Introduction

Systemic psychotherapy has long distinguished itself through its commitment to challenging individualized explanations of distress. Influenced by developments in general systems theory, cybernetics, communication theory, and constructivist thought, systemic practitioners increasingly emphasized relationships, circular processes, and the broader social and cultural contexts in which difficulties emerge (e.g., Bateson, 1972; Minuchin, 1974; Von Bertalanffy, 1950, 1968; Watzlawick et al., 1974). General systems theory proposed that living systems are best understood not as collections of isolated components but as dynamic and interconnected wholes whose properties emerge through relationships among their constituent parts. Bowen (1978) similarly emphasized the inseparability of individual functioning from wider emotional systems and highlighted the influence of intergenerational patterns and differentiation of Self. Over time, systemic practice has expanded beyond work with families to include organizational, professional, and multi-agency contexts. Constructivist and dialogical approaches further highlighted the importance of language, power, and reflexivity in therapeutic conversations (Anderson, 1997; McNamee, 2015).

Despite this broadening of scope, there remains a sense in practice that systemic therapy is often defined by who is physically present in the room. At the same time, contemporary service contexts have shifted in ways that increasingly position systemic practitioners within individual therapy settings, often due to organizational, financial, and logistical constraints that limit opportunities for whole-family or network-based work. This creates an ongoing clinical and theoretical question: how might systemic epistemology be meaningfully sustained when working with individuals? Engaging with this question has prompted growing interest in approaches that enable therapists to remain relationally and contextually attuned, even in the absence of multiple family members in the room. At the same time, it is important to recognize that this question does not only apply to individual therapy. Even when working with couples and families together, there is an ongoing need for approaches that can hold both interpersonal and intra-personal processes in view. This integration is already evident within systemic traditions. For example, Johnson’s Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy conceptualizes internal emotional experience and interpersonal interaction as mutually organizing processes, with emotion understood as integral to, rather than separate from, the relational system (Johnson, 1998, 2004). In this sense, exploring models that attend to internal relational dynamics may further enrich systemic practice within the therapy room itself, offering additional ways of understanding and engaging with complex relational patterns as they unfold between and within people. These developments raise an important question for contemporary systemic practice: how can systemic principles be maintained when therapists are working not only with interpersonal relationships but also with internal experience? One model that has gained increasing attention in this context is Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy, which will be the focus of the present paper.

Emerging from a family systems background, IFS conceptualizes psychological distress not as a unitary state, but as arising from interactions between multiple “parts” of the Self (Schwartz, 1995; Schwartz & Sweezy, 2019). Although initially situated within trauma and family therapy contexts, IFS has expanded rapidly across counseling, psychotherapy, and coaching settings. At the same time, this growth has been accompanied by both enthusiasm and critique. For instance, increased cultural visibility, including discussions on social media and popular representations such as Pixar’s Inside Out, has contributed to growing public awareness and increased demand for practitioner training (Schwartz & Sweezy, 2019). Critique around the limited evidence base has also been communicated (see Buys, 2025; The Cut, 2025). Such debates are not new within systemic psychotherapy.

Historically, the field has engaged in critical dialogue as new models have emerged. Examples include tensions between structural and Milan approaches and critiques of narrative therapy’s perceived departure from an interactional focus (Minuchin, 1998). These debates reflect an ongoing commitment within systemic practice to theoretical rigor, relational ethics, and contextual sensitivity. From this perspective, the question is not whether new models should be accepted or rejected, but how they can be understood, critically examined, and situated within systemic epistemology.

Within this context, the positioning of IFS remains contested. Concepts such as “parts,” “unblending,” and “Self” may appear to emphasize intra-psychic processes, raising concerns that relational dynamics and social context could be marginalized. It is within this context that IFS merits closer examination. Rather than dismissing the model because of its terminology or popularity, systemic thinkers might ask whether it embodies systemic principles in ways that are theoretically and clinically meaningful, even if expressed through different language. Addressing this question requires examining the core ideas of IFS and the clinical techniques through which change is facilitated, as well as considering how these relate to established systemic theory.

In this paper, we argue that IFS therapy can be understood as compatible with, and potentially extending, systemic thinking. This is not intended to imply equivalence with traditional family therapy, nor does our argument rest solely upon metaphorical parallels. Instead, we propose that IFS reflects systemic principles at the level of both theory and clinical practice. Specifically, we suggest that IFS conceptualizes distress and change in ways that are consistent with core systemic principles and draws upon therapeutic practices that will be familiar to many systemic practitioners. Importantly, our intention is not simply to catalog similarities between IFS and systemic therapy, nor to argue that IFS should be uncritically incorporated into systemic practice. Rather, we seek to explore whether IFS may be understood as a contemporary extension and elaboration of systemic epistemology within the intra-personal domain. More specifically, we examine whether internal experience can be understood according to principles that have long informed systemic thinking, including circularity, reflexivity, context, hierarchy, and adaptation. In doing so, we aim not only to contribute to ongoing discussions concerning the nature and boundaries of systemic practice, but also to consider what IFS may contribute to systemic theory itself. In particular, we explore whether IFS offers a framework for integrating intra-personal and interpersonal processes within contemporary systemic practice.

