Abstract
When designing or redesigning sociotechnical systems, it is often required that those systems be more “resilient’’ as a result. However, exactly what is meant by resilience in these contexts is unclear. To design resilient systems, we must first be able to answer a number of questions, including: Should a resilient system change to accommodate influences or stay the same? If the system changes, where should this change take place? How do we decide which system, or sub-system, to make resilient? For any given system, answering these questions requires engagement with different stakeholders, allowing a conversation to take place that typically spans different disciplines. However, resilience is a difficult concept to communicate about because terminology is not used consistently across, or even within, domains. This presents a challenge for designers wishing to elicit or understand stakeholders’ requirements for the systems that they are concerned with. To address this, we conducted a workshop with stakeholders working in different areas of academia, industry, and policy who are concerned with the resilience of sociotechnical systems. The aim of this workshop was to identify what stakeholders might want to convey about resilience and what would help them to communicate effectively. We identified three main characteristics of resilience and three system features that are critical to communication about resilience. These are all illustrated with a diagrammatic framework that was developed from real system examples given by the participants. From the data we propose a set of distinctions that offer a starting point for discussions about resilience with diverse stakeholders.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Adger, W. N. (2000). Social and ecological resilience: Are they related? Progress in Human Geography, 24(3), 347–364. https://doi.org/10.1191/030913200701540465
Allen, C. R., Angeler, D. G., Garmestani, A. S., Gunderson, L. H., & Holling, C. S. (2014). Panarchy: Theory and application. Ecosystems, 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10021-013-9744-2
Amalberti, R. (2006). Optimum system safety and optimum system resilience: Agonistic or antagonistic concepts? In Resilience engineering: Concepts and precepts (pp. 253–271). Hampshire, UK: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
Ash, J., & Newth, D. (2007). Optimizing complex networks for resilience against cascading failure. Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and Its Applications, 380, 673–683. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physa.2006.12.058
Baek, J. S., Meroni, A., & Manzini, E. (2015). A sociotechnical approach to design for community resilience: A framework for analysis and design goal forming. Design Studies, 40, 60–84. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2015.06.004
Behymer, K. J., & Flach, J. M. (2016). From autonomous systems to sociotechnical systems: Designing effective collaborations. She Ji: The Journal of Design, Economics, and Innovation, 2(2), 105–114. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sheji.2016.09.001
Biggs, R., Schlüter, M., Biggs, D., Bohensky, E. L., BurnSilver, S., Cundill, G., et al. (2012). Toward principles for enhancing the resilience of ecosystem services. Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 37(1), 421–448. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-environ-051211-123836
Bruneau, M., Chang, S. E., Eguchi, R. T., Lee, G. C., O’Rourke, T. D., Reinhorn, A. M., et al. (2003). A framework to quantitatively assess and enhance the seismic resilience of communities. Earthquake Spectra, 19(4), 733–752. https://doi.org/10.1193/1.1623497
Buede, D. M. (2000). The engineering design of systems: Models and methods. New York: Wiley.
Campanella, T. J. (2006). Urban resilience and the recovery of New Orleans. Journal of the American Planning Association, 72(2), 141–146. https://doi.org/10.1080/01944360608976734
Cardona, O. D., Hurtado, J. E., Duque, G., Moreno, A., Chardon, A. C., Velásquez, L. S., et al. (2003). The notion of disaster risk: Conceptual framework for integrated management. Indicators for Disaster Risk Management. Manizales, Colombia: National University of Colombia.
Carpenter, S., Walker, B., Anderies, J. M., & Abel, N. (2001). From metaphor to measurement: Resilience of what to what? Ecosystems, 4(8), 765–781. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10021-001-0045-9
Carpenter, S. R., Arrow, K. J., Barrett, S., Biggs, R., Brock, W. A., Crépin, A.-S., et al. (2012). General resilience to cope with extreme events. Sustainability, 4(12), 3248–3259. https://doi.org/10.3390/su4123248
Chalupnik, M. J., Wynn, D. C., & Clarkson, P. J. (2013). Comparison of ilities for protection against uncertainty in system design. Journal of Engineering Design, 24(12), 814–829. https://doi.org/10.1080/09544828.2013.851783
Chatham House. (2017). Chatham House Rule.
