International Summit and Conference on Enterprises *as* Systems

For the past 6 years the International Conference on Enterprises as Systems: Theory and Theory in Action has been concerned with the treatment of (networked) enterprises *as* systems in constantly changing social, economic, legal and technical environments. It has been held (with varying degrees of success) with the intent to create an environment for the collaborative exchange of knowledge among and between the Systemics Community, the Systems Architecture and Engineering Community (including Enterprise Architecture), and communities that are concerned with any aspect/part or whole of (inter-, intra-) enterprise systems and enterprises *as* systems.

This year, to further the collaboration effort, a(n) (Networked)Enterprises *as*
Systems Summit will be held in conjunction with the conference. Common threads for both the summit and conference include:

(1) (networked)enterprises *as* systems in the (general) systems-theoretic sense (systemics and the systems family of disciplines)
(2) identification and characterization of some of the most complex problems facing (networked) enterprises and potential solutions to which systemics may contribute.
(3) the formal and/or empirical representation of such systems for description,explanation, simulation, prediction and operation(formal/empirical theory)
(4) the use/application of theory in analysis / design, architecture / engineering, strategy, tactics, and operation of (inter-, intra-) enterprise systems and enterprises *as* systems

In general an enterprise may be considered a business, an educational organization, a standards body, a government organization, a federation, a group of enterprises bound by law in some fashion, any group of cooperating / collaborating enterprises such as those in GRID systems and emergency management/response systems, etc. In essence, an enterprise is a socio-technical system with dynamically varying systems characteristics which are dependent on both its' internal environment and its' external social, legal, economic/financial, and technical environment.

Disciplines of Systemics include, but are not limited to: General Systems Theory, Complex Adaptive Systems, Cybernetics, System-of-Systems, Systems Dynamics, Systems Thinking, Systems Engineering, Systems Analysis, Autopoiesis, Organization Theory.

The distinction between the summit and conference is that a summit organization committee, with input from interested individuals/organizations, will determine the summit tracks, the summit schedule, duration, etc.
The conference (and workshop) will focus primarily on a special topic and individuals will submit contributions for consideration. It is tentatively planned for the conference to kick-off the summit the first week in Aug. The summit will be virtual and will tentatively last until the third week in Nov.

Conference Dates: August 15-17, 2012
The Summit will run from August 20 - November 21st.

Summit planning is in the early stages. If anyone has any comments/questions, or if any person or organization is interested in planning the *summit* please contact me.

Conference information may be found at: http://www.enterprisesystemtheory.net/estconference/estconference.html.