Critical fragility in sociotechnical systems

Sociotechnical systems, where technological and human
elements interact in a goal-oriented manner, provide
important functional support to our societies. Here,
we draw attention to the underappreciated concept of
timeliness—i.e., system elements being available at the
right place at the right time—that has been ubiquitously
and integrally adopted as a quality standard in the modus
operandi of sociotechnical systems. We point out that
a variety of incentives, often reinforced by competitive
pressures, prompt system operators to myopically opti-
mize for efficiencies, running the risk of inadvertently tak-
ing timeliness to the limit of its operational performance,
correspondingly making the system critically fragile to
perturbations by pushing the entire system toward the
proverbial “edge of a cliff.” Invoking a stylized model for
operational delays, we identify the limiting operational
performance of timeliness, as a true critical point, where
the smallest of perturbations can lead to a systemic col-
lapse. Specifically for firm-to-firm production networks,
we suggest that the proximity to critical fragility is an
important ingredient for understanding the fundamental
“excess volatility puzzle” in economics. Further, in gener-
ality for optimizing sociotechnical systems, we propose
that critical fragility is a crucial aspect in managing the
trade-off between efficiency and robustness.