Reverse Salients Research Articles

Reverse Salient as a Nexus of Technologies and Values in Sociotechnical Systems: A Case Study of Lithium-ion Batteries

A good comprehension of value dynamics can contribute to a more value-sensitive and responsible design of technology. Theories addressing changes in values related to technology tend to reduce the complexity of technology development, neglecting the intricate interrelations between technical components within sociotechnical systems. This paper proposes an approach that incorporates Thomas Hughes’ notion of reverse salient to explore value change across two sociotechnical scenarios, which also aligns with the pragmatic account of values. Through an analysis of the values of safety and sustainability within lithium-ion battery (LiB) technologies, this study illustrates how the approach assesses changes in the relative importance of specific values within a certain domain, as well as the dynamics in the translation of these values. This case demonstrates that the emergence of reverse salients can enhance the recognition of certain values, potentially prompting a reconsideration of how these values are interpreted or translated. The study recommends that future research advances the operationalization of reverse salients and applies them to specific contexts to better manage value change.

Where digital meets physical innovation: Reverse salients and the unrealized dreams of3Dprinting

AbstractFor more than three decades, enthusiasts have predicted that direct manufacturing enabled by 3D printing would inevitably supplant traditional manufacturing methods. Alas, for nearly as long, these utopian predictions have failed to materialize. One reason is a flawed assumption that hybrid digital‐physical systems such as 3D printing would advance as rapidly as purely digital innovations enabled by Moore's law. Instead, like other examples of cyber‐physical systems (CPSs), technological progress in 3D printing faces inherent limitations that are emblematic of the differences between CPSs and purely digital innovations. As with any complex CPS, improved performance of a 3D printing system has been limited by that of its key components—the sort of limiting problem previously defined as a reverse salient. Unlike previously studied technologies, several reverse salients for 3D printing performance have neither resolved nor signs of resolving soon. Here we analyze these key reverse salients, and show how they have hampered the suitability of 3D printing for direct manufacturing and other predicted applications. We contrast predicted versus actual capabilities for 3D printing‐enabled transformation in six key areas: product innovation, mass customization, home fabrication, distributed manufacturing, supply chain optimization and business model innovation. From this, we suggest opportunities for greater realism in future 3D printing research, as well as broader implications for our understanding of CPSs and reverse salients.

Beyond the Lab and the Field: Infrastructures as Places of Knowledge Production since the Late Nineteenth Century ed. by Eike-Christian Heine and Martin Meiske

Reviewed by: Beyond the Lab and the Field: Infrastructures as Places of Knowledge Production since the Late Nineteenth Century ed. by Eike-Christian Heine and Martin Meiske Thomas Kaiserfeld (bio) Beyond the Lab and the Field: Infrastructures as Places of Knowledge Production since the Late Nineteenth Century Edited by Eike-Christian Heine and Martin Meiske. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2022. Pp. 292. The contributors to this anthology, comprising an introduction and ten empirical chapters, argue that infrastructures have been an overlooked site for knowledge production. New knowledge, they claim, has traditionally been traced back to spaces like labs and field studies. In these environments, control has to a varying degree been exercised over conditions and elements. Not in this volume, where instead infrastructures—characterized as a second nature—are branded as a hitherto ignored arena for the generation of knowledge. Beyond the Lab and the Field examines projects characterized as "scientific bonanzas," a metaphor for infrastructures as junctions for opportunities as well as distress. The cases include the Panama Canal; dam constructions in Germany, the United States, and Spain; the German autobahns during the Third Reich; Siberian oil extraction and irrigation in the Caucasus during the Soviet regime; European and Dutch power lines; a highway in Tel Aviv, Israel; and an airstrip in Antarctica. Timewise, the empirical examples stretch from the late nineteenth century to the early twentieth. The different chapters constitute a range of relations between infrastructures and knowledge, including social sciences and the humanities. Most straightforward are probably examples of how construction of infrastructures such as the Panama Canal led to the emergence of tropical medicine and to the further development of geology and paleontology. But infrastructures, such as waterscapes exploited for hydropower, can also exhibit more complicated patterns of knowledge management, including the coexistence of different knowledge traditions. In addition, the monograph includes examples of how new knowledge may constitute formative elements of infrastructure projects. In the case of autobahn construction in the Third Reich, archaeological excavations pointed backward to an imagined glorious Germanic past while the new road system under construction pointed forward to modernization and motorization. Ethnographical research was mobilized in Siberia in order to understand how indigenous people could be transformed to contribute to the extraction of oil, resulting in new knowledge about indigenous Siberian lifestyles. Related to this are examples of counterexpertise knowledge opposing new infrastructures by introducing alternative value scales for the assessment of their impact, such as accessibility or the preservation of cultural and natural heritage. Taken together, the different contributions make up a heterogenous collection in which the theme is analyzed from a number of perspectives. One drawback is that the concept of infrastructure becomes a bit stretched. [End Page 268] Although briefly discussed in the introduction, where it is characterized by "profound interdependencies" (p. 5), and in a chapter on the European electrical system as arrangements that enable "flows of energy, information, people, and goods" (p. 163), many of the chapters focus on isolated parts of infrastructures. The resulting impression is that the common denominator for the sites of knowledge production analyzed is more ambitious construction projects than infrastructures. For instance, an Antarctic airstrip is certainly a project that is part of an infrastructure. But when the analysis is focused on ecological knowledge mobilized in opposition to the exploration of Antarctica, the infrastructural aspects are easily lost. Another concern is the choice of analytical concepts. Although Thomas P. Hughes's notion of technological momentum is employed to elucidate the suitability of infrastructures for the study of knowledge production as they often involve substantial investments in order to mobilize extensive resources to be managed by numerous stakeholders (p. 8), his ideas regarding reverse salients are never put to work despite their relevance to knowledge production in the contexts of infrastructures and large technical systems alike. In fact, many of the contributions could easily be brought together as examples of how reverse salients are handled by the production or engagement of knowledge—or, alternatively, how knowledge may create reverse salients where there were none due to ignorance. Still, the different contributions make a strong, albeit somewhat less concerted, effort to highlight infrastructures as an important space for knowledge production and...

