Resilience Factors Reconciled with Complexity: The Dynamics of Order and Disorder

Abstract

One of the main challenges in crisis management is to assess, ahead of time, the resilience of a system before a crisis erupts (pandemic, computer bug with large‐scale effects, cascade effects in critical infrastructure, etc.). In this article, we propose to reconcile the multiple and sometimes divergent definition of resilience by explaining the complementarity of stability and adaptability inherent to the concept. Also, we integrate a new dimension to the assessment of resilience by analysing the dynamics of negentropy (order, stability) and entropy (disorder, change) between factors. Until now, the evaluation of organizational and interorganizational resilience focused on analysing the presence or absence of resilience factors. With this new dimension, we show the complementarity and interdependence of resilience factors. Finally, we demonstrate how resilience is based on both favourable order and favourable disorder which create diversity and conformity in the system, while vulnerability relies on unfavourable order and unfavourable disorder.