Nested hierarchies are different: they contain no value judgments, no better/worse or superior/inferior. Rather, they describe a set of relationships, often correlated to scale. In biology this is the hierarchical logic of Kingdom-Phylum-Class-Order-Family-Genus-Species. Though this is often graphically depicted as top-down (and thus looks similar ... See more
One of his observations is that when any aspect of a living system is torn from its contextual relationships, it can then be exploited. How a description is made of a person, a family, a community, a culture, or an ecosystem –matters.