In order to illuminate the ambiguity of the ecosystem concept and to distinguish ecosystem theories a typology for theories of synecological units is proposed. Three idealtypical forms of supra-individual organisation are constructed: ‘association of independent individuals’, ‘organismic community’, ‘machine-like community’. For heuristic reasons these idealtypes are developed based on the ‘structural core’ of political philosophies, namely of liberalism, konservatism and democracy. By a comparative study guided by these three idealtypes both the peculiarities of the respective synecological theory and the substantial differences between ecosystem theories can be shown.
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In order to illuminate the ambiguity of the ecosystem concept and to distinguish ecosystem theories a typology for theories of synecological units is proposed. Three idealtypical forms of supra-individual organisation are constructed: ‘association of independent individuals’, ‘organismic community’, ‘machine-like community’. For heuristic reasons these idealtypes are developed based on the ‘structural core’ of political philosophies, namely of liberalism, konservatism and democracy. By a compara...
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