WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM OUR FRIENDS - HOW SYSTEM DYNAMICS AND SOFT ORCAN LEARN FROM EACH OTHER

At its inception, the paradigm of system dynamics was deliberately mad e distinct from that of OR. Yet developments in soft OR now have much in common with current system dynamics modeling practice. This article briefly traces the parallel development of system dynamics and soft O R, and argues that a dialogue between the two would be mutually reward ing. To support this claim, examples of soft OR tools are described al ong with some of the field's philosophical grounding and current issue s. Potential benefits resulting from a dialogue are explored, with par ticular emphasis on the methodological framework of system dynamics an d the need for a complementarist approach. The article closes with som e suggestions on how to begin learning from the links between the two fields.