Chen, C.-C., & Crilly, N. (2014). Modularity, redundancy and degeneracy: Cross-domain perspectives on key design principles (pp. 546–553). In 2014 8th annual IEEE Systems Conference (SysCon). Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. https://doi.org/10.1109/SysCon.2014.6819309
Chen, C.-C., & Crilly, N. (2016a). Describing complex design practices with a cross-domain framework: Learning from synthetic biology and swarm robotics. Research in Engineering Design, 27(3), 291–305. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00163-016-0219-2
Chen, C.-C., & Crilly, N. (2016b). From modularity to emergence: a primer on the design and science of complex systems. https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.4503
Comfort, L. K. (1994). Risk and resilience: Inter-organizational learning following the Northridge Earthquake of 17 January 1994. Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, 2(3), 157–170. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-5973.1994.tb00038.x
Comfort, L. K. (1999). Shared risk: Complex systems in seismic response. New York: Pergamon.
Crilly, N. (2013). Function propagation through nested systems. Design Studies, 34(2), 216–242. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2012.10.003
de Weck, O., Eckert, C., & Clarkson, J. (2007). A classification of uncertainty for early product and system design. Presented at the International Conference on Engineering Design. Paris: ICED.
de Weck, O., Roos, D., & Magee, C. (2011). Engineering systems: Meeting human needs in a complex technological world. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
de Weck, O., Ross, A. M., & Rhodes, D. H. (2012). Investigating relationships and semantic sets amongst system lifecycle properties (ilities). Presented at the Third International Engineering Systems Symposium. Delft, The Netherlands: CESUN 2012.
Dovers, S. R., & Handmer, J. W. (1992). Uncertainty, sustainability and change. Global Environmental Change, 2(4), 262–276. https://doi.org/10.1016/0959-3780(92)90044-8
Fiksel, J. (2003). Designing resilient, sustainable systems. Environmental Science & Technology, 37(23), 5330–5339. https://doi.org/10.1021/es0344819
Fiksel, J. (2006). Sustainability and resilience: Toward a systems approach. Sustainability: Science, Practice, & Policy, 2(2).
Fitzgerald, M. E., & Ross, A. M. (2012). Sustaining lifecycle value: Valuable changeability analysis with era simulation (pp. 1–7). Presented at the Systems Conference (SysCon), 2012 IEEE International. https://doi.org/10.1109/SysCon.2012.6189465
Folke, C., Carpenter, S. R., Walker, B., Scheffer, M., Chapin, T., & Rockström, J. (2010). Resilience thinking: Integrating resilience, adaptability and transformability. Ecology and Society, 15(4), 20.
Frei, R., & Serugendo, G. D. M. (2011a). Advances in complexity engineering. International Journal of Bio-Inspired Computation, 3(4), 199–212.
Frei, R., & Serugendo, G. D. M. (2011b). Concepts in complexity engineering. International Journal of Bio-Inspired Computation, 3(2), 123–139.
Fricke, E., & Schulz, A. P. (2005). Design for changeability (DfC): Principles to enable changes in systems throughout their entire lifecycle. Systems Engineering, 8(4), 342–359. https://doi.org/10.1002/sys.20039
Haberfellner, R., & de Weck, O. (2005). Agile systems engineering versus agile systems engineering (Vol. 2, pp. 1449–1465).
Haimes, Y. Y. (2009). On the definition of resilience in systems. Risk Analysis, 29(4), 498–501. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2009.01216.x
Haimes, Y. Y., Crowther, K., & Horowitz, B. M. (2008). Homeland security preparedness: Balancing protection with resilience in emergent systems. Systems Engineering, 11(4), 287–308. https://doi.org/10.1002/sys.20101
Handmer, J. W., & Dovers, S. R. (1996). A typology of resilience: Rethinking institutions for sustainable development. Organization & Environment, 9(4), 482–511. https://doi.org/10.1177/108602669600900403
Holling, C. S. (1973). Resilience and stability of ecological systems. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 4, 1–23. https://doi.org/10.2307/2096802
Home, J. F., & Orr, J. E. (1997). Assessing behaviors that create resilient organizations. Employment Relations Today, 24(4), 29–39. https://doi.org/10.1002/ert.3910240405
Jen, E. (2003). Stable or robust? What’s the difference? Complexity, 8(3), 12–18.
