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Technology in Society 33 (2011) 244–252
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Technology in Society
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/techsoc
The 2010 BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill: Implications for theory of organizational disaster
Barry Bozeman Department of Public Administration and Policy, University of Georgia, 201 Baldwin Hall, Jackson, St. Athens, GA 30602, United States
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history: Received 10 August 2011 Received in revised form 28 September 2011 Accepted 28 September 2011
Keywords: Organizational disaster Technology Oil spill Theory of catastrophic events
E-mail address: [email protected].
0160-791X/$ – see front matter � 2011 Elsevier Ltd doi:10.1016/j.techsoc.2011.09.006
a b s t r a c t
Focusing on the interaction of technology and organizational factors, the present paper examines the 2010 BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill for the purpose of developing a better understanding of the requirements for a theory of organizational disasters. Drawing from literature on organizational disasters, a model of “technology-embedded disasters” is developed and discussed. After outlining the events surrounding the oil spill disaster, the model is employed in analysis of the oil spill. The oil spill case is employed as a means of reflecting on the requirements for an improved model of organizational disaster.
� 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
One of the worst environmental disasters in world history began in the early evening of April 20, 2010 as escaping, uncontrolled hydrocarbons caused an explosion on the oil drilling platform Deepwater Horizon, a facility leased by BP Exploration & Production Incorporated from Transocean, an international technology company providing rig-based, well- construction products and services. Within 36 h the gigantic oil rig, approximately 300 by 300 feet and large enough to provide living quarters for about 175 people, complete with cafeteria, recreation facilities and helicopter pad, had crum- bled and sunk into the ocean. Eleven inhabitants on the rig died, most as a result of the explosion, and 17 others were injured. The damage had only just begun. Crude oil gushed from the uncapped welluntilJuly 15,2010 and it was not until September 19, 2010 that the well was completely sealed [52].
As the oil spill spread out to cover more than 88,000 square miles and made its way to beaches and estuaries, incalculable damage was done to tourism and fishing industries and to the many marine animal and bird species in and around the Gulf of Mexico [47]. By BP’s
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estimate [26], the oil spill cost the company more than $40 billion in both direct outlays, including a $20 billion victim compensation fund.
During the six months following the BP oil spill media coverage was so ubiquitous that perhaps historian Douglas Brinkley was correct in his assessment that the general public had experienced an “oil spill fatigue” [9]. While not seeking to resuscitate oil spill fatigue, I provide yet another analysis, one focused on the interaction of technology and organizational factors and inter-organizational relations. I provide no holistic analysis of the disaster in all its aspects but, instead, use the disaster as a building block to further understanding of the interactions of organizations and technology in disasters [12]. The model presented here, termed the “technology-embedded disaster model,” will perhaps shed some small light on those disasters where organizations and technology interact, but the model will not account fully for diverse causes of the BP oil spill. It is not my purpose to identify causal factors and then parse them out according to their degree of culpability. Suffice to say that the causes were many, diverse and interrelated and that others (see especially [52] have already provided causal analyses that are as exacting as we are likely, at least in the near term, to obtain. My focus on the BP oil spill is more as a case in point, using the case as a backdrop to
B. Bozeman / Technology in Society 33 (2011) 244–252 245
considering the need and possibilities for a better theo- retical understanding of organizational disasters.
Inasmuch as the term “technology” plays a pivotal role in this analysis, it is perhaps useful to begin by defining it. My definition is “a physical embodiment of knowledge designed to in its application solve a problem or serve a perceived need.” In this usage, “technology” cannot be only social; some physical embodiment is required. A further elaboration of this definition can be found in [14].
The next section of the paper considers organizational disaster as a topic for social science theory. After this context setting, I discuss a technology-embedded disaster model, a model designed to be applicable to a broad array of organization disasters. Then the paper turns to the BP oil disaster and its particulars, focusing specifically on deep sea drilling technologies and the events, both the idiosyn- cratic events and the institutional and organizational contexts of those events. Finally, I refer to the technology- embedded disaster model and seek to determine the ways in which the BP oil disaster has broader implications for the interaction of technologies and organizational cultures in disaster creation.
