Identifying Assumptions of the Relation between Ecosystem Thinking and Systems Thinking, Using Q Methodology

Ecosystem is a concept borrowed from humanities, the field of creation and nature, on the basis of which economic, organizational, business and social fields have evolved. Based on this evolution, influence of concepts and knowledge, and a special type of thought called ecosystem thinking has been formed. Under this system, understanding and observing the different social and economic spaces as ecosystems and designing them as ecosystems become relevant. Ecosystem thinking is now a new perception which relates to systems thinking. This study is intended to identify different presuppositions of some scholars and thinkers in the field of systems theory, on the relation between system thinking and ecosystem thinking. Hence, Q methodology is employed for this purpose because it is designed for identifying the suppositions and for their classification. Having covered the scope and theoretical literature of the research, 37 statements of this theoretical domain were extracted and were exposed through identical cards to 30 participant selected by availability for sorting the Q sample. The reliability of Q categories was confirmed through test-retest method. The collected data were analyzed and processed by SPSS25 software. Q factor analysis resulted in the identification of four suppositions including “contrast”, “absolute generality and peculiarity”, “relative generality and peculiarity” and “change and evolution”. Finally different identified suppositions were introduced.