Critical Thinking: Moving from Infrastructure Protection to Infrastructure Resiliency

This updated compilation examines the concept of critical infrastructure resilience in theory, policy, and implementation. On the one hand, “resilience” may just be another policy buzzword; but on the other hand, it might indicate a shift in perception and priority of threats, vulnerabilities, and consequences. Indeed, the Critical Infrastructure Task Force (CITF) has recently recommended to the Homeland Security Advisory Committee (HSAC) to “Promulgate Critical Infrastructure Resilience (CIR) as the top-level strategic objective – the desired outcome- to drive national policy and planning.”

Defined broadly as the ability of a system to withstand to and recover from adversity, resilience is increasingly applied to larger social and technical systems. Stress and adversity are experienced not only by individuals and groups, but also by organizations and systems. In the context of increasing natural and man-made threats and vulnerabilities of modern societies, the concept seems particularly useful to inform policies that mitigate the consequences of such events.

The contributions to this series attempt to define, clarify, and set boundaries for intellectual discourse on resilience in the post-9/11 and post-Katrina homeland security environment. Please direct feedback to Dr. Christine Pommerening, Critical Infrastructure Protection Program, at 703-993-3132 or cpommere@gmu.edu.

Table of Contents

From Protection to Resilience: Injecting “Moxie” into the Infrastructure Security Continuum.

John A.McCarthy..........................................1

Resilience in Organizations and Systems: Background and Trajectories of an Emerging Paradigm.

Christine Pommerening............................9

Shifting Security Paradigms: Toward Resilience.

Lewis J. Perelman.....................................23

Moving Beyond Critical Infrastructure Protection to Disaster Resilience.

Paula L. Scalingi.........................................49

Measuring Resilience in Network-Based Infrastructures.

David A. Garbin and John F. Shortle....... 73

Resilience: A Systems Design Imperative.

David Arsenault and Arun Sood................87

The Need for Resiliency at the Corporate Level.