2. Organization disaster as a theory-building challenge
When cataclysmic events occur, vast reportage and government investigations follow soon afterward. This has certainly been the case with the BP oil spill, as evidenced by an outpouring of books (e.g. [22,27,34,64], media reports, government reports [52] and scholarly articles [1,49]; Pade, 2010). Early analyses of the BP oil spill have varied in causal attribution focusing variously on corporate greed, poor government regulation, idiosyncratic factors, or on the world’s “addiction” to oil.
Other disasters have generated fine works on the interaction of technology and organizations, many focusing on decision-making (e.g. [3,37]. From these works, we
Table 1 Definitions of organization disaster and related concepts.
Organizational concept Definition
Crisis “An organizational crisis (1) threatens high-priority of time in which a response can be made, and 3) is “.We define crises as events characterized by thre and high potential costs if they are not resolved eff “Crises are characterized by low probability/high co of an organization. Because of their low probability on sensemaking.” ([72]; 629). “Crisis implies a perception that an individual or se as a composite perception based on several differe immediacy, and uncertainty of an issue all contribu
Disaster “Disaster is a type of routine nonconformity that si and place. It is a physical, cultural, and emotional e damages the fabric of social life. For an accident to unusually costly, unusually public, unusually unexp “Industrial crises are disasters caused by human age The impacts of industrial crises sometimes transce effects.” ([62]; 287)
Catastrophe Catastrophe refers to trauma in the workplace, typ Failure “Failure, in organizations and elsewhere, is deviatio
errors and the unavoidable negative outcomes of e
know more about how bad or unfortunate decisions led to catastrophic outcomes in such cases as the Challenger disaster [63], Three Mile Island, the Bhopal chemical spill [10], and the Exxon-Valdez oil spill [66].
While there is no shortage of formal knowledge about organizational disasters, there is a large body of literature on organizational disasters that is multidisciplinary and diverse in its assumptions, approaches and methods. Literature on organizational disaster is characterized by a variety of approaches and foci including, among others, leadership failures [38,41] and failures due to external contingencies [17,29]. While some studies focus on the individual level of causality [25,30], others focus on group level dynamics [2]; and Nelson, 1996 [56]; or the inter- organizational or institutional level [21,44].
One of the reasons that there is no consensus definition of organizational disaster is that the literature includes so many proximate concepts. For example, the literature includes studies of “organizational failure” (see [50] for an overview), “organizational catastrophe” [5,48,60] and, especially, “organizational crisis” [24,32,51,68]. Table 1 gives one a sense of the diversity of definitions of disaster and crisis.
To avoid the problem of a missing or ambiguous defi- nition, I posit that an organizational disaster occurs (for a given organization) if highly disruptive events bring extremely negative consequences to the organization or its stakeholders (for elaboration see [12]). While it is some- times not an easy matter to determine just what events do and do not qualify as “disaster,” suffice it to say, the BP Gulf oil spill is certainly a disaster by any standard.
3. Technology-embedded organizational disasters
A “technology-embedded organizational disaster” is simply one in which technology plays an important part. This does not imply that technology is the major determi- nant of the disaster; only that technology is significantly
values of the organization, (2) presents a restricted amount unexpected or unanticipated by the organization.” ([33]; 64). at, surprise, and magnitude, with a need for a quick response ectively. ([28]; 27). nsequence events that threaten the most fundamental goals , these events defy interpretations and impose severe demands
t of individuals faces a potentially negative outcome. Crisis can be seen nt dimensions of an issue. In particular, the perceived importance, te to how threatening an issue is perceived to be.” ([23]; 502). gnificantly departs from normative experience for a particular time vent incurring social loss, often possessing a dramatic quality that be defined as a disaster, the accident would need to be large-scale, ected, or some combination.” ([70]; 292). ncies and the social order; natural disasters are acts of nature. nd geographic boundaries and can even have trans-generational
ically arising from injuries, accidents or violence [5,43]. n from expected and desired results. This includes both avoidable xperiments and risk taking.” ([18]; 300).
B. Bozeman / Technology in Society 33 (2011) 244–252246
implicated. This is in contrast to organizational disasters owing to such factors as civil disturbance, economic collapse, weather events, or the corrupt or immoral acts of particular human beings.
