Pattern Cargo Cult

Kind: anti-pattern

Layer: Enforcement Core

Aliases: Cargo-Cult Pattern Use

Record: architecture:pattern-cargo-cult

Severity: discouraged

Scope: contract_compatibility, correctness_verification

Formed by: Copy named patterns or architecture styles without implementing their required forces, contracts, constraints, or validation gates.

Canonical: Ontology

A defect in which a pattern's name and shape are copied without the forces, contracts and checks that make it work.

Listed in Architecture principles, after Golden Hammer and before Lava Flow.

Refactored by

• Validate Required Forces
• Define Contract
• Name the Concept
• Remove Pattern Shell

Severity

• discouraged

Category

• Anti-patterns

Force

• Contract compatibility
• Correctness verification

Negated by

• First-Principles Design

Linked from

• Algorithm examples
• Proxies give way
• Seven controls, seven classes
• Anti-patterns
• Architecture Review / Evolution / Governance Artifacts
• Architecture Review Evolution Governance
• Contracts / Interfaces / Compatibility
• Core Vocabulary
• Severity levels
• The forces