SOCIAL CYBERNETICS - PROMISES AND PITFALLS

After a brief review of the influence of cybernetic thinking in both t heory and practice of social sciences, the paper develops an integrate d social theory, or ''social cybernetics'', by incorporating recent ad vances in cybernetics and systems science. ''Social cybernetics'' is b uilt on the five conditions of interdependence, requisite variety, loo ped instrumentation, organic coherence and entropy change. How policy instruments are formulated and implemented is shown to be crucial if t he new discipline of ''social cybernetics'' is to be helpful in guidin g the evolution of social systems.