4. Organizational and technology roles in disasters
In some cases where technology is implicated in disaster, organizational factors play no prominent role (even though organizations subsequently suffer great damage). One good example is the 2002 explosion of the Concorde jet taking off from Charles De Gaulle Airport [16]. This example is one of limited human agency. A piece from another airplane was left on the runway, a Concorde tire burst, materials were sucked into the engines, and the plane was destroyed. This disaster could not reasonably be said to have been precipitated by the pilots and crew of the plane or by the company, Air France, responsible for the well being of the passengers. No one made decisions or took actions pertinent to the tragedy. Such disasters as these, important and terrible though they may be, provide little insight for the study of organizational disaster.
In other cases there is a clear human element in the chain of events leading to the disaster. In such instances, a point comes where parties disagree about risk and procedure. In the case of the Challenger accident [70], that moment came in discussions about the integrity of components exposed to cold weather. A joint seal failed due to the cold, precipitating a gas leak through the solid rocket motor and penetrating the external tank, causing the explosion [70]. But before the launch, there were discus- sions about the effect of the cold and whether to launch. Ultimately, decision-makers interacting with each other contributed considerably to the disaster.
In the case of the BP Gulf oil spill disaster, it seems clear that human decision-making and organizational culture played a key role. Human decision contributed to and exacerbated the disaster [52]. However, as we shall see in the case analysis below, the causal elements in the BP Gulf oil spill are many, diverse and interdependent.
5. Theorizing about technology-embedded organizational disasters
One approach to developing theory about organiza- tional disaster is to consider the differences in their causes as suggested by Fig. 1. Thus, we might expect a very different approach to analysis when considering an HT/HH type- the BP oil spill- than with the three other archetypes. In considering each of the four quadrants, we can make a few simple observations that perhaps clarify theory- building requirements. The lower right hand quadrant (LH/LT) can be viewed as, essentially, acts of God, and though they may be interesting from the standpoint of emergency preparedness, they cannot generally be much edified by organizational analysis. Similarly, the cases that are driven almost entirely by seemingly unpreventable technological failures, such as the Concorde disaster, have limited interests to organizational theorists. In those cases where disasters take on the aspect of stochastic technology failures, unpredictable and largely unpreventable, the
disaster highlights needs for new technology and for innovation, but has less relevance or use for organizational theorizing. However, as one moves away from the extremes to a role of human agency (e.g. Hurricane Katrina flooding), there is a greater role to be played by organizational and institutional analysis [11].
The predominant role for organization and institutional theory is in the two HH quadrants (HH/LT, HH/HT); in such cases, organizational and institutional theory may have the ability to help explain disastrous outcomes and to prescribe approaches to mitigation. In the case of the BP oil spill disaster, there are likely important organizational and strategic issues related to such factors as (1) coordination of a multiplicity of contractors, (2) the relationship of orga- nizational structures to human judgment interactions with risk and failsafe technologies; and (3) the deployment of organizational strategies in cases where extreme physical risk meets financial risk (i.e. contrasting, for example, decision-making in economically sheltered nonmarket organizations with similar decision requirements in highly competitive market organizations).
Arguably, the organizations’ environments play an important role in understanding an organization’s role in disasters and disaster mitigation. Fig. 2 adds two additional dimensions, one related to environmental complexity and the other to the degree of external constraint. As the figure implies, the concepts presented here could potentially be operationalized and tested against a larger set of organi- zational disasters.
6. BP oil spill as a case of technology-embedded disaster
In the interest of space, I present the events of the BP oil spill in a brief summary. This limitation is important to note because the events surrounding the oil spill were exceed- ingly complex. Those wishing greater detail may wish to consult the [52] Final Report.
We can have a better grasp of the various problems encountered in the case if we understand what occurs routinely in deep sea oil drilling. This enables us to better identify and compare the problems experienced in this exceptional case. In characterizing the operations of Deep- water Horizon, I rely extensively on the [52] final report.
7. Deep sea drilling technology: what is supposed to happen
Before April 20, 2010, the technological and manage- ment activities occurring on Deepwater Horizon (hereafter “Deepwater”) were for the most part typical of contempo- rary deep sea drilling. The Deepwater rig was a prospecting rig and would have been replaced by a smaller and less expensive operation once oil reservoirs were confirmed and the drill apparatus had been set up for suitable extraction. Deepwater was designed to drill in very deep water and at ocean floor depths of several miles. In 2009, it had drilled the deepest oil well in history, more than 10,000 m, at a location in the Gulf of Mexico, 250 miles from Houston, Texas [67].
