 Integration means the bringing together or connecting of things. It is the act of combining or adding parts to make a unified whole. As such, it can be defined as the opposite from disintegration or differentiation, which means to set apart. The degree of integration to a system can be defined in terms of the integrity to the network of connections between its parts. The systems paradigm looks at the world in terms of relations and the integrity of those relations. Systems are integrated holes whose properties cannot be reduced to those of smaller units. Instead of concentrating on basic building blocks or substances, the systems approach emphasizes the principles of organization, how the components are integrated into whole patterns of organization. At a low level of connectivity, what defines an entity is simply its set of elements. But as the degree of connectivity is turned up, it is the connections between the parts that comes to define the whole organization as an integrated system. Thus what defines a system is the degree of connectivity, exchange and interdependence between the parts. At a low level of connectivity and integration, the systems parts define the relations and the whole. But in integrated systems with a dense network of connections, this is inverted as the parts come to be shaped by the connections in the whole system. The degree of integration to the connections within a system is important because it defines how unified that system is. The connections within a system enable the flow of some resource through those connections. It is this flow of resources through the system into an interdependent hole. It is the movement of blood through the network of veins within the body that is the primary integrating factor to the whole system. Likewise, it is the flow of communications through a nation's broadcast media that binds a modern nation state into a single integrated sociocultural unit. Social capital likewise can be understood as the number of connections within a community. A strong community is an integrated network of connections along which resources flow and which enables the community to experience itself and operate as an entirety. Every new connection made within the system allows some resources to flow more efficiently. Whether this is goods within a national transport network, information to flow more freely around the world through telecommunications networks or resources within ecosystems through the exchange between the creatures. The more the connections, the greater the integration and the more the organization will form a unified system. Disintegration may be understood as the opposite from integration, as it defines the breaking up or the removing of connections and a reduction in overall integration. As the system becomes disintegrated, the relations are reduced and the parts become disconnected. No longer interdependent, the system returns to a simple set of components without unity to it. From this perspective, when looking at the difference between a functional community and a dysfunctional urban ghetto, we would note that there is some integration within the first social network that enables the flow of resources between the members of the community. While the dysfunctional community would represent a disintegrated network that inhibits the flow of these resources and the overall functioning of the system. Although disintegration can appear as being solely dysfunctional, it does however play a major role in the development of a system. Without disintegration, there can be no reintegration. For example, on the level of the individual, this dynamic process of integration and disintegration is captured in psychology under the term positive disintegration. Unlike mainstream psychology, this theoretical framework views psychological tension and anxiety as necessary for growth. These disintegrative processes are therefore seen as positive, whereas people who fail to go through positive disintegration may remain in a state of primary integration. The connections within a system and its overall integration enable system-wide processes to take place. Through the connections, the parts to a system can become interrelated in performing some common function. For example, the human digestive system is a set of components that are integrated through a nexus of connections to perform one overall macro operation of processing inputted food into nutrients to be circulated. For example, when a business is operating as an integrated system, production processes can take place that span the entire organization. The system's functionality may be reduced by some part, not functioning properly or through lack of interoperability between the elements leading to disintegration. Integration through connectivity then forms the foundations of the process of emergence. To achieve emergence within a system, the parts must be integrated so that a global process can take place through those connections. As another example of this, through globalization, which is the process of international integration, we're witnessing the rise of global processes, such as production and logistics processes that require the integration of economies and organizations across the entire planet. Integration is a defining factor to the autonomy of a system. As what defines a system is the pattern of connections between its parts, the greater the interconnections and interdependence between the elements within a system, the more it can function as a coherent integrated whole, defining its autonomy from its environment. This exchange between the parts enables processes take place within the system that are autonomous to some degree from other systems in the environment. Within an integrated community of people, there will be certain processes that take place, making it a functional and autonomous society with beliefs, social institutions and economic activity being integrated to form a coherent society. Dependence may then be understood as the opposite of autonomy and thus a lack of self-contained integration. Without appropriate connections between the parts, the system requires more connections to other entities within its environment to enable its functional processes to take place. Integration then is a defining factor to autonomy. The word integrity evolved from the Latin adjective integer, meaning whole or complete. Integrity is a state of being integrated into a whole. An individual's personal integrity, for example, is their capacity to define a set of moral rules and code that are coherent and to act in agreement with them. Integrity in this sense is generally understood as a personal choice to hold oneself to consistent moral and ethical standards. Integrity stands in opposition to hypocrisy, where hypocrisy means a lack of integration between one's stated values and actions. Hypocrisy implies that a party holds within themselves conflicting values and actions, and thus there is a lack of integration. When someone acts based upon integrity, they act according to some coherent set of rules, and this enables their autonomy from contingent events that are governed by a different set of rules. In this integrity of acting consistently under the same set of rules, the individual defines their autonomy and earns trust from others. With integrity, others can trust that they will continue to operate under the same consistent set of rules in the future. In such a way, others feel they know how they will act and can count on them to make actions based upon the rules they used in the past. Integration and disintegration form a dynamic process through which a system develops to become part of larger systems and environments, as the integration to a system on one level must become, at least partially, disintegrated to promote integration on another level. Integration represents a unique set of interrelations between a group of parts that define them as in some way autonomous from other systems in their environment, but for a system to inter-operate with other systems and form part of a more extensive environment, some of the connections in the system will become compromised or redundant. For example, as a traditional community becomes integrated into a modern nation state, some of the local, social, economic or cultural connections will be replaced by those forming within the larger society, thus at the same time integrating the smaller subsystems into the larger organization of the parent society, but also working to disintegrate local connections within the community. This new set of links work then to reduce the integrity of the original system in that they are governed by a different protocol and set of rules as defined by the larger organization. Likewise, it works to reduce the original system's autonomy in that it now becomes more dependent on the broader system in some way.