The remainder of the paper is organized into two sections. First, we explore how core systemic concepts, such as homeostasis (Dallos & Draper, 2015), roles and hierarchy (Dallos & Vetere, 2018; McNamee, 2015), polarization (Seikkula & Olson, 2003), and circularity (Burnham, 2012; Whittaker et al., 2023; Selvini Palazzoli et al., 1980), can be understood within internal systems as conceptualized in IFS. We also consider points of convergence between IFS and established systemic practices, including a stance of curiosity (Cecchin, 1987), relational joining and alignment with clients’ meaning-making (Anderson, 1997; Minuchin, 1974), appreciative enquiry (Cooperrider & Srivastva, 2012), circular questioning (Tomm, 1988), family sculpting (Hearn & Lawrence, 1985), and narrative practices including externalizing and witnessing (White, 2024), as well as reconsolidation-informed approaches to change (Ecker et al., 2012; Lane et al., 2015). To bring these ideas into practice, we present an anonymized case vignette. Second, we reflect on the broader implications of positioning IFS as a systemic therapy, particularly for therapists working in contexts where individual therapy predominates, while also considering its potential contribution to work with couples, families, and organizations. We also consider the broader implications and limitations of this position, including concerns regarding the objectification of parts and insufficient attention to social context and power. We conclude by offering a tentative reflection on the value of recognizing IFS as a form of intra-systemic therapy. Rather than replacing family- or network-based work, we suggest that IFS may offer one way of extending and enriching systemic psychotherapy as the boundaries of the field continue to evolve.

Internal systems as relational ecologies

One of the most influential contributions of systemic psychotherapy has been its shift away from locating distress within individuals. This perspective can be traced to general systems theory (Von Bertalanffy, 1950, 1968), which emphasized the importance of understanding phenomena within the context of the wider systems of which they form a part. Rather than assuming that causality operates linearly, general systems theory draws attention to the ways in which interactions, patterns of organization, and reciprocal influences shape the functioning of complex systems over time. Building on these ideas, systemic approaches understand difficulties as emerging within patterns of relationships rather than as properties of isolated individuals. Early systemic thinkers emphasized that problems are rarely maintained through simple cause–effect chains; rather, they persist through circular processes, feedback loops, and attempts to maintain stability that can become self-perpetuating over time (e.g., Bateson, 1972; Watzlawick et al., 1974). From this perspective, change does not occur by correcting isolated behaviors or symptoms, but through shifts in relationships, whether between people, roles, or positions within a system. Over time, systemic thinking has expanded beyond family therapy to include organizational, professional, and discursive contexts. Social constructionist and dialogical developments further highlighted how realities are shaped through language, positioning, and shared meaning rather than discovered as objective truths (Anderson, 1997; McNamee, 2015). As a result, the term “systemic” now refers less to the physical boundaries of a system and more to a way of understanding distress and change as relational, contextual, and embedded within patterns that evolve and stabilize over time.

Importantly, we do not argue that IFS introduced the idea that individuals should be understood within wider relational systems or that internal processes can be conceptualized metaphorically. Systemic practitioners have long employed concepts relating to roles, positions, internalized relationships, internal dialogs, and multigenerational patterns (Bowen, 1978; Satir, 1983). Rather, one of the features that distinguishes IFS is its explicit conceptualization of these experiences as an organized internal system composed of interacting parts, together with the proposition of Self as an organizing center of awareness and the development of a structured therapeutic approach for engaging with these internal relationships. Consequently, our intention is not to position IFS as a departure from systemic thought but rather to explore the extent to which it represents a particular extension and elaboration of systemic ideas within the intra-personal domain.

Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy shares many features with this broader systemic perspective. The model emerged from Richard Schwartz’s background in family therapy and was shaped by his clinical observation that clients often describe their inner experiences as relational rather than singular or static (Schwartz, 1995). Rather than conceptualizing the mind as a unified entity, IFS proposes that human experience is organized through multiple “parts” or sub-personalities that interact with one another within an internal system. These parts are not seen as deficits or dysfunctions, but as meaningful responses that have developed within particular relational and contextual conditions. Within IFS, parts are commonly described as managers, firefighters, and exiles. Managers attempt to maintain control and prevent anticipated harm (e.g., rejection, failure, or humiliation) through strategies like perfectionism, vigilance, emotional suppression, intellectualization, or compliance. A manager’s highest context marker is to prevent further harm (Pearce & Pearce, 2000). Firefighters respond when distress becomes overwhelming, often by attempting to reduce emotional intensity through avoidance, dissociation, compulsive behaviors, or numbing. A firefighter’s highest context marker is to do whatever it takes to stop the pain (Pearce & Pearce, 2000). Exiles carry more vulnerable emotional experiences, frequently linked to shame, fear, grief, or unmet attachment needs (Schwartz & Sweezy, 2019). While these categories can be clinically useful, their systemic significance lies in the roles they perform within the system: each part contributes to an internal organization oriented toward protection, survival, and the maintenance of homeostasis.

The organization of these internal roles may be understood as resembling patterns long described in systemic family therapy. When systems encounter stress or what Bateson (1972) described as “too much difference,” members often adopt stabilizing roles, such as the responsible one, the caretaker, the identified patient, or the distractor, in order to maintain equilibrium (Minuchin, 1974). These roles are often adaptive responses to relational pressures, even if they later become restrictive or costly. IFS suggests that similar role differentiation can occur internally, particularly when early relational environments made certain emotions, needs, or expressions unsafe or unsupported. In this sense, internal systems can be understood as internalized relational arrangements. What appears “internal” is therefore not separate from context, but shaped by relational histories, cultural expectations, and implicit rules about safety and belonging.

The systemic qualities of IFS may become particularly evident in processes of polarization. Systemic clinicians are familiar with polarized dynamics, such as pursuer–distancer cycles or escalating patterns of control and resistance, in which each position intensifies in response to the other (Tomm, 2014). These patterns are maintained through circular feedback processes and rarely resolve through attempts to change one side in isolation. Instead, change typically requires a shift in the relational context that sustains the pattern. IFS describes a comparable process within the internal system. For example, a controlling manager part may attempt to prevent exposure to shame or vulnerability by increasing vigilance and control, while a firefighter responds by intensifying avoidance or emotional numbing. Each part experiences the other as problematic, and each escalates its strategy in response. From a systemic perspective, this dynamic reflects a self-reinforcing protective loop organized around perceived threat, rather than an individual pathology. Accordingly, IFS does not attempt to eliminate or override one position, but to transform the relational context in which the polarization occurs. This approach resonates with systemic principles of neutrality and circularity, as articulated in early Milan systemic practice (Selvini Palazzoli et al., 1980), where the aim is to understand and shift patterns rather than align with any single position.

