According to Yale sociologist Perrow, we live with an increasing
number of expanding systems - interlocking webs of smaller units -
that, through failure, may bring catastrophe upon large numbers of
people. Because some risk is inherent in these systems, certain
accidents can be called normal. What concerns Perrow is which
systems are particularly accident-prone and why, and what can we do
about it. For this examination, he uses some of his own concepts;
most important, as regards the relative standing of different
systems, are the concepts of linear vs. complex systems, and
tightly vs. loosely coupled systems. In the first instance, Perrow
contrasts systems that are connected with relatively little room
for unexpected behavior (because they proceed linearly from one
function to the next) with systems that have more feedback, or
whose operation jumps from one linear system to another, or which
branch out. The second concept refers to systems that are more or
less autonomous - and leads to Perrow's demonstration that the
complex, tightly coupled systems are the ones to watch out for.
Riskiest are nuclear power and nuclear weapons - where the
unexpected can be expected, and too little experience is available
to operators. DNA recombinant research is another high-tech
example, while marine transport is a more surprising one. (The real
culprit there is tight coupling of systems that don't work well
together, leaving a virtual free-for-all on the high seas.) Perrow
thinks that marine-transport safety (and air-transport and
chemical-manufacture safety) can be greatly increased with fairly
simple measures. In the DNA and nuclear fields, however, he
believes the systemic potential for catastrophe far outweighs the
potential benefits. The case is made through chapters devoted to
surveys of various types of accidents - from air crashes to a
Louisiana lake that disappeared when an oil rig drilled,
unsuspectingly, into a salt mine. The results will leave you either
scared or reassured, depending on where you started. Informative
and persuasive. (Kirkus Reviews)
"Normal Accidents" analyzes the social side of technological
risk. Charles Perrow argues that the conventional engineering
approach to ensuring safety--building in more warnings and
safeguards--fails because systems complexity makes failures
inevitable. He asserts that typical precautions, by adding to
complexity, may help create new categories of accidents. (At
Chernobyl, tests of a new safety system helped produce the meltdown
and subsequent fire.) By recognizing two dimensions of
risk--complex versus linear interactions, and tight versus loose
coupling--this book provides a powerful framework for analyzing
risks and the organizations that insist we run them.
The first edition fulfilled one reviewer's prediction that it
"may mark the beginning of accident research." In the new afterword
to this edition Perrow reviews the extensive work on the major
accidents of the last fifteen years, including Bhopal, Chernobyl,
and the Challenger disaster. The new postscript probes what the
author considers to be the "quintessential 'Normal Accident'" of
our time: the Y2K computer problem.
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