High Human Agency
Low Human Agency
High
Technological
Culpability
Low
Technological
Culpability
Concorde
Enron
Challenger
BP Oil Spill
2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami
Stanford Yacht Scandal
Hurricane Katrina Flooding
Corps of Engineers Everglades Dredging
1937 Texas Gas Main Explosion
IRS Philadelphia Service Center Disaster
(HT/HH) (HH/LT)
(HT/LH) LH/LT
Fig. 1. Technology-embedded disasters.
B. Bozeman / Technology in Society 33 (2011) 244–252 247
The Deepwater was gigantic in size because of the need to house scores of workers as well as a huge quantity of supplies and equipment, especially drill pipes and associ- ated technology. Deepwater could be thought of as not so much a drilling apparatus per se but a small fabrication and manufacturing facility.
After setting up, Deepwater, or any similar facility, begins drilling in search of the oil reservoir. An important part of the drilling, even at initial stages, is the injection of so-called “drilling mud.” Drilling mud is a synthetic fluid
High Human
Low Human
High
Technological
Culpability
(HT/HH)
(HT/LH)
Environmental
Complexity
External Constraint
Fig. 2. Technology-embedded disasters and org
lubricant, usually composed of bentonite clays or synthetic compounds, used to compensate for the enormous amount of friction that occurs with drilling [71]. In addition to mitigating friction and the heat build up from friction, drilling mud also serves as a conduit for material being drilled, suspending materials such as sand or other minerals and carrying materials to the surface [47].
Just as important as its role in inhibiting friction, drilling mud is crucial for controlling the pressure that builds up once oil or gas begins to rise. The drilling mud plays a role
Agency
Agency
Low
Technological
Culpability
(HH/LT)
LH/LT
anizational environment characteristics.
B. Bozeman / Technology in Society 33 (2011) 244–252248
throughout the drilling process as the mud is re-circulated, passing through screens that trap materials from the borehole and then cycling back to the drill bit. In general, use of drilling mud is a key element of drilling effectiveness and safety, and petroleum engineers strive to optimize the amount, density and viscosity of the mud, making adjust- ments as needed by changing conditions and materials flow.
Once an oil deposit is reached, the focus shifts to control. Since oil is under heat and pressure, there is no need to pump it, but rather to regulate its upward flow and, particularly, to prevent an uncontrolled blowout. A blowout is an unintended and uncontrolled release of crude from an oil well that occurs after all the system’s pressure control devices have failed [36].
The heavy downward flow of the drilling mud is a major tool for regulating pressure and preventing blowouts, as such, a primary means of safety assurance. After the drill has reached its site, a steel casing is inserted down the middle of the bore. Many pieces of steel casing, each piece about 10 m long, are screwed together as the casing descends. In the BP Gulf site, the drill had extended for more than three miles and, therefore the steel casing was lengthy. After the casing is completed, the next step, also a safety and control measure, is to pour concrete down the watertight casing. A final pipe is put through the casing, and this pipe, surrounded by concrete, actually extracts the oil.
Another crucial safety element is the “blowout preventer.” This is a device set on the ocean floor above the borehole that serves as a last resort for cutting off the flow in case of loss of control or other emergency. The blowout preventer is a unique piece of equipment and is manufac- tured on the rig and then lowered into place. The blowout preventer includes one or more valves and may include such components as electric and hydraulic control lines and accumulators, test valves, electronic control pods, and “kill switches”, all in a massive support frame. The devise used for Deepwater was more than 50 feet tall and weighed more than 300 tons.
Once all is in place, the shaft that the drill bit is con- nected to goes down to the oil deposit, and it is sur- rounded on the ocean floor by the blowout preventer. The “riser shaft” extends up to the surface. The drill and the drilling mud blow through the riser shaft and, ultimately, the oil flows up, through the riser shaft and through the blowout preventer, up to the rig. The pipes often are not vertical but may be diagonal, depending on the most efficient means of reaching the deposit. The blowout preventer includes several different technologies for sealing the drill hole, most of them intended for use only in emergencies, with some used to more or less routinely regulate volatile methane “burps” that rise through the pipe. Events that, if not properly controlled, can easily lead to explosions.
If all goes as planned, the configuration described above is set in place and the oil deposits are released and flow to the surface at a controlled rate, accumulating in tanks at the rig. This extraction may go on for many months, and, once all or most of the oil is extracted, the well is capped.
