[Author's abstract] If Critical Systems Thinking is to contribute to enlightened
societal practice, e.g. with respect to the pressing environmental and societal
issues of our time, it should be accessible not only to well-trained
decision-takers and academics but also to a majority of citizens. The point is
not that Critical Systems Thinking ought to take an advocacy stance but
rather, that it has a potential to give new meaning to the concept of
citizenship; it might enable all of us to become more responsible citizens. My
question is, how can we harvest this potential? I propose that the way in
which we seek to answer this question might constitute an important test for
the methodological viability and validity of Critical Systems Thinking.