One mechanism proposed to support this reorganization in IFS is the concept of Self, described as an innate capacity characterized by qualities such as calmness, curiosity, compassion, clarity, courage, confidence, creativity, and connectedness (Schwartz & Sweezy, 2019). Importantly, Self is not conceptualized as another part competing for influence within the system. Rather, it represents a reflexive position from which the internal system can observe itself and relate differently. From a systemic perspective, this can be understood as a shift in internal leadership, resonating with broader systemic ideas about reflexivity and meta-positioning. For example, this aligns with McCarthy and Minogue’s (2019) notion of a “fifth province,” which describes a space of reflective awareness beyond immediate interaction, as well as with Partridge’s (2007) positioning compass, in which the “all-seeing eye” represents a capacity to hold multiple perspectives simultaneously. In this sense, Self may be understood as an intra-systemic analogue of the systemic therapist’s reflexive stance.

When the internal system is dominated by protective roles alone, patterns often become rigid and reactive, with responses organized around the need to prevent perceived threat or emotional overwhelm. This can be understood in relation to Byng-Hall’s (1995) description of corrective and replicative family scripts, which, while well-intentioned, can become constrained and repetitive over time. In contrast, the emergence of a more reflective leadership stance – consistent with access to Self – enables greater flexibility within the system. From this position, parts are able to renegotiate their roles, soften their extremes, and respond more adaptively to changing contexts. This process is akin to the development of more improvisational family scripts (Byng-Hall, 1995), in which relational responses are less bound by rigid patterns and more open to variation, creativity, and responsiveness. In this way, Self-led reorganization can be understood not as the elimination of parts, but as a systemic shift in how internal relationships are structured and enacted.

This shift can be understood as a form of second-order change. Rather than modifying behavior within an existing structure, the system reorganizes the principles that govern it, such as how threat is interpreted, how authority is distributed, and how vulnerability is managed (Watzlawick et al., 1974). As in systemic therapy more broadly, the aim is not simply symptom reduction but increased adaptability, choice, and coherence. When the system reorganizes in this way, symptoms often reduce as a consequence rather than as a direct target. IFS facilitates this reorganization through clinical practices that closely resemble established systemic and experiential techniques. Circular and reflexive questioning, as developed by Tomm (1987, 1988), plays a central role, although the questions are directed toward internal roles rather than external relationships. Questions such as: “What do you fear would happen if you stepped back?” or “What happens inside when the pressure increases?” help map circular processes and implicit system rules rather than searching for simple causal explanations. These forms of enquiry encourage differentiation between positions and allow the system to observe itself in new ways, opening space for change. In this respect, the process resonates with Bowen’s (1978) concept of differentiation of self, which refers to the capacity to maintain reflective awareness while remaining emotionally connected within relational systems.

Witnessing practices also connect IFS with narrative and trauma-informed systemic approaches. Narrative therapy has long emphasized the importance of witnessing in supporting meaning-making and restoring agency, particularly following traumatic experiences (Denborough, 2012). In IFS, protective parts often soften when vulnerable experiences are approached with care and respect. Previously exiled experiences can then be processed through careful witnessing and contextualization (Schwartz & Sweezy, 2019). In this sense, the process can be understood not as exposure to distress but as a relational revision of meaning. Recent trauma research has also linked such processes to memory reconsolidation. Reconsolidation theory proposes that when a memory is reactivated and then updated through a new emotional experience that contradicts previous expectations, the underlying learning can be revised rather than merely suppressed (Ecker & Bridges, 2020; Ecker et al., 2012). In IFS, when vulnerable experience is activated while the system simultaneously encounters a new relational stance, characterized by safety, compassion, and protection, earlier threat-based meanings may be revised. This may help explain why changes achieved through IFS are often experienced as durable and internally coherent.

To illustrate how some of these systemic processes unfold in IFS practice, we present an anonymized case vignette below. The vignette draws primarily on one clinical case but has been substantially adapted to protect confidentiality. Details have been changed, combined, or omitted to preserve anonymity while retaining the relational and contextual processes that are central to the work. Reflecting the systemic orientation of this paper, the vignette brings together multiple perspectives, including those of the client, the family, the therapist, and the supervisory process. Rather than presenting a literal account of a particular sequence of events, the intention is to illuminate the recursive and relational processes through which difficulties emerged, were maintained, and gradually shifted over time.

Case vignette

In this vignette, we present a substantially anonymized and adapted clinical case involving a family referred for court-ordered psychotherapy. Janet, a 38-year-old mother of two daughters, Mabel (9) and Iris (14), had separated from their father, Morris (45). Their separation was shaped by differing views on gender roles and parenting, with ongoing tensions influencing post-separation arrangements. Following an incident in which Janet slapped Iris during an argument and subsequently left the children at home while attempting to regulate her distress, Morris sought full custody through the courts. An independent psychological assessment concluded that the children remained at risk of significant harm, as defined within the Children Act (1989), owing to concerns regarding emotional dysregulation, episodes of anger, and difficulties within the parent-child relationship. Janet had not previously received a formal psychiatric diagnosis. The independent assessment nevertheless characterized her presentation in terms of personality disorder traits, a formulation that the present paper seeks to consider within a broader relational, developmental, and sociocultural context. The court subsequently recommended supervised contact and psychotherapeutic intervention, with the aim of supporting Janet’s emotional regulation and reducing the likelihood of further harm.

The vignette is presented in two interrelated strands. First, we describe the therapeutic work with the family, which begins with Janet individually and then develops into joint sessions with both Janet and her daughter Iris. The progression illustrates how the therapist works not only with an individual, but also with the system of which these individuals are a part of, thereby attending to both internal and interpersonal systems. Second, we reflect on the therapist’s own internal system, highlighting how engagement with the external systems (i.e., the psychological report) activated the therapist’s internal system, and how the therapist worked through this in their own supervision time to ensure a shift toward more effective clinical work. Both these strands as well as relevant parts relations are illustrated in Figure 1 below.

