ABSTRACT
The major components of a complex organization are determined by the design of that organization. This chapter focuses on the impact of technological requirements on social structure. It also focuses on differentiation and linkages of the individuals in the organization that is, on the social structure. The synthetic organizations involved in disaster-recovery activities are ad hoc organizations and usually dissolve rather rapidly. The synthetic organization for disaster recovery is inefficient by technological or economic standards because it must order the actions of its components in a situation of interdependence and in the face of uncertainty as to where and how that interdependence exists. Both the natural-system and rational models of complex organizations assume interdependence of organizational parts, the rational model being somewhat more specific about the location of interdependence and somewhat more circumscribed about the nature of the interdependence assumed.
