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Thinking in Systems: International Bestseller
Author(s): Donella Meadows (Author), Diana Wright
- Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing Co
- Publication Date: 20 July 2017
- Edition: Illustrated
- Language: English
- Print length: 240 pages
- ISBN-10: 1603580557
- ISBN-13: 9781603580557
Book Description
The classic book on systems thinking, with more than half a million copies sold worldwide!
This is a fabulous book. This book opened my mind and reshaped the way I think about investing. Forbes
Perfect for fans of Kate Raworth, Rutger Bregman and Daniel Kahneman
The co-author of the international best-selling book Limits to Growth, Donella Meadows is widely regarded as a pioneer in the environmental movement and one of the world’s foremost systems analysts. Her posthumously published Thinking in Systems, is a concise and crucial book offering insight for problem solving on scales ranging from the personal to the global. This essential primer brings systems thinking out of the realm of computers and equations and into the tangible world, showing readers how to develop the systems-thinking skills critical for 21st-century life.
Some of the biggest problems facing the world war, hunger, poverty, and environmental degradation are essentially system failures. They cannot be solved by fixing one piece in isolation from the others, because even seemingly minor details have enormous impact.
While readers will learn the conceptual tools and methods of systems thinking, the heart of the book is grander than methodology. Donella Meadows reminds readers to pay attention to what is important, not just what is quantifiable, to stay humble, and to stay a learner.
No matter what industry or career you re in, Thinking In Systems will bring clarity to the complicated, crowded and interdependent networks that make up the world today. Thinking in Systems helps readers avoid confusion and helplessness, the first step toward finding proactive and effective solutions.
Editorial Reviews
Review
“The publication of Thinking in Systems is a landmark … This book is destined to shape our understanding of socio-ecological systems in the years to come in much the same way that Silent Spring taught us to understand the nature of ecosystems in the 1960s and 1970s.”
Oran R. Young, Professor, Donald Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, University of California, Santa Barbara
“Thinking in Systems is required reading for anyone hoping to run a successful company, community, or country. Learning how to think in systems is now part of change-agent literacy. And this is the best book of its kind.”
Hunter Lovins, Founder and President, Natural Capital Solutions; coauthor of Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution
“When I read Thinking in Systems I am reminded of the enormity of the gap between systemic thinkers and policy makers. If this book helps narrow the gap, it will be Dana’s greatest contribution.”
Lester Brown, Founder and President, Earth Policy Institute
“Dana Meadows was one of the smartest people I ever knew, able to figure out the sensible answer to almost any problem. This book explains how she thought, and hence is of immense value to those of us who often wonder what she’d make of some new problem. A classic.”
Bill McKibben, author of Deep Economy
“In Dana Meadows’s brilliantly integrative worldview, everything causes everything else; cause and effect loop back on themselves. She was the clearest thinker and writer co-creating the art and science of systems dynamics, and Thinking in Systems distills her lifetime of wisdom.”
Amory B. Lovins, Chairman and Chief Scientist, Rocky Mountain Institute; coauthor of Natural Capitalism
About the Author
Donella Meadows was a pioneering environmental scientist, author, teacher, and farmer widely considered ahead of her time. She was one of the world’s foremost systems analysts and lead author of the influential Limits to Growth. She was Adjunct Professor of Environmental Studies at Dartmouth College, the founder of the Sustainability Institute and cofounder of the International Network of Resource Information Centers.