Work with the family

Several challenges emerged during the therapeutic process. First, the high-conflict nature of the separation contributed to considerable mistrust between family members and the professionals involved in the proceedings. Second, Janet’s history of attachment-related trauma, parentification, and unresolved grief increased her vulnerability to emotional dysregulation when themes of abandonment, criticism, and rejection were activated. Third, the ongoing court proceedings introduced additional complexity, requiring the therapist to balance therapeutic work with considerations relating to safeguarding, risk management, and professional neutrality. Finally, Morris declined participation in joint work, requiring the therapist to work systemically with the parental subsystem despite the absence of one family member.

Therapy initially focused on Janet individually, over a course of five sessions. The aim was to support her in developing awareness of her internal system and increasing access to Self-energy before involving other family members. This was informed by Minuchin’s et al. (2021) structural ideas of strengthening the parental subsystem before introducing the child, to reduce the possibility of Janet becoming emotionally dysregulated with Iris present. Through an IFS-informed approach, different internal roles became visible, including protective manager and firefighter parts, alongside more vulnerable exile positions. Using the “parts on the bus”¹ metaphor, Janet began to identify how different parts attempted to take control in moments of distress. Over time, she connected these responses to earlier experiences, particularly her father’s departure when she was 14 years old and her subsequent assumption of a caregiving role within the family. A systemic hypothesis (Selvini Palazzoli et al., 1980) gradually emerged that Janet’s difficulties intensified when Iris reached the age of 14, mirroring the developmental period during which Janet’s own family system underwent significant change (McGoldrick et al., 2014). It was hypothesized that Iris’ increasing differentiation and growing independence reactivated Janet’s unresolved grief, fears of abandonment, and experiences associated with her own earlier parentification. At the same time, Iris appeared to have taken on a parentified role in relation to Janet, suggesting a possible repetition of caregiving roles across generations. As these experiences became overwhelming, firefighter parts responded through anger, withdrawal, and other strategies aimed at reducing emotional pain.

Through the process of unburdening, Janet was able to revisit these experiences from a position of greater Self-energy and support the release of beliefs and responsibilities that no longer belonged to her. In doing so, she increasingly recognized that she was no longer the 14-year-old adolescent who had been required to assume an adult role within the family. As Janet developed greater access to Self-energy, she became increasingly able to approach this exile with compassion, curiosity, and understanding. This internal reorganization reduced her emotional reactivity as Iris began her own process of differentiation (Bowen, 1978). Using Minuchin’s et al. (2021) structural framework, the boundaries between Janet and Iris gradually shifted from an “enmeshed” to a more developmentally appropriate pattern. Mapping these recursive processes helped Janet recognize the circular relationship between her internal experiences and her interpersonal relationships. Over time, she demonstrated increased compassion, curiosity, and emotional regulation, all of which are considered indicators of greater Self-leadership. This shift represented an important precondition for subsequent relational work.

Once Janet showed sufficient emotional stability and reflective capacity, the therapist invited her daughter, Iris, to join the sessions. This decision was informed by a structural formulation focused on relational repair and strengthening the parental subsystem (Minuchin et al., 2021). During this phase of the work, the therapist supported Janet in remaining aware of her own internal system while simultaneously attending to Iris’s internal experience and the recursive patterns emerging between them. The therapist moved flexibly between intra- and interpersonal processes, exploring how internal dynamics became expressed within the broader relational system. For example, Janet recognized an exile that had historically sought care and comfort from Iris, reflecting a longstanding pattern of parentification (Figure 1). Iris, in turn, had learned from an early age that suppressing her own needs and presenting herself as “good” increased the likelihood of maintaining connection with her mother. As Iris entered adolescence and began the developmentally appropriate process of differentiation (Bowen, 1978), these strategies became increasingly difficult to sustain. Iris increasingly turned toward her peer group, experimented with drugs, and disengaged from school. These changes activated Janet’s own fears of abandonment (Figure 1), leading firefighter parts to respond through anger and withdrawal. In turn, Iris’s firefighter parts became increasingly activated through risk-taking behavior, illustrating the circular and mutually reinforcing relationship between internal and interpersonal processes. Working together in the therapy room allowed Janet and Iris to map these recursive patterns and develop a greater understanding of how their respective internal systems intersected and influenced one another. As access to Self-energy increased, both became increasingly able to approach these dynamics with curiosity, compassion, and understanding. Over the course of four sessions, this process facilitated relational repair and supported the development of new patterns of interaction characterized by increased flexibility, mutual recognition, and trust.

Consideration was also given to inviting Morris to participate in therapy in order to strengthen the parental subsystem (Minuchin et al., 2021). However, Morris declined this invitation because of the anger he continued to experience toward Janet. Nevertheless, the therapist continued to work systemically with this subsystem despite his physical absence from the sessions. One intervention involved the use of the Fire Drill technique (Schwartz, 2020), in which clients are invited to imagine an individual who evokes strong emotional reactions while simultaneously maintaining awareness of their own internal experience. Janet was invited to imagine Morris in a separate room where she could see him, but where he could neither influence nor harm her. This intervention enabled her to identify and explore the different parts activated in relation to him, including younger parts that longed for care and protection, alongside angry parts responding to the betrayal associated with the extramarital affair. Within the wider professional system, these responses may have been interpreted as irrational or indicative of emotional instability. However, from an IFS-informed systemic perspective, they were understood as protective responses arising within a particular relational context. As these parts were witnessed, appreciated, and gradually unburdened, Janet became increasingly able to relate to Morris from a position characterized by greater curiosity, compassion, and Self-leadership. This shift appeared to contribute to a reduction in the cross-generational coalition that had initially developed between Morris and the children against Janet (Minuchin et al., 2021). Consistent with this observation, the family’s social worker reported a reduction in parental conflict and increasingly respectful communication between the parents, leading Children’s Services to consider closing the case.

