COVID-19 - Anarchy or Panarchy?

In September 2005, we had reason to worry about the ability of a tightly coupled world to withstand shocks. At that time this included Hurricane Katrina and SARS. More recent crises, including the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine have arguably outshocked these.

In his analysis of the economic sanctions imposed against Russia following its 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Simon Jenkins comments that the interdependence of the world’s economies, so long seen as an instrument of peace, has been made a weapon of war.

As the global economy becomes more tightly coupled, the chances of one event having a catastrophic impact on the entire system increase notes an account called @Forrest. Forrest, billed as anti-tech, right-wing dissident thought, uses this statement as part of an argument against geoengineering remedies to climate change, on two grounds. Firstly, because meddling with complex systems is likely to have unforeseen consequences, and secondly because these supposed remedies represent a further power-shift towards global technological elites. (Bill Gates obviously, who else?)

Other thinkers see this as an opportunity to shift from deterministic systems to more adaptive and resilient systems (Wieland) or to shift from technological capitalism to a different sociopolitical system (Zhang).

 

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Tony Dutzik, Defusing a rigged to blow economy: Rebuilding resilience in a suddenly fragile world (Frontier Group, 30 March 2020) reprinted (Strong Towns, 1 April 2020) 

Nick Gall, Panarchitecture: Architecting a Network of Resilient Renewal (Gartner, 24 January 2011)

Tim Harford, Why the crisis is a test of our capacity to adapt (Financial Times, 20 March 2020)

Simon Jenkins, The rouble is soaring and Putin is stronger than ever - our sanctions have backfired (The Guardian, 29 July 2022)

Andreas Wieland, Dancing the Supply Chain: Toward Transformative Supply Chain Management (The Journal of Supply Chain Management. 2021 Jan; 57(1): 58–73.  

Yanzhu Zhang, Is panarchy relevant in the COVID-19 pandemic times? (Blavatnik School of Government, 10 June 2020)

Related blogposts: Efficiency and Robustness - On Tight Coupling (September 2005)

Updated 18 February 2023

Efficiency and Robustness - Processing New Orleans mail after Katrina

New Orleans resident and blogger Ernie the Attorney posts an interesting diagram on Flikr.



Obviously this is not an efficient way of delivering mail. But when the direct method is not available, an inefficient workaround is usually better than nothing. I wonder what service level is being achieved by this workaround, and who is paying the extra cost? I also wonder how quickly it was possible to put this workaround into operation, and how long it will persist.

From a systems engineering point of view, I am interested to note the architectural characteristics of the postal system that makes this kind of workaround possible. Among other things, this assumes a high degree of interoperability and consistency between the various locations involved.

See my previous posts on Efficiency and Robustness

Efficiency and Robustness - On Central Planning

The debate between Ian Welsh and Chandler Howell has continued since my previous post on Efficiency and Robustness, and the topic of Central Planning has appeared. In this post, I want to set aside the ideological aspects of central planning and discuss some of the practical aspects.

Central Planning - The Ideology

The question of central planning is widely seen as a political one, but it certainly isn't a simple matter of left and right. There are many right-wing libertarians who reject central planning as equivalent to Stalinism, the worst excesses of the Soviet experiment. (See this article Central Planning is Spontaneous Economic Order whose author complains that the Santa Fe Institute has betrayed the principles of complexity.) And there are left-wing libertarians who are puzzled or aghast at the centralizing tendencies of some of the right-wing authoritarians as well as corporate commercial interests.

Intelligent Design is of course a form of central planning - but executed by a perfect being rather than imperfect humans. (Boston Globe, via Snowdeal.) Robin Wilton asks whether it is possible for an atheist to believe in Intelligent Design. Well, it is certainly possible for atheists to believe in central planning. There are science fiction worlds in which central planning is carried out by a supreme computer, sometimes known as Multivac (or perhaps Spaghetti Monster). Science fiction writers often use technology as an oblique way of discussing serious philosophical and moral questions.

But if we put the politics and religion on one side, there is clearly a great deal of imperfect central planning that goes on within large organizations. We should be able to discuss this in pragmatic terms rather than ideological ones.

Central Planning in Practice

In a comment to Chandler Howell's previous post, Stu Berman advocates "horizontal integration rather than vertical" and rejects central planning. Chandler replies that, "Central Planning is the best analogy I have ever seen for how large corporations are run today. The only difference [with the Soviet Union] is that the corporations have a lot better computing power to manage their logistics." Chandler goes on to describe the fragility of systems (including large organizations) based on central planning, and suggests that H5N1 (aka Bird Flu) could have a more devastating effect than Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

Chandler goes on to talk about coordination (what the military call C3I) in a crisis management context. "The disaster in Katrina may have started with the levees breaching, but lack of coordination at any level is what kept it going for days."