Johnson, J., Panagioti, M., Bass, J., Ramsey, L., & Harrison, R. (2016). Resilience to emotional distress in response to failure, error or mistakes: A systematic review. Clinical Psychology Review, 52, 19–42. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpr.2016.11.007
Joseph, J. (2013). Resilience as embedded neoliberalism: A governmentality approach. Resilience, 1(1), 38–52. https://doi.org/10.1080/21693293.2013.765741
Kimhi, S., & Shamai, M. (2004). Community resilience and the impact of stress: Adult response to Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon. Journal of Community Psychology, 32(4), 439–451. https://doi.org/10.1002/jcop.20012
Kroes, P., Franssen, M., van de Poel, I., & Ottens, M. (2006). Treating sociotechnical systems as engineering systems: Some conceptual problems. Systems Research and Behavioral Science, 23(6), 803–814. https://doi.org/10.1002/sres.703
Leveson, N., Dulac, N., Zipkin, D., Cutcher-Gershenfeld, J., Carroll, J., & Barrett, B. (2006). Engineering resilience into safety-critical systems. In Resilience engineering: Concepts and precepts (pp. 95–124). Hampshire, UK: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
Levis, A. (1999). System architectures. In A. P. Sage & W. B. Rouse (Eds.), Handbook of systems engineering and management (pp. 427–454). New York: Wiley.
MacAskill, K., & Guthrie, P. (2014). Multiple interpretations of resilience in disaster risk management. Procedia Economics and Finance, 18, 667–674. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2212-5671(14)00989-7
Madni, A. M., & Jackson, S. (2009). Towards a conceptual framework for resilience engineering. IEEE Systems Journal, 3(2), 181–191. https://doi.org/10.1109/JSYST.2009.2017397
Maguire, B., & Hagan, P. (2007). Disasters and communities: Understanding social resilience. Australian Journal of Emergency Management, 22(2), 16–20.
Maier, M. W., & Rechtin, E. (2009). The art of systems architecting (3rd ed.). Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
McDonald, N. (2006). Organisational resilience and industrial risk. In Resilience engineering: Concepts and precepts (pp. 155–182). Hampshire, UK: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
McManus, H., Richards, M., Ross, A. M., & Hastings, D. (2007). A framework for incorporating ‘ilities’ in tradespace studies (Vol. 1, pp. 941–954). Presented at the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Space 2007 Conference. Long Beach, CA: AIAA.
Melese, Y., Stikkelman, R., & Herder, P. (2016). A sociotechnical perspective to flexible design of energy infrastructure systems (pp. 004669–004674). In 2016 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics (SMC). https://doi.org/10.1109/SMC.2016.7844968
Midgley, G. (1992). The sacred and profane in critical systems thinking. Systems Practice, 5(1), 5–16. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01060044
Mosleh, M., Ludlow, P., & Heydari, B. (2016). Resource allocation through network architecture in systems of systems: A complex networks framework (pp. 1–5). In 2016 Annual IEEE Systems Conference (SysCon). https://doi.org/10.1109/SYSCON.2016.7490629
Nachtwey, A., Riedel, R., & Mueller, E. (2009). Flexibility oriented design of production systems (pp. 720–724). Presented at the International Conference on Computers Industrial Engineering, 2009. CIE 2009. https://doi.org/10.1109/ICCIE.2009.5223914
Norman, D. A., & Stappers, P. J. (2015). DesignX: Complex sociotechnical systems. She Ji: The Journal of Design, Economics, and Innovation, 1(2), 83–106. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sheji.2016.01.002
Pariès, J. (2006). Complexity, emergence, resilience. In Resilience engineering: Concepts and precepts (pp. 43–54). Hampshire, UK: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd
Pavard, B., Dugdale, J., Saoud, N. B., Darcy, S., & Salembier, P. (2006). Design of robust sociotechnical systems. Presented at the Resilience Engineering, Juan les Pins, Ecole de Mines de Paris, France.
