System archetype
Any system can be drawn as a diagram set up with circles of causality – including actions, feedbacks and delays.
The balancing (negative) feedback adjusts a present state to a desirable target regardless whether the trend is descending or ascending.
This causes an under- or overestimation of the needed action and results in oscillation, instability or even breakdown.
Nevertheless, correctly identifying and understanding your situation is always the first step of solving your problem in a sustainable way.
If the agents do not perceive the delayed feedback, they might overshoot or underestimate the requisite action in order to reach their goals.
Example: supply chain (The Beer Game)[1] The unprecedented growth is produced by a reinforcing feedback process until the system reaches its peak.
Example: dieting, learning foreign languages[1] The Attractiveness Principle is an archetype derived from Limits to Growth.
The origin of the problem should be identified and solved in the long-term run during which the addiction to the symptomatic remedy decreases.
Example: drug addiction, paying debts by borrowing[1] A special case of the “Shifting the Burden” systems archetype that occurs when an intervenor is brought in to help solve an ongoing problem.
In the short-term this works, but in the long term the system is unable to function on its own due to the dependence on the intervention and eventually fails to perform.
Example: balancing the public debt, sliding limits of environmental pollution[1] The escalation archetype could be seen as a non-cooperative game where both players suppose that just one of them can win.
The vicious circle can be broken by one agent stopping to react defensively and turn the game into cooperative one.
Examples: two products of one company, work vs. family[1] Agents use common limited resource to profit individually.
If the investment is not aggressive enough (or it is too low), the capacities are overloaded, the quality of services declines and the demand decreases.