Innovation Ecosystem Evolution as Socio-technical Transition: A Case Study

The evolution of innovation ecosystems is an important topic for scholars and practitioners alike, as externalities such as market changes, competitive landscapes, and regulatory pressures demand the delivery of new customer-facing value propositions. In this paper we aim to enhance our conceptual understanding of ecosystem evolution by shining a socio-technical lens upon the innovation ecosystem. Through this perspective we understand ecosystem evolution as a socio-technical transition resulting from the emergence and resolution of development-retarding social or technical components referred to as ‘reverse salients’. Our case study of a food innovation ecosystem in regional Australia identifies numerous reverse salients that inhibit ecosystem reconfiguration and transition from its current state delivering high-quality agricultural produce, to a new state marked by greater output capacity and higher number of value-added offerings. We categorise these reverse salients as ‘actors’, ‘connections’ between actors, and ‘resources’ flowing between actors. While these categories align with the ecosystem-as-structure perspective, our findings additionally underscore the role of ecosystem ‘leadership’ and ‘rules of engagement’ within the ecosystem as further sources of reverse salience. We subsequently present a conceptual model that integrates our study findings along with a set of propositions to guide future empirical research.

Ciencia en transición. El lastre franquista ante el reto de la modernización [Science in transition. The Francoist burden and modernization's challenge] ed. by Lorenzo Delgado and Santiago M. López

Reviewed by: Ciencia en transición. El lastre franquista ante el reto de la modernización [Science in transition. The Francoist burden and modernization's challenge] ed. by Lorenzo Delgado and Santiago M. López Lino Camprubí (bio) Ciencia en transición. El lastre franquista ante el reto de la modernización [Science in transition. The Francoist burden and modernization's challenge] Edited by Lorenzo Delgado and Santiago M. López. Madrid: Sílex Ediciones, 2019. Pp. 386. The title of this edited volume plays with the general meaning of "transition" and the more specific meaning in a Spanish context: the mid-1970s political shift from the Francoist dictatorial regime to the current democratic system. This is thus a welcome incursion in the relatively understudied development of Spain's scientific research system within that political and economic transformation. The book's subtitle contains a strong thesis: the Francoist period (1939–75) constituted a "burden" that prevented Spain from properly facing "modernization's challenge." Modernization occurred. By most indicators, in the 1960s, the Spanish economy experienced one of history's most rapid developments. Yet, as the editors' introduction explains, the Francoist administration failed to meet the economic and political challenges this growth implied. Specifically, the missed opportunity to implement an adequate research and development policy prevented successful economic development. The book's introduction borrows from Thomas P. Hughes's Networks of Power to identify the "reverse salients" that stopped the system moving in the direction system builders expected. In particular, letting growth rest on technology imports eventually made Spanish companies too dependent on foreign machinery and decisions. In addition, the failure to create a critical mass of highly trained scientists and technical workers hampered Spain's productivity and political stability. The editors offer an intriguing comparison—South-Asian dictatorial economies emerging in the same period—which needs further justification and elaboration. There is much to debate here. For historians interested in the intersections of technology and political economy, the Spanish case is particularly productive for exploring the prevailing assumptions that economic growth rests on technological innovation, which in turn depends on investment in scientific research. But even assuming innovation is a universal model (but see Lee and Russell, The Innovation Delusion), describing an entire forty-year period as a "burden" misses some of the book's nuances. Other chapters state that some public enterprises created in the first two decades of Francoism contributed to private growth in the 1960s. Secondary and tertiary education opened up from the elites to large parts of the population, facilitating the creation of a middle class that did ensure certain levels of productivity and political stability. [End Page 554] But the value of this volume lies precisely in its exploratory character. It enables historians of technology to reformulate big questions: Can technology imports occur without innovating adaptations? What are the scientific, technical, and labor conditions for external know-how to have an internal impact? How do we account for science's role in the wider political economy in a context of low public expenditures in science? Individual chapters provide some answers. Chapters 2–5 each look at one major research institution that concentrated most public spending on scientific and technological development during the Francoist period. Most of these four chapters summarize earlier findings. Together, however, they offer a clear picture of areas where research and development did have a significant impact on science and society at large, even though this did not always translate directly into productivity and growth. Four chapters are of particular interest to an international readership (chs. 6–9). They explore how international and diplomatic relations (including trade), particularly with Germany, France, and the United States, impacted Spanish science policy. Hence the book's eye-catching frontispiece: the three Apollo 11 astronauts dressed up as toreros during a visit to Madrid, organized by NASA to celebrate and secure Spanish observation sites for the moon landings. The book then turns to the testimonies of reflective actors involved in the political transition to democratic institutions for science. Caution is of course needed when using primary sources, but these chapters offer valuable reflections on policy, labor, and the growing role of regional governments (chs. 10–13...