8. The Deep water Horizon accident: what is NOT supposed to happen- but did
In all likelihood, the BP Gulf oil spill would not have occurred had the blowout preventer performed up to specifications. According to BP’s own investigation (BP, Inc., 2010, p. 9), the accident “involved a well integrity failure, followed by a loss of hydrostatic control of the well. This was followed by a failure to control the flow from the well with the BOP (blowout preventer) equipment, which allowed the release and subsequent ignition of hydrocar- bons. Ultimately, the BOP emergency functions failed to seal the well after the initial explosions.”
In most cases, the blowout preventer has several different means of activation, some automatic. When acti- vated, the blowout preventer is supposed to cut the drill line and seal the well. For some reason, still unknown, this did not occur in the Deepwater accident. BP officials sug- gested that a hydraulic leak could have been responsible, but it is also possible that the emergency disconnect was disabled by an explosion [26]. The valves were subse- quently determined to have been shut to some degree, but not sufficient to stop the flow.
There is some discussion that the blowout preventer effectiveness was diminished by the fact that it did not have an acoustic switch, a remote-control device for deploying the blowout preventer. While such devices are often used in rigs, the U.S. government (unlike some other countries) does not require this third line of defense, a measure costing about $500,000. Not being required to do so, BP chose not to install this third tier device. According to one report [35], the Department of Interior’s Minerals Management Service considered requiring remote-control of blowout preventers several years ago but companies protested, citing increased costs and undemonstrated effectiveness.
According to the BP report (2010), largely consistent with the [52] subsequent findings, a series of failures occurred, precipitating the disaster. Among the most important:
� The cement mixture appeared not to be adequate and allowed hydrocarbons to enter the wellbore.
� The Transocean and BP crew incorrectly concluded that the pressure tests were adequate and proceeded to replace the expensive drilling mud with seawater (a common practice when well integrity has been estab- lished and pressure is judged at safe levels).
� The crew did not recognize the influx of hydrocarbons in the riser in time to take corrective action.
� The blowout preventer failed, likely due to explosions, causing the mechanism’s autoshear function to be disabled.
The BP report (2010, p. 11) concludes that accident was due to “a complex and interlinked series of mechanical failures, human judgments, engineering design, opera- tional implementation and team interfaces [that] came together to allow the initiation and escalation of the acci- dent.” While other analyses (EPA, 2010 [52]; depart from the BP report in assigning priorities to causes and in
B. Bozeman / Technology in Society 33 (2011) 244–252 249
judging culpability, there seems little doubt about the accuracy of the above description of events leading to the disaster.
9. Analyzing organizations and disaster
In the remainder of this analysis, I consider the inter- action of technology and organizational elements. A first issue is the size and scope of organizational roles in tech- nology-based disasters (or, from another perspective, disaster avoidance and remediation). To what extent are organizational disasters related to rationally constructed strategies as opposed to poorly understood and largely idiosyncratic events? Are organizations really hostage to uncontrollable events in a sort of “disaster lottery” [12], or do organizations more often implode because organiza- tions promote cultures that underbid risk? After this conceptual sorting, I consider organizational characteristics pertaining to strategy and, specifically, “what characteris- tics of organizations and their cultures determine the level and type of technology-based risk they are willing to sustain?”
10. Idiosyncrasy and the possibilities for analyzing strategy
Some historians (e.g. [42] argue that any approach to aggregation or generalization from organizational disasters does not do justice to the role of idiosyncrasy or the “overdetermined” [15] nature of complex historical events. An idiosyncratic perspective tells us that we can develop deep understanding of events only if we consider unique and non-reoccurring attributes of those events. By seeking to aggregate these attributes and study patterns across series of unique events, one loses much information and an important type of understanding.
To be sure, focusing on unique aspects of events provides insights that emerge in no other way, and, certainly, the act of aggregating requires some loss of detail. I suggest that the limitations of aggregation and pattern seeking pose no insurmountable barriers to systematic inquiry about organizational disasters. For example, if one reads the investigation reports of airline disasters, one inevitably finds that a series of usually improbable idio- syncratic events are strung together to produce a causal sequence leading to tragic outcome. At the same time, however, these events often have close relation to organi- zational and policy variables such as pilot training protocols and engineering design standards. In the case of the BP oil spill disaster, one can fully credit the role of idiosyncrasy while, at the same time, looking for patterns. Thus, even while recognizing the interaction of human decisions, such as premature replacement of drilling mud with seawater, with highly idiosyncratic events, such as the breakage of a single shearing device, one can examine organizational issues. In the BP oil spill case, one might ask if the system redundancy built in to these complex technology-human interactive systems suffices to prevent the single failure that can lead to disaster [45,46,65].