The therapists’ internal experience

Engagement with the independent psychological assessment evoked a strong emotional and embodied response within the therapist (Figure 1). The report appeared to reflect a predominantly diagnostic and risk-oriented understanding of Janet’s presentation, with relatively little attention given to the relational, developmental, and contextual factors surrounding the difficulties. In particular, the limited consideration given to the significance of Morris’s extramarital affair was notable, especially given that this event echoed an earlier critical moment (Pearce, 1995) in Janet’s life, namely her father’s departure from the family home following an extramarital relationship (Figure 1). From an IFS-informed perspective, these responses were understood as trailheads, signaling the activation of particular positions within the therapist’s own internal system. Maintaining a stance of curiosity (Cecchin, 1987), the therapist explored these responses in supervision, revealing a constellation of protective and vulnerable parts. These included strongly protective parts concerned with injustice, gendered power relations, and the potential pathologisation of Janet’s responses, alongside more vulnerable parts shaped by earlier experiences associated with authority, social class, and messages concerning the importance of “staying in one’s lane” (Mason, 2020). Together, these positions reflected a polarization within the therapist’s internal system, characterized by competing tendencies toward confrontation and inhibition.

Initially, there was a risk that these responses would influence the therapist’s relationship with the report and the wider professional network. Consequently, careful attention was paid to maintaining a position of neutrality and reflexivity (Selvini Palazzoli et al., 1980). Through supervision, the therapist was able to recognize and appreciate the protective intentions of these activated parts (Boscolo et al., 1987), facilitating greater differentiation of self (Bowen, 1978) and a corresponding shift in internal leadership. In this context, differentiation refers to the capacity to remain emotionally connected while maintaining reflective awareness within the relational system. As access to Self-energy increased, the therapist became increasingly able to adopt a more reflective, regulated, and curious stance in the work with the family. This shift proved clinically significant, enabling movement beyond a reactive engagement with the external systems involved in the court proceedings (Figure 1) and allowing the report to be understood not simply as “right” or “wrong,” but as a product of relational, professional, institutional, and risk-oriented processes. Consequently, the report prepared for the court was informed less by the activation of particular parts and more by a position of Self-leadership. Ultimately, the court proceedings were concluded, and Janet was granted unsupervised contact with her daughters.

These issues were explored within regular clinical supervision informed by both systemic and IFS principles. Supervision focused on the therapist’s embodied responses, the identification of activated protective and vulnerable parts, consideration of broader sociocultural influences, and reflection on how these responses might shape relationships with the family, the court, and other professionals. Particular attention was devoted to maintaining curiosity, reflexivity, and therapeutic neutrality while remaining attentive to questions of power, gender, and oppression. This process enabled the therapist to distinguish personal responses from those emerging within the wider therapeutic system and to use these responses constructively within the work.

Conclusion

This dual focus, on the family’s internal and interpersonal systems and on the therapist’s own internal system, shaped the formulation presented in the court report. Janet’s anger was understood not as a fixed trait, but as a protective response to underlying shame and perceived criticism (Figure 1). Similarly, Morris’ position could be understood in relation to his own protective concerns (Figure 1). As such, these responses were seen as mutually reinforcing within a broader relational pattern. Taken together, this vignette illustrates how IFS-informed systemic practice operates across multiple levels simultaneously. The work moves from individual to relational contexts, incorporates multiple people in the room, and remains attentive to the therapist’s own internal processes. Rather than separating internal and external domains, these are understood as recursive and mutually influencing, allowing for a more integrated and responsive form of clinical practice.

Discussion

In this paper, we set out to explore what it might mean to position Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy as a systemic therapy, and why such a positioning may matter for contemporary systemic practice. Drawing on both our theoretical discussion and the vignette, we suggest that IFS can be understood not as a departure from systemic thinking, but as an extension of it into the domain of internal relational experience. In this sense, IFS offers a way of sustaining systemic epistemology across levels of practice, such as within individual work, and importantly, within sessions involving multiple family/couple members where intra- and interpersonal processes unfold simultaneously. Therapeutic work began with Janet individually, before progressing to joint sessions with Janet and Iris, allowing the therapist to attend simultaneously to internal and interpersonal processes. This movement from individual to relational work highlights how IFS-informed systemic practice is not limited by the number of people present, but rather by how relational processes (both internal and external) are conceptualized and engaged with. As illustrated in the vignette, IFS allows clinicians to attend simultaneously to intra-personal, interpersonal, and broader systemic processes. Rather than locating difficulties within the individual, distress is understood in relational and contextual terms. In this sense, IFS may offer a framework for maintaining a systemic orientation across different therapeutic settings.

Importantly, these similarities are not merely conceptual but have practical implications for clinical work. From an IFS-informed systemic perspective, symptoms are understood less as isolated expressions of pathology and more as communications arising within a relational system organized around protection, adaptation, and survival. Consequently, the therapist’s task shifts from identifying deficits to exploring patterns of organization, relationships between parts, and the contextual conditions that gave rise to them. This orientation has implications for therapeutic stance as well as intervention. Curiosity is prioritized over certainty, understanding is privileged over pathologising explanations, and change emerges through the transformation of relationships within the system rather than through the elimination of particular symptoms or behaviors. In this sense, IFS may offer a way of operationalizing established systemic principles within the intra-personal domain.