Pimm, S. L. (1984). The complexity and stability of ecosystems. Nature, 307(5949), 321–326.
Robson, C. (2011). Real world research (3rd ed.). Chichester, UK: Wiley.
Rose, A. (2007). Economic resilience to natural and man-made disasters: Multidisciplinary origins and contextual dimensions. Environmental Hazards, 7(4), 383–398. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envhaz.2007.10.001
Rose, A., & Liao, S.-Y. (2005). Modeling regional economic resilience to disasters: A computable general equilibrium analysis of water service disruptions. Journal of Regional Science, 45(1), 75–112. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0022-4146.2005.00365.x
Ross, A. M. (2008). Defining and using the new ‘ilities’ (SEAri Working Paper Series No. WP-2008-4-1). Cambridge, MA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT.
Ryan, E. T., Jacques, D. R., & Colombi, J. M. (2012). An ontological framework for clarifying flexibility-related terminology via literature survey. Systems Engineering, 16(1), 99–110.
Sheffi, Y., & Rice, J. B. (2005, Fall). A supply chain view of the resilient enterprise. MIT Sloan Review, 47, 41–48.
Simmie, J., & Martin, R. (2010). The economic resilience of regions: Towards an evolutionary approach. Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, 3(1), 27–43. https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsp029
Smith, L., & Violanti, J. (2000). Disaster response: Risk, vulnerability and resilience. Disaster Prevention and Management: An International Journal, 9(3), 173–180. https://doi.org/10.1108/09653560010335068
Timmerman, P. (1981). Vulnerability resilience and collapse of society: A review of models and possible climatic applications (Environmental Monograph No. 1). Toronto, Canada: Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Toronto.
Umoquit, M. J., Tso, P., Varga-Atkins, T., O’Brien, M., & Wheeldon, J. (2013). Diagrammatic elicitation: Defining the use of diagrams in data collection. The Qualitative Report, 18(60), 1–12.
UN/ISDR. (2004). Living with risk: A global review of disaster reduction initiatives. New York: United Nations Publications.
Vermaas, P., Kroes, P., van de Poel, I., Franssen, M., & Houkes, W. (2011). A philosophy of technology: From technical artefacts to sociotechnical systems. San Francisco: Morgan & Claypool Publishers.
Westrum, R. (2006). A typology of resilience situations. In Resilience engineering: Concepts and precepts (pp. 55–68). Hampshire, UK: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
Whitacre, J., & Bender, A. (2010). Degeneracy: A design principle for achieving robustness and evolvability. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 263(1), 143–153. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtbi.2009.11.008
Wiendahl, H.-P., ElMaraghy, H. A., Nyhuis, P., Zäh, M. F., Wiendahl, H.-H., Duffie, N., et al. (2007). Changeable manufacturing – Classification, design and operation. CIRP Annals – Manufacturing Technology, 56(2), 783–809. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cirp.2007.10.003
Wildavsky, A. B. (1988). Searching for safety. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.
Woods, D. D., & Cook, R. I. (2006). Incidents – Markers of resilience or brittleness? In Resilience engineering: Concepts and precepts (pp. 69–76). Hampshire, UK: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
Acknowledgements
The authors wish to thank all of the workshop participants for their time and insights. Thanks also go to Belen Tejada Romero for her help in organizing the event and transcribing the data and to Dr. Chih-Chen for her constructive comments. This work was supported by the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) through a Doctoral Training Grant awarded to Eloise Taysom and an Early Career Fellowship awarded to Nathan Crilly (EP/K008196/1). The raw data from the workshop cannot be made freely available because inherent to that data is sensitive information relating to the individuals and organizations involved.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 Springer Japan KK, part of Springer Nature
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Taysom, E., Crilly, N. (2018). On the Resilience of Sociotechnical Systems. In: Jones, P., Kijima, K. (eds) Systemic Design. Translational Systems Sciences, vol 8. Springer, Tokyo. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-55639-8_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-55639-8_6
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Tokyo
Print ISBN: 978-4-431-55638-1
Online ISBN: 978-4-431-55639-8
eBook Packages: Economics and FinanceEconomics and Finance (R0)