As reconstructions of such disasters as the Challenger [69] and Three Mile Island [40] have shown us, human
error tendencies are highly sensitive to organizational culture and context. As [70] notes, “research firmly links the social origin [of disasters] to political, competitive, regula- tory, and cultural environments” (293).
11. Organizational coupling and disaster propensity
According to [54,55]; a major factor in organizational disasters is “interactive complexity”. Social systems, espe- cially tightly coupled ones, are amenable to failure due to design flaws. Often designs are so complicated that no one could reasonably expect to understand fully all their interdependencies. Indeed, this seems the case with the BP oil spill, and, moreover, the interactive complexity is exacerbated by the number of different organizations and different organizational cultures that are parties to deep sea oil exploration.
I argue that interactive complexity is at least as great a problem in loosely couple systems, and that such systems are often much more vulnerable to design flaws because their designs are so often “soft” or even chaotic. Perrow’s insight about “normal accidents” is that even if they occur only rarely in highly reliable socio-technical systems, they will occur. However, we can expect that organizations in loosely coupled systems, systems with ambiguous controls and high autonomy, including the organizational and policy domains in which deep water drilling occurs, will more often produce disasters than will the more structured systems (e.g. nuclear regulatory regimes) examined by Perrow. In some cases failure is due to organizational routines and disasters will flow from these routines.
12. Disaster theory and the BP oil spill
While it is true that organizational disasters have a highly complex causal trajectory, in part because of the significant role of idiosyncrasy [19], one can nonetheless discern important patterns and learn from them. The organizational and institutional factors at the center of the BP oil spill case seem to have much in common with other well known and carefully analyzed technology-embedded organizational disasters. Some of the common features include (1) the role of hierarchy in mediating decision- making; (2) a false sense of security produced by redun- dant systems; (3) the apparent suppression of dissent (in the case of substituting seawater for drilling mud); (4) the diffusion of risk.
While the organizational level features of the BP oil spill disaster have much in common with other well studied organization-centered disasters, the broader policy and institutional features of the oil spill case differentiate it from such familiar cases as the Challenger disaster or the Bhopal disaster. In the oil spill case one could well argue that the “bigger picture” lies in understanding such factors as public policy for offshore drilling, energy policy writ large, and international commerce. In my judgment, these different sets of factors are actually quite closely inter- twined. Thus, public policy affects organizational percep- tions of risk and energy policy affects requirements for technology.
B. Bozeman / Technology in Society 33 (2011) 244–252250
As one looks for patterns to connect cases, one must also consider just what aspects of a case render it sufficiently different to elevate its importance for theory development (as opposed to its inherent importance for disaster prevention). In the case of the BP oil spill disaster, two factors stand out. In the first place, BP, as seems to be the case with many of its competitors, remains steadfast in its opposition to many environmental and safety regulations that, while having significant short term costs, would seem to have the advantage of enhancing predictability and leveling the technological playing field. What characteris- tics of organizations and their cultures lead to visceral reactions to regulations, including, most importantly, ones that could perhaps have, in this case, perhaps saved BP $40 billion? Companies seem to, at the same time, revile and seek to co-opt regulatory agencies responsible for safety [4]. How does such a corporate ethos emerge?
A second factor that stands out in this case is the wide diffusion of responsibility. While everyone agrees, including BP, that the prime contractor is ultimately responsible for outcomes, how is it possible to exercise effective monitoring when working with another com- pany’s technology, leased from a third party, engineered by a fourth? When engineering decisions, such as those per- taining to lubrication engineering, is outsourced to other companies with other designs and cultures, how is it possible to maintain sufficient cohesion and to develop the instantaneous information flows needed for crisis decision- making? These problems are not unique to the BP case and they suggest why a comparative case approach may be edifying.
