Abstract
The recent emergence of internet-enabled software tools to support e-learning has prompted many UK universities to begin to attempt to integrate auch Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) into their teaching. It is generally recognised that to be effective in an institutional context, VLEs need to be joined up to existing information and administration systems. In this paper we argue from a cybernetics perspective that in addition to the technical demands of this task, there are a wide variety of organisational, social and political factors associated with the way a university is structured, the dynamics of its internal operation and its recent history that present a significant risk of project failure of they are not given sufficient recognition and appropriate strategies for change put in place. The challenges can usefully be addressed from a cybernetics perspective. The remainder of this paper describes an approach to modelling an institution's socio-techncial systems using a combination of the Viable System Model, drawn from management cybernetics and action research techniques.