence in the economy and politics. They are, in effect, shaping the world.

Systems thinking: How can social systems be changed?

When faced with the task of restructuring a complex social system, looking at system sciences is of little help. They can help us analyze and understand the state of a system. However, the task of deliberately changing social systems lies outside their focus.

So how can complex social systems be changed? How can society, the state, or the economic system be transformed in a planned manner? There is a practice that has emerged based on systems science and systemic thinking and is explicitly dedicated to the transformation of complex social systems. It was developed by a group of thinkers and management consultants within the business world who gathered around Prof. Russell L. Ackoff in the 1980s. This practice is known as systems thinking or systems design. It has already been used to successfully transform a large number of companies and organizations.

The possibility of deliberately shaping society using this method was explored by Russell L. Ackoff and Sheldon Rovin in their book "Redesigning Society". Alan P. Stern used it in his book "Redesigning Civilization", published in German, for the deliberate transformation of contemporary civilization. I must refer to this book here because this complex topic can only be adequately presented in a longer text.

Even very large social systems can be changed in a targeted manner. However, this requires reason instead of agitation, consensus building instead of media manipulation, and a democracy that is governed from the bottom up. It also requires a method, namely systems design, which has proven its effectiveness over decades.

However, the most important insight gained from systems design is easy to summarize: a complex social system can only be changed as a whole. And because it consists of people, their beliefs and goals are an integral part of the transformation process. And these people, us, must be involved in the process.

One thing is certain: we will not be able to repair our civilization, our democracy, and the economy in the way that our governments are currently attempting to do. In addition, as a society, we urgently need goals that are not only appropriate to the current state of the world, but also explicitly defined. To achieve this, we need a societal conversation about the kind of world we want to live in. Only when we have this big goal in mind can we make our small decisions (from voting to how we raise our children) in a way that will lead us to our goal.

Andreas Sternowski is a publisher at Continentia Verlag, where he publishes books on the change towards sustainability and responsibility. His vision is a society based on fair and enriching community and harmony with nature.