Systemic Therapy - Praxis of Systemic Therapy

Praxis of Systemic Therapy

This has a direct impact on the praxis of systemic therapy which approaches problems practically rather than analytically, i.e. it does not attempt to determine past causes as does the psychoanalytic approach, nor does it assign diagnosis (who is sick, who is a victim), rather systemic therapy seeks instead to identify stagnant patterns of behavior in groups of people such as a family, and address those patterns directly, irrespective of analysis of cause. A key point here of this postmodern perspective then is not a denial of absolutes, but far more a humility and recognition on the part of the therapist that they do not hold the power to change people or systems, rather the systemic therapist's role is to help systems to change themselves by introducing creative “nudges”,

“Systemic therapy neither attempts a 'treatment of causes' nor of symptoms, rather it gives living systems nudges that help them to develop new patterns together, taking on a new organizational structure that allows growth.”

Thus systemic therapy differs from analytic forms of therapy, including psychoanalytic or psychodynamic forms of family therapy (for example the work of Horst Eberhard Richter) in systemic therapy's focus on practically addressing current relationship patterns rather than analyzing causes such as subconscious impulses or childhood trauma. Systemic therapy also differs from family systems therapy in that it addresses other living systems (i.e. groups of people) in addition to the family, for example businesses. In addition to families and business, the systemic approach is increasingly being implemented in the fields of education, politics, psychiatry, social work, and family medicine.