The relevance of this integration becomes particularly evident within family court contexts, where high-conflict separations are common. Parents are often positioned in opposition as they seek to secure custody arrangements, with interactions characterized by patterns of blame, defensiveness, withdrawal, attack, or appeasement (Tomm, 2014). From a systemic perspective, these dynamics frequently involve triangulation processes (Bowen, 1978), in which children are drawn into the relational field between caregivers and placed in complex positions of loyalty and alignment. Within such contexts, children may experience what Bateson et al. (1956) described as double bind communication, where conflicting relational messages generate uncertainty about safety, belonging, and relational expectations. An IFS-informed perspective allows these dynamics to be understood not only interpersonally, but also internally. As suggested in the vignette, aspects of the child’s experience may become exiled, carrying burdens such as responsibility for parental wellbeing or beliefs about being at fault for the conflict. Similarly, parental responses, such as Janet’s anger or withdrawal, can be understood as protective strategies emerging in response to the activation of vulnerable internal positions. In this way, IFS may extend systemic formulations by linking observable interactional patterns with the internal processes that sustain them. Although systemic therapists have long attended to both domains, IFS may offer a more explicit framework for understanding the recursive relationship between intra-personal and interpersonal processes.

This integrated perspective may be particularly valuable when working with trauma and high-conflict family systems. Traumatic experiences frequently become embedded within both intrapersonal and interpersonal processes, influencing patterns of attachment, emotional regulation, protection, and meaning-making. Within high-conflict family contexts, these processes may be further intensified through cycles of blame, withdrawal, parentification, triangulation, and loyalty conflicts. Consequently, distress may be expressed simultaneously within the individual, between family members, and across wider social and professional systems. An IFS-informed systemic framework offers clinicians a means of attending to these interacting processes while maintaining awareness of the broader relational and sociocultural context.

The vignette also illustrates key mechanisms of change. The development of Self-leadership within Janet can be understood as an intra-systemic form of reflexivity, aligning with systemic concepts of meta-positioning and second-order observation (Burnham, 2012; McNamee, 2015). From this position, Janet was able to approach her internal system with curiosity and compassion, allowing previously exiled experiences to be witnessed and recontextualised. This process further resonates with narrative practices of externalizing, witnessing (Denborough, 2012), and with emerging understandings of memory reconsolidation (Ecker et al., 2012), where new relational experiences can revise previously held meanings. In the vignette, this was reflected in Janet’s ability to “unburden” earlier experiences and respond more flexibly within her relationships. However, understanding IFS as systemic requires attention not only to the recursive relationship between internal and interpersonal processes, but also to the wider social, cultural, and professional systems within which these processes are embedded. The vignette illustrates this particularly clearly in relation to gender, power, and the professional discourses surrounding Janet’s distress.

IFS, power, oppression, and sociocultural context

The therapist’s response to the perceived misogyny evident within the professional system can be understood within a broader systemic epistemology. Since the feminist critique of the early Milan position of neutrality, systemic psychotherapy has increasingly sought to recognize and challenge the effects of oppression and unequal power relations within families, organizations, and wider society (Selvini Palazzoli et al., 1980). Within contexts of abuse and oppression, neutrality came to be regarded as ethically problematic, leading Cecchin (1987) to reconceptualize neutrality as curiosity. IFS is closely aligned with this orientation through its explicit attention to the ways in which relational, social, and cultural contexts shape internal experience. Alongside personal burdens, which develop through experiences within family and relational systems, IFS describes legacy burdens and cultural burdens (Schwartz, 2021). Legacy burdens refer to beliefs, emotions, and relational patterns that are transmitted across generations, either directly or indirectly. These ideas bear similarities to Byng-Hall’s (1995) notion of family scripts and McGoldrick et al. (2014) description of vertical stressors within the family life cycle. Experiences such as war, poverty, migration, colonization, and other forms of collective trauma may therefore continue to influence both internal and external systems across generations. Within the present vignette, Janet appeared to carry a legacy burden associated with expectations that women should assume responsibility for caregiving and caretaking. Through therapy, she gradually recognized the extent to which these beliefs influenced her relationships and contributed to her remaining in a relationship characterized by betrayal and inequality. As these burdens were explored and unburdened, Janet developed greater self-compassion and an increasing belief that she deserved to be treated with fairness, dignity, and respect. Viewed through the family life-cycle framework, this illustrates how vertical and horizontal stressors may intersect: intergenerational legacies are carried forward over time, while individuals and families simultaneously encounter developmental, social, and cultural pressures within their current contexts (McGoldrick et al., 2014).

IFS also recognizes the influence of cultural burdens, which arise from the internalization of dominant social beliefs, expectations, and discourses associated with broader social systems. These may include experiences of racism, homophobia, misogyny, ableism, and other forms of marginalization. These ideas can be considered alongside McGoldrick et al. (2014) conceptualization of horizontal stressors, which include the developmental, social, and contextual pressures encountered by families as they move through the life cycle. Such pressures may become embodied within internal systems and shape both intrapersonal and interpersonal functioning. Du Bois’s (1903) notion of double consciousness, for example, illustrates how individuals may develop protective strategies in response to discrimination and oppression. Within the present case, both Morris and the independent psychological assessment characterized Janet as emotionally unstable, thereby locating distress primarily within the individual and obscuring the broader relational and contextual circumstances in which these difficulties emerged (Foucault, 2003). From a systemic perspective, however, Janet’s responses may be understood as attempts to navigate experiences of abandonment, betrayal, parentification, and unequal power relations. Through therapy, Janet became increasingly aware of the extent to which wider social and familial beliefs concerning gender, caregiving, and power shaped her experiences and appeared to be mirrored within the legal and professional systems surrounding the family (Hare-Mustin, 1994).

Taken together, these observations suggest that IFS offers systemic practitioners an additional framework through which the interaction between internal experience, social location (Watt Jones, 2010), the GRACES framework (Burnham, 2012), and broader sociocultural processes may be understood. Distress is therefore conceptualized not as an individual deficit, but as a phenomenon embedded within relational, historical, social, and cultural contexts. Importantly, the therapist is not positioned outside these systems. Their own social location, assumptions, emotional responses, and experiences inevitably enter the therapeutic system, making reflexivity particularly important when working with issues of power and oppression.

