Chapter 5 Flashcards — System Traps and Opportunities
flashcards tis systems-thinking system-traps archetypes
What is a system archetype?
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A common system structure that produces a characteristic pattern of problematic behavior. Archetypes appear across wildly different domains (economics, ecology, politics, organizations) because their feedback structures are structurally identical.
What is the Policy Resistance trap and how do you escape it?
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Structure: Multiple actors each trying to pull a stock toward their own different goals. Any policy that moves it toward one actor’s goal triggers counter-resistance from others. Nothing changes; everyone wastes effort. Way out: (1) Let go — withdraw the policy; counter-moves will also calm. (2) Harmonize goals — find a higher-level goal all actors can pull toward (e.g., Sweden’s “every child should be wanted and well-cared-for” instead of fighting over birth rate numbers).
What is the Tragedy of the Commons trap?
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Structure: A shared, erodable resource used by multiple actors. Each actor benefits fully from their own use but shares the costs of overuse with everyone. The feedback from resource condition to individual user decisions is missing or too delayed. Result: overuse, depletion.
What are the three ways out of the Tragedy of the Commons?
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- Educate and exhort — least reliable; traditions and honor can be violated. 2. Privatize the commons — create direct feedback between resource condition and user decisions; not applicable to atmosphere/oceans. 3. Regulate — “mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon” (Hardin); requires monitoring, enforcement, legitimate regulators.
What is the Drift to Low Performance trap?
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Structure: A balancing loop whose goal is influenced by past bad performance. Bad performance → goal slips → less corrective action → further degradation. A reinforcing loop going downward. Also called: eroding goals, boiled frog syndrome.
How do you escape the Drift to Low Performance trap?
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(1) Keep standards absolute, regardless of actual performance. (2) Let standards be driven by the best past performance, not the worst. This flips the same R loop upward: better results → higher standards → more effort → even better results.
What is the Escalation trap?
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Structure: Two stocks where each actor’s goal is to surpass the other’s state — a reinforcing loop of competitive one-upmanship. Each response justifies further response, producing exponential growth toward extremes. Examples: arms races, price wars, negative campaign advertising.
How do you escape the Escalation trap?
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- Unilateral disarmament — deliberately reduce your own state to break the loop (counterintuitive; requires surviving short-term disadvantage). 2. Negotiate a structural change — create new balancing loops to bound the competition (arms control treaties, advertising regulations).
What is the Success to the Successful trap?
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Structure: Winners of a competition receive resources that allow them to win even more decisively next time — a reinforcing loop driving toward monopoly or elimination of weaker competitors. Also called competitive exclusion principle in ecology.
What are the ways out of the Success to the Successful trap?
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- Diversification — winner finds new niche; loser exits and enters new market. 2. Limit the winner’s gain — antitrust laws cap total market share. 3. Level the playing field — progressive taxation, inheritance taxes, universal education. 4. Periodic reset — games start over with equal positions.
What is the Addiction (Shifting the Burden to the Intervenor) trap?
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Structure: An intervention relieves symptoms without solving the underlying problem. If the intervention causes the system’s self-correcting capacity to atrophy, more intervention is needed over time, creating dependency. The loop: Problem → Intervention → Symptom relief → Underlying problem persists → More intervention → Self-capacity weakened.
What are examples of Addiction traps beyond substance addiction?
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- Government subsidies to inefficient industries → industry loses capacity to compete independently. - Pesticides → natural predators decline → more pesticides needed. - Highway construction → reduces transit incentive → more driving → more highways needed. - Modern medicine shifting health responsibility from lifestyle to doctors and drugs.
What is the Rule Beating trap?
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Structure: Rules designed to govern a system lead to evasive behavior that satisfies the letter but not the spirit of the law. The system self-organizes to work around the rules. Examples: departments spend budget at year-end to avoid cuts; Vermont’s 10-acre law → proliferation of 10.1-acre lots.
How should you respond to rule-beating behavior?
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Treat rule-beating as feedback — it signals that the rules are poorly designed, unworkable, or create perverse incentives. Don’t respond with more enforcement; redesign the rules to align creative energy with the purpose of the rules, not against them.
What is the Seeking the Wrong Goal trap?
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Structure: Balancing feedback loops driven by goals that don’t accurately reflect the real desired outcome. The system produces exactly what was asked for — which is not what was wanted. Examples: national security measured by military spending; education quality measured by test scores; GNP as welfare.
What is the way out of the Seeking the Wrong Goal trap?
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Specify indicators and goals that reflect the real welfare of the system. Don’t confuse effort with result. Don’t optimize proxies when you can observe actual outcomes. Be especially critical of what you’re measuring and why.
Total Cards: 16
Review Time: ~8 minutes
Priority: HIGH
Last Updated: 2026-05-30