Structural Couplings
Niklas Luhmann · 2004
Abstract The more systems theory stresses the operative closure of autopoietic systems, the greater the need to establish how the relations between the system and its environment are shaped. Neither reality nor the causal relevance of the environment is denied (otherwise one could not even talk about difference, differentiation, etc.). Operative closure means only that the autopoiesis of the system can be performed only with its own operations. Hence the unity of the system can be reproduced only with the system’s own operations. Conversely, the system cannot operate in its environment and hence cannot communicate with the environment by using the system’s operations.