Therapist reflexivity and second-order observation

This reflexive dimension is also illustrated in the therapist’s engagement with their own internal system. Engagement with the independent psychological assessment activated strong emotional and embodied responses within the therapist, which were subsequently explored in supervision. Through this process, the therapist was able to recognize and work with both protective and vulnerable parts, facilitating greater access to Self-energy and a corresponding shift toward a more reflective, regulated, and curious position in the work with Janet and Iris. This process reflects longstanding systemic commitments to reflexivity and second-order observation (Burnham, 2012), while simultaneously offering a more detailed account of how such reflexivity may be experienced and enacted internally. The therapist’s engagement with their own internal system is particularly relevant because, although systemic practitioners have traditionally been encouraged to attend to their own assumptions, beliefs, emotional responses, and positions within therapeutic systems, comparatively less attention has been devoted to understanding how these processes are organized within internal experience.

IFS offers one possible framework through which such processes may be conceptualized. Rather than viewing emotional responses solely as biases that should be eliminated, the model understands them as valuable sources of information concerning the interaction between the therapist, the family, and the wider sociocultural context. Through supervision, the therapist was able to recognize that firefighter parts had become activated in response to perceived misogyny within both the family and professional systems. By acknowledging the protective intentions of these parts, it became possible to adopt a more differentiated position characterized by both compassion and curiosity. This made it possible to challenge oppressive practices while remaining open to the intentions and perspectives of others.

These issues were explored within regular clinical supervision informed by both systemic and IFS principles. Supervision focused on the therapist’s embodied responses, the identification of activated protective and vulnerable parts, consideration of broader sociocultural influences, and reflection on how these responses might shape relationships with the family, the court, and other professionals. Particular attention was devoted to maintaining curiosity, reflexivity, and therapeutic neutrality while remaining attentive to questions of power, gender, and oppression.

Taken together, these observations suggest that IFS may provide one means of sustaining what Larner (2000) referred to as epistemological humility, taking a “both/and” position that holds intra-personal and interpersonal processes in view while maintaining systemic commitments to context, reflexivity, and relational meaning-making. These considerations invite further reflection on how systemic practice might continue to evolve across different clinical contexts.

Clinical implications

Positioning IFS as a systemic therapy has several implications for our practice. Taken together, these implications suggest that the contribution of IFS lies not merely in introducing new techniques, but in providing a more explicit and operationalized framework for integrating intra-personal, interpersonal, and contextual processes within contemporary systemic practice. In doing so, IFS may enable therapists to move more fluidly across levels of experience while maintaining a coherent relational and contextual framework.

First, it may offer a framework for working systemically in contexts where family or network involvement is not possible. By engaging with internal systems as representations of relational experience, we can continue to formulate difficulties in relational terms, even within individual therapy settings. Second, IFS may provide a language for engaging with complexity without prematurely pathologising clients. In the vignette, Janet’s behavior was reframed from a diagnostic label toward an understanding of protective responses within a relational system. This aligns with systemic and narrative approaches that seek to move away from deficit-based formulations toward more contextualized understandings of distress (McNamee, 2015; White, 2024). Third, we suggest that the integration of reflexivity within IFS may deepen systemic practice. The therapist’s engagement with their own internal system reflects a commitment to reflexive awareness, long considered central to systemic work (Burnham, 2012). IFS may therefore offer a structured way of operationalizing reflexivity, particularly in complex and emotionally charged contexts such as family court work.

Finally, IFS may support integration between systemic and trauma-informed approaches. This integration is not unique to IFS and is already evident in established systemic models. For example, Attachment-Based Family Therapy (ABFT) provides a manualised and empirically supported approach that draws on attachment and systemic principles to address relational ruptures and strengthen attachment relationships within families (G. Diamond et al., 2021; G. S. Diamond et al., 2014). IFS may complement such approaches by offering an explicit framework for attending to how relational and attachment experiences are also organized within the individual’s internal system. By linking these internal relational processes with interpersonal dynamics and drawing on mechanisms such as memory reconsolidation (Ecker et al., 2012; Lane et al., 2015), IFS may provide an additional way of understanding how relational and experiential change processes interact. As illustrated in the vignette, this may be particularly relevant in trauma and high-conflict family contexts, where intrapersonal responses and interpersonal patterns such as emotional reactivity, withdrawal, triangulation, and loyalty conflicts may become recursively interconnected.

Tensions, limitations, and areas for further dialogue

Although in this paper we have argued that IFS may be understood as a contemporary extension and elaboration of systemic epistemology within the intra-personal domain, it is important to acknowledge several limitations and areas of ongoing theoretical debate. Our intention is not to suggest that IFS should be regarded as universally compatible with all systemic traditions, nor that it resolves longstanding questions concerning selfhood, relationality, and change. Rather, we view these questions as opportunities for continued dialogue and theoretical development.

One area of tension concerns the conceptualization of internal parts. Social constructionist and postmodern approaches within systemic practice have traditionally been cautious about reifying internal entities, preferring instead to emphasize language, meaning-making, social interaction, and the co-construction of experience (Anderson, 1997; Gergen, 2009; McNamee, 2015). From this perspective, describing parts as though they possess stable characteristics, intentions, or roles may risk transforming fluid and context-dependent experiences into fixed psychological entities. Critics may therefore question whether the language of parts inadvertently reproduces a more individualized understanding of distress, potentially obscuring the broader relational, social, cultural, and political contexts within which difficulties emerge and are maintained. At the same time, proponents of IFS might argue that parts are not intended to be understood as discrete or essential entities, but rather as heuristic devices that provide a language through which individuals can engage with complex internal experiences. From this perspective, parts are understood not in isolation from wider systems but as products of ongoing interactions between individuals and their relational, cultural, and historical contexts. Rather than resolving this tension, we suggest that it represents an important area for continued dialogue between constructionist and IFS-informed perspectives.

