Resilience in Risk Analysis and Risk Assessment

Resilience is the ability of a system to react to and recover from disturbances with minimal effects on dynamic stability. Resilience is needed as systems and organizations become more complex and interrelated and the consequences of accidents and incidents increase. This paper analyzes the notion of resilience based on a literature survey and an exploration of incidents. In particular, resilience involves the ability of systems to undergo graceful and controlled degradation, the ability to rebound from degradation, the presence of redundancy, the ability to manage margins close to the performance boundaries, the establishment and exploration of common mental models, the presence of flexibility in systems and organizations, and the reduction of complexity and coupling. The paper describes how resilience can be included in system development and operations by considering organizations, technology and human factors. Also, it shows how past strengths and weaknesses can be considered in risk analysis to enhance safety, security and resilience.