In Integral Relational Logic, hierarchy is a primal concept, indicating three principal types of hierarchical relationships, which can be connected to form networks, as interpreted structures, generally easier to understand than their dual associative relationships, which can lead to much complexity.
Using the fundamental principles of concept formation, these are:
It is important not to dismiss hierarchical relationships, as some do, because of their association with authoritarian social structures, like organized religions, the military, business corporations, and nation states.
If the cognitive maps we use to guide us during our daily activities are to be complete, it essential to include such relationships in our maps of the Cosmos. For, as E. F. Schumacher stated in A Guide for the Perplexed, the fundamental maxim for mapmaking is “Accept everything; reject nothing.”
But with authoritarian structures on the rise in our sick society, there is no simple solution to how we can deal harmoniously with this critical psychosocial issue, other than just to accept it.
Probably about 1343, ierarchie ‘ranked division of angels’, from Old French jerarchie, from Medieval Latin hierarchia, from Greek hierarkhiā ‘rule of a high priest’, from hierarkhēs ‘high priest, leader of the sacred rites’, from hieros (ἱερόϛ) ‘holy, sacred; vigorous, strong’, possibly from PIE base *eis-, and arkhē (ἀρχή).