Discussion of central planning is relevant not just to the destruction of New Orleans, but to its subsequent reconstruction. The popular alternatives to central planning come under a range of labels including clusters (SwampFox) dynamic improvisation (Arnold Kling via OceanStateBlogger), organic growth (MCB) and private initiative (CapitalFreedom). These alternatives certainly don't all come from the same end of the political spectrum.

Advocacy for central planning also comes from various quarters, including Environmental Planning (WHY, WHAT, HOW and FOR WHOM).

In the real world, we are not likely to have either total central planning or total anarchy, but a complicated mixture of the two. To make a productive contribution to this debate, we have to be able to reason intelligently about outcomes (evidence-based policy) rather than ideological principles. (MCB also makes this point.) Furthermore, we have to connect outcomes with a specific context. (Not generic outcomes that would be exactly the same for New Delhi, New Orleans and New York.)

Interoperability

Central Planning is an attempt to produce all decisions from a single directing mind. To this extent that this attempt is successful, it puts the emphasis on endo-interoperability - coordination within the scope of a single plan. In contrast, exo-interoperability involves dynamic collaboration between autonomous agencies, whose plans may be formulated in entirely different terms.

Chander Howell, Surge Protectors (21 September 2005), Surge Protectors Part 2 (25 September 2005)

Ian Welsh, The Economics of a Flu Pandemic II (24 August 2005)

Related posts on Efficiency and Robustness

Efficiency and Robustness - On Tight Coupling

People (including Ian Welsh and Chandler Howell) have been worrying about the ability of a tightly coupled world to withstand shocks - including Hurricane Katrina and SARS. Here are some key quotes from their blogs.

• Our society, as a whole, has no surge protection - no ability to take shocks. We have no excess beds, no excess equipment, no excess ability to produce vaccines or medicines, nothing. Everybody has worshipped at the altar of efficiency for so long that they don't understand that if you don't have extra capacity you have no ability to deal with unexpected events. (IW)
• As we have now seen with Hurricane Katrina, even if the capacity were there, the United States’ ability to manage and allocate that capacity is essentially non-existent. (CH)
  

Welsh quotes some analysis from Sherry Cooper and Donald Coxe, comparing a possible SARS outbreak with the flu pandemic.

• Because our society and economy is so much more integrated and so much more connected (for example the flu had to spread by ship back then), and so much more "just on time" that it isn't really a model you can use. We'll likely get hit harder, faster and because many locations have such limited inventories, relying on getting it as they need it, the supply disruptions are likely to be much worse.

Telecoms analyst Martin Geddes offers a potentially more upbeat perspective, at least in relation to Hurricane Katrina, asking us to distinguish between an emergency and a disaster.

• In an emergency, a distributed piece of information calls for a central response. A disaster, the converse. Those best informed are in the field; those best equipped, in the field. The best disaster response system is the one in your hand when the disaster strikes.

But Geddes's optimism is tempered by his distrust of central committees, and his fear they will abuse their power.

• But the changes needed to make things better are politically painful and resistent by incumbent powers. ... I suspect that central committees will determine we need more central response systems, and weaken the economy by taxing everyone hard to pay for it. The exact opposite of the medicine a “network edge” response would dictate.

There are some interesting (and sometimes shocking) details from the Hurricane Katrina experience, and several different levels of incapacity can be detected. From a systems-of-systems perspective, what I find particularly interesting are the interoperability failures.

• Inability of FEMA to work with medical professionals unless they are part of the National Disaster Medical Team. Inability of FEMA to orchestrate external / autonomous agents. (Overlawyered Blog, via Ernie the Attorney)
• Inability of FEMA to provide appropriate support for people with special needs. Inability of FEMA to collaborate with agencies with specialist knowledge and resources. (Conmergence Blog)

My colleagues and I are currently talking to some large organizations about some of the strategic aspects of interoperability, with particular reference to SOA, and I hope to be permitted to publish some of this material one day. In the meantime, I am keen to collect and analyse more public domain examples of interoperability failures. Please contact me, or link to this blog posting.

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The FEMA response to Hurricane Katrina

Related blogposts:

Efficiency and Robustness - On Central Planning (September 2005)

Efficiency and Robustness - Processing New Orleans mail after Katrina (November 2005)
Technological Progress (October 2005)