Several streams of cybernetic thinking lead to the notion that there may exist systems of a higher logical order than that of manmade organisation. Such systems would be autopoietic and, in principle, beyond human control. Man and his institutions would be but components of such systems. The accelerated growth of institutions and the connections between them facilitated by the IT revolution makes the realization of such systems more probable at this time. The implications for systems practice are discussed.

Key words: autopoiesis, cybernetics, management, organization, systems practice.

The debate about the application of the concept of “autopoiesis” to social systems has been disabled by the difficulties of defining the autopoiesis of a specific social system ostensively. This paper considers the evidence that the circular relations of production which define autopoietic processes appear both in the cognitive domain and in the domains of human activity associated with “accounting.” Without a sound theoretical footing and, in the eyes of some, fatally flawed, accounting appears to be organizationally closed, capable of adapting itself to its rapidly changing environment, and probably well able to engulf many of the alternative ways of representing activities in society. It is concluded that if there are indeed “autopoietic suprahuman systems” of a natural kind mobilizing mankind in their service, then accounting is to be numbered among them.

Autopoietic systems are self-defining and real-world entities of a natural kind. They are subject to natural laws. It is suggested that the theory of emergence and the law of maximum entropy production relate to, and may be predictive of, the emergence, development, and evolution of autopoietic entities, including supra-human systems. \\Not to be confused with institutionalized categories such as family, corporation, nation, etc… autopoietic supra-human systems are irreducible entities of a different order from the mutually causal interactions, conversations and compliances, that produce them and are inaccessible at the level from which they emerge. \\The energy driving the emergence of supra-human systems is the human lifetime locked up in au-topoietic organization and ultimately dispersed, thus maximizing entropy production in the social domain. The possibly dire effects on the human state are considered. \\This hypothesis justifies closing the gap between the naral and social sciences under the rubric of general systems studies.

Key words: Alienation. autopoiesis. entropy production, general systems thinking, natural kind entities, social dynamics, supra-human systems

Counter response to Zeleny M. & Hufford K. D. (1992) The ordering of the unknown by causing it to order itself. International Journal of General Systems 21(2): 239–253.