Advances in the Systems Sciences 2018

Dear Colleagues,

Every year, the International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS) convenes a conference where everyone with an interest in the field of systems can meet to present, discuss, and learn about new developments in our understanding or application of the systems sciences. The conference has a topical annual theme, but there is also a continuity of subject interests, as represented by the ISSS’s 24 “Special Integration Groups” (SIGs). 

This Special Issue aims at enhancing the impact of the ISSS conference in three ways, by:

1. Giving attendees an opportunity to create modified and extended versions of their conference papers, based on the discussions, feedback, and other insights they generated at the conference;
2. Providing community members who were unable to join the conference with an opportunity to engage with the conference theme and ISSS SIG themes by contributing a paper they would have liked to present if they had been able to attend the conference;
3. Enabling conference attendees to present additional papers beyond the one they were limited to by the conference design.

We invite contributions on any aspect of the theme of the 2018 ISSS Conference, Innovation and Optimization in Nature and Design, or on any of the following ISSS SIG themes:

• Action research;
• Balancing individualism and collectivism;
• Critical systems theory and practice;
• Designing educational systems;
• Digital product–service systems (IS and ICT);
• Health and systems thinking;
• Hierarchy theory;
• Human systems inquiry;
• Leadership and systemic innovation (LaSI);
• Living systems science;
• Organizational transformation and social change;
• Relational science;
• Research towards general theories of systems;
• Science, spirituality, and systems science;
• Socioecological systems and design;
• Systemic ethics;
• Systems applications in business and industry;
• Systems biology and evolution;
• Systems and mental health;
• Systems modeling and systems engineering;
• Systems pathology;
• Systems philosophy.

For details about the focus of each SIG please visit: isss.org/world/special_integration_groups

This invitation is open to anyone interested in contributing to the advancement of the systems sciences and their applications, and is NOT conditional on ISSS membership or ISSS Conference attendance. Submissions must be original works not previously published, or, if previously published in the Proceedings of the 2018 ISSS Conference, then substantially reworked and extended compared to the Proceedings version. Review and acceptance of papers will proceed in accordance with the MDPI Systems journal editorial policies and processes.

Dr. Javier Calvo-Amodio
Dr. David Rousseau
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Systems is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.