13. Conclusions
The technology-embedded disasters model provides an elementary framework for thinking about organizational disasters. Even in its current, limited form, it has some utility for helping understand organizational disaster and the threat of the disasters. The model is taxonomic rather than predictive, but, as is the case with any taxonomy, it suggests the variables to be employed as entry points to understanding. In particular, the model points to possible policy and management emphases. To the extent there is human agency involved (including not just individuals’ actions but also acts or corporate individuals such as firms and governments), disasters tend to be more complex but also potentially amenable to policy solutions [6]. While “acts of God” are, of course, relevant to public policy (think of the levy failure in New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina), they are only partly predicable and controllable. Even with good policies, the winds blow. However, in policies where human agency is to a greater degree implicated, policies and strategies matter. Thus, in the wake of Three Mile Island, Enron and IRS information technology management failures, specific policies were adopted that addressed threats.
We can at least see some nascent propositions emerging from the technology-embedded disaster model as pre- sented in Fig. 2. The model suggests that we should expect a higher threat of disaster in cases when there is a complex interaction of technology and human agency such as the BP
Gulf oil spill. However, despite this level of environmental complexity, there is a relatively relaxed set of external constraints and oversights. In the model simply identifying this dangerous cocktail- the confluence of complex and risky technology, human agency and high degrees of interdependence, and limited constraint and oversight- should serve as a warning sign [39]. When we add to this mix a potential for cataclysmic damage and organizational cultures encouraging high risk for high payoff, the 2010 regulatory regime for deep sea drilling seems perfectly maladapted [59].
The current model of technology-embedded disasters has, at best, value as a sign post, suggesting emphases. The model requires a great deal more development and more comparative analysis before it has any potential as a predictive model. What next steps are needed for a more useful model? One way to address this question is by looking at the model in Fig. 1 and asking, where does one look for “solutions?” In some cases, the solution set to disasters is close to nil, at least from a practical standpoint. The above-mentioned Concorde case (low human agency culpability, moderate technological culpability) seems not to have been caused by poor performing technologies or faulty organizations. In the case of the Enron disaster [61], the solution set seems straightforward (though immensely challenging) in that it points to developing a means of constraining human venality. These means include changes in regulatory regimes but perhaps also incentives and means of choosing and advancing corporate executives.
What about the BP oil spill? Arguably, the most chal- lenging realm of potential disaster is one in which both technological and organizational systems play a major role, both separately and interactively. Going beyond the model to possible implications, I suggest that any case so charac- terized is fraught with great risk, and the following safe- guards are in order: (a) a higher degree of system redundancy and failsafe mechanisms; (b) an appreciation for the difference between normal risk assessment and assessment of potentially catastrophic risk; (c) greater oversight of inter-organizational relations and (d) atten- dant mechanisms for accountability. The BP oil spill case gives us a situation with only moderate system redundancy and fail safes, limited attention to catastrophic risk, remarkably limited oversight or even coordination of inter- organizational relations and limited, diffuse accountability.
One of the most important factors not yet incorporated into the technology-embedded disaster model is the impact of resource scarcity and resource value [20,57] in framing disaster potential and mitigation strategies. It is noteworthy that even in the wake of one of the greatest environmental disasters known to humankind, one of the primary concerns on the part of policy-makers and the general public was a fear that deep sea, offshore drilling would be curtailed or limited. Indeed, legal challenges were successfully mounted to thwart the Obama administra- tion’s moratorium.
The institutional and policy environment surrounding the BP oil spill suggests a possibility for extending and improving the technology-embedded disaster model. A more powerful model would take into account the specific nature and value of the resources at stake, the resources
B. Bozeman / Technology in Society 33 (2011) 244–252 251
motivating organizational action and the deployment of technology. Doing so could provide a better understanding of disasters and of the possibilities for mitigating them. For example, such a model would suggest time limitations of remedial approaches relying largely on more regulations and regulatory oversight. A precondition to the effective- ness or regulatory alternatives may well be an organiza- tional and institutional environment amenable to regulation. When resources are perceived to be so scarce and valuable that (for many at least) environmental catastrophe takes a back seat to resource pursuit, then a useful model of disaster should lead us to consider just how and why rapacious organizational cultures emerge [59]. One possibility is that they exist with the complicity of those nominally charged with overseeing them and with the tacit consent of a public willing to make nearly any sacrifice or take any risk to ensure the continued flow of the resources that emerge from marriage of high risk tech- nology and risk tolerant organizational culture.
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