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C. West Churchman, Russell L. Ackoff, E. Leonard Arnoff.
Introduction to Operations Research.
Wiley. 1957

As its title indicates, this book is an introductory treatment of a growing field of scientific research. It grew out of lecture material for the “Short Course in Operations Research” offered, at first, annually (since 1952) and, now, semiannually by Case Institute of Technology. For the prospective consumer of O.R. it provides a basis for evaluating the field and for understanding its procedures and its potentialities. For the new or future practitioner it presents a survey of the field and the background necessary for further education to gain competence with the methods and techniques.

The technical material has been simplified, but not at the risk of distortion. In a clear and straight-forward manner, the book presents a general coverage of such topics as inventory, linear programming, waiting line, replacement, competitive and other mathematical methods useful in O.R.

Each method and model is illustrated by an interesting and lucid case example to point up the important implications of O.R. in business and industry. Emphasis is on the importance of defining management problems in terms of objectives and on the importance of administration of O.R.

C. West Churchman.
The Systems Approach: 2nd edn.
Delta. 1979

C. West Churchman.
The Systems Approach and Its Enemies.
Basic Books. 1979

The systems approach to planning—in the form of operations research, systems analysis, and other kinds of comprehensive rational planning—has already revolutionized the way we fight our wars, design our cities, and run our businesses. And yet both we and the planners themselves are increasingly dissatisfied with this approach as a means of improving the human condition.

Here one of the originators of systems analysis, himself a leading practitioner who has applied the systems approach in fields as varied as education, city planning, public health, and management, argues forcefully that the critics—at least some of them—have a point: there are approaches to human affairs which, although not “rational,” are nonetheless powerful and indeed desirable keys to understanding human experience. Too often, Professor Churchman concedes, such ultimate realities are ignored, with the result that planning efforts are sterile, unsatisfying, and irrelevant. Drawing on his own experience as both thinker and planner, he shows, as few have done before, that until planners learn to stand back and consider the purpose of their designs from the broadest nonplanning point of view, those designs will continue to be both “inhuman” and largely unimplemented.