Time is not merely a backdrop against which events occur; it is a constitutive element of all systemic outcomes. Systems emerge, stabilize, accumulate effects, transform, and decline through time. What appears permanent is often the result of processes unfolding across extended temporal horizons. By requiring analysts to account for temporal dynamics, STF prevents static explanations and reveals how outcomes are shaped by duration, accumulation, path dependence, and delayed consequences. An event cannot be adequately explained without understanding the temporal conditions that produced it.