Supply Chain Resilience : Push and Pull in Catastrophes
nancial connections , market competition , and social relationships optimized to deliver what consumers want , when , and where wanted with a price and quality that targeted consumers are ready to accept . The resulting — emergent — network-of-networks has evolved into a complex adaptive system that is robust and resilient in many disaster contexts . But as with other complex adaptive systems , contemporary demand , and supply networks also display aspects of self-organized criticality , a structural predisposition toward unexpected unraveling and even collapse . 5 Such systemic failure is an existential threat to large populations . Given the volumes , velocities , and complexities of such demand and supply networks , it is not possible to quickly replace lost capacity or capabilities . To avoid significant human suffering , demand and supply networks must continue largely intact or quickly recover preexisting flows .
Pandemic Observations , Confirmations , and Questions to Date
Most disasters disrupt or destroy physical networks in specific places defined by the reach of an “ external ” event : tornado , flood , hurricane , earthquake , wildfire or other major event . Outside this space , preexisting network capacities and capabilities persist . Early studies of disaster response observe the surviving and surrounding “ cornucopia ... deluging the impact area .” 6 External capacity is deployed to establish a new equilibrium of supply and demand . In contrast , the novel coronavirus has depended on the cornucopia to facilitate its widening circulation . Rather than destroying physical networks , the virus has coopted these connections .
The virus has sometimes been contained or constrained by slowdowns , shutdowns , or lockdowns of demand and supply networks . The choices involved in slowing or shutting or locking have prompted epidemiological , strategic , social , and political controversies .
Some of the most dramatic consequences of the pandemic relate to sharply increased demand threatening to drain available supplies while curtailing flows to the most vulnerable . Preexisting weaknesses in demand and supply networks — for food , health care , internet access , and more — have been made more obvious by pandemic consequences . In some situations , purposeful shaping of network behaviors to contain the virus may be as disruptive or more disruptive than the direct impact of the virus ; for example , mass unemployment resulting from shutdowns . Another example : the persistent preference of many to share interior spaces and physical proximity has , again and again , provided the virus its own high volume , high velocity opportunities . Contemporary demand and supply networks do not require crowding into badly ventilated interiors . But the virus is poised to exploit such behavior .
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