A related epistemological question concerns the concept of Self. Collaborative, narrative, and social constructionist traditions have frequently challenged assumptions regarding the existence of a coherent, essential, or unitary Self, emphasizing instead the socially situated, dialogical, and continuously evolving nature of identity (Anderson, 1997; Gergen, 2009). In contrast, IFS conceptualizes Self as an enduring source of awareness characterized by qualities such as curiosity, compassion, calmness, and connectedness (Schwartz & Sweezy, 2019). For some systemic practitioners, this conceptualization may appear inconsistent with postmodern understandings of identity and experience. However, an alternative interpretation may be possible. Rather than understanding Self as an essential or fixed entity, it may instead be viewed as a phenomenological, relational, or emergent process that arises through ongoing interactions between individuals and their wider environments. Such an interpretation may be more closely aligned with existing systemic understandings of reflexivity, meta-positioning, and second-order observation. Whether these perspectives can be fully reconciled remains an open question and one that warrants further theoretical exploration.

It is also important to acknowledge that IFS may not be equally compatible with all forms of systemic practice. Approaches grounded in narrative, collaborative, discursive, and solution-focused traditions may question whether a greater emphasis on internal organization risks shifting attention away from language, power, social context, and the co-construction of meaning. Similarly, an exclusive focus on internal experience may inadvertently individualize distress and diminish attention to structural influences, including social inequalities, discrimination, and broader cultural processes. This concern is particularly relevant given the longstanding commitment within systemic practice to understanding individuals in relation to the wider systems of which they form a part (Bowen, 1978; Minuchin, 1974; Von Bertalanffy, 1950, 1968). Although IFS explicitly acknowledges the relational origins of protective processes, difficulties may arise if the language of parts is applied in ways that inadvertently narrow the focus of attention to intra-personal experience alone. We therefore suggest that maintaining an explicit connection between internal experience and wider relational, social, and structural processes remains essential when integrating IFS within systemic practice.

Lastly, we also note concerns regarding training and application. As discussed earlier, the rapid expansion of IFS has been accompanied by questions about its use outside of established training contexts. Ensuring that IFS is practised in ways that are ethically grounded, competently delivered, and appropriately supervised remains essential. In addition, the financial cost of formal IFS training may itself present a barrier to accessibility, potentially contributing to a disproportionate representation of more financially privileged therapists within the model’s training pathways and professional community. Further empirical research is therefore needed to clarify the circumstances under which IFS-informed practice may be most effectively and appropriately integrated within systemic work.

In summary, we encourage readers not to view these tensions as evidence of incompatibility but to acknowledge that they reflect longstanding debates concerning the nature of mind, identity, relationality, and change that have shaped systemic theory since its inception. Indeed, it may be precisely these areas of tension that offer the greatest opportunities for theoretical development and critical dialogue between systemic and IFS-informed practitioners.

Conclusion

In this paper, we have explored the proposition that Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy may be meaningfully understood as a systemic therapy when considered at the level of epistemology, clinical process, and mechanisms of change. Through our theoretical discussion and anonymized case vignette, we have explored the proposition that IFS may extend systemic thinking into the intra-personal domain while remaining grounded in longstanding commitments to context, relationality, and reflexivity. Importantly, we have suggested that this offers a way of maintaining systemic practice in contemporary contexts where clinicians are often required to work individually rather than with whole families or networks. In this sense, IFS therapy does not simply provide a new set of techniques but offers an alternative way of conceptualizing how systemic principles may be enacted in contemporary clinical practice.

The contribution of this paper lies not simply in identifying similarities between IFS and systemic therapy, but in exploring the proposition that systemic epistemology may be extended into the intra-personal domain. More specifically, we have argued that internal experience can be understood as a relational system organized according to principles that have long informed systemic thought, including circularity, reflexivity, hierarchy, adaptation, and patterns of organization. As such, IFS may offer one possible framework through which these principles can be further elaborated while remaining grounded in the broader relational, social, and cultural contexts in which human experience unfolds.

More broadly, this perspective may have implications for systemic education, supervision, and clinical practice. Within training contexts, it may encourage practitioners to think of systemic work less in terms of who is physically present in the room and more as an epistemological commitment to relational, contextual, and reflexive ways of understanding human experience. Within supervision, it may offer a more explicit framework for exploring therapists’ internal responses and their influence on the therapeutic process. Clinically, it may support greater integration between individual, couple, family, and trauma-informed approaches while maintaining a coherent systemic framework. Taken together, these possibilities suggest that IFS may contribute not only to contemporary clinical practice, but also to the continuing development of systemic theory and practice.

At the same time, we have highlighted the importance of maintaining a critical stance. Risks of potential objectification of “parts” and the need to attend to power and broader social structures remain important considerations. Positioning IFS as systemic therefore does not imply uncritical adoption, but rather careful integration grounded in systemic ethics and reflexivity.

Rather than positioning IFS as a competing model, we invite systemic practitioners to engage with it as a potentially compatible and enriching approach. As our vignette illustrates, IFS does not replace systemic thinking but offers an additional lens through which systemic principles can be applied within individual therapeutic work. This invitation is consistent with the broader history of systemic psychotherapy, which has developed through dialogue, critique, and the integration of new ideas. Engaging with IFS in this way allows us to remain responsive to contemporary practice contexts while sustaining the epistemological foundations that have traditionally defined systemic work, including commitments to circularity, reflexivity, contextual understanding, relational meaning-making, and an appreciation of the reciprocal relationship between individuals and the wider systems of which they form a part. These principles remain central regardless of whether therapeutic work takes place with individuals, couples, families, or broader networks. From this perspective, the question is perhaps not whether IFS belongs within systemic therapy, but how systemic practitioners might critically and creatively engage with it while remaining grounded in the epistemological commitments that have long characterized the field.