Railroads and the Transformation of China by Elisabeth Köll

Reviewed by: Railroads and the Transformation of China by Elisabeth Köll Ying Jia Tan (bio) Railroads and the Transformation of China By Elisabeth Köll. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2019. Pp. 396. Railroads and the Transformation of China By Elisabeth Köll. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2019. Pp. 396. Railroads have featured prominently as engines of change in histories of modern nation-states and economies. As the first comprehensive history of China's railroad development in any language, Elisabeth Köll's well-researched account addresses issues of interest to historians of technology. It demonstrates how, in the words of Peter Norton in "Urban Transport and Mobility in Technology and Culture," "transport and mobility are not technological systems governed by purportedly objective measures (such as efficiency), but socio-technical systems that are constantly subject to the influence of social groups" (Technology and Culture, 2020, p. 1203). This work of business and institutional history brings into focus key socioeconomic factors that either impeded or accelerated the expansion of China's railroads. Köll explicitly spells out her objective in the opening paragraph by noting that the examination of "social, economic, cultural, and political functions" addresses "how and to what extent railroads affected China's development throughout the twentieth century, and conversely how this trajectory left an imprint on the railroad itself as a bureaucratic system" (p. 1). The chapters offer a chronological account that begins with the depiction of trains and railroads in journals published in the 1870s and ends with the abolition of the Ministry of Railways in the wake of the catastrophic collision of two high-speed trains in Wenzhou in 2011. Köll focuses on the following three major railroad lines owing to the comprehensiveness of archival documentation before the Communist revolution in 1949: the Tianjin-Pukou line connecting North China with the lower Yangtze, the Guangzhou-Hankou line connecting the middle Yangtze with the Pearl River delta, and the Shanghai-Hangzhou-Ningbo line connecting commercial centers in the lower Yangtze. The institutional analysis begins with the fractious integration of "Western managerial styles with indigenous business practices" under a semicolonial context and then moves on to the integration of railway lines into a national network during decades of regime change, war, and revolution (p. 20). After examining how these railroad companies became incorporated in the socialist economy and played a role in radical campaigns between the 1950s and 1960s, the study concludes by showing how the Chinese railroad system concurrently underwent rational bureaucratization and maintained autonomy at the regional and local levels (pp. 296–97). Köll's narrative arc follows Thomas Hughes's four-stage process in the [End Page 962] formation of technical systems, namely, invention, technology transfer, the correcting of reverse salients during system growth, and momentum (Networks of Power, 1993, pp. 14–17). The agents of historical change differ widely from Hughes's theory, which is generalized from electrical power systems in Western nations. While Hughes focused on the work of engineers, Köll briefly touches on their role in a section on the professionalization of railroad engineering (pp. 168–78). Her institutional approach instead focuses on the responses of managers, state administrators, and even military leaders to political upheaval and explores the implications of their decisions on the railroad system. The main problems of the "technology transfer" phase in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries arose from the "tensions and misunderstandings created by the half-dozen colonial powers building railroads under Chinese management," which in turn led to improvised solutions to resolve disputes over financing, surveying, land purchases, and construction (p. 51). Köll highlights the contribution of the military during the "system growth" and "momentum" stages. Not only did the inept handling of the engines by captives of warlord armies damage the equipment, but the soldiers themselves exacerbated engine failure by helping themselves to the hot water from the engine or the cold water from the tender (p. 71). The military was not entirely destructive. In the 1920s, armies of the warlord Zhang Xun and nationalist forces under Chiang Kai-shek transformed Xuzhou into a main supply station during their military campaigns (p. 120). The strategic destruction of...

Identifying and addressing reverse salients in infrastructural change. The case of a small zero emission campus in Southern Norway

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the relevance and use of the concept “reverse salient” in ambitious infrastructural change. Thomas Hughes, in his seminal study of socio-technical system building, observed that the elimination of “reverse salients”, i.e. subsystems that because of their limited performance hold back further development, was a central driver for creativity and innovation. It is argued that in sustainable infrastructural transformations, however, reverse salients that resist change are more often neglected than addressed.Design/methodology/approachHigher education institution campuses combine laboratory-like conditions and sufficient internal complexity to be used as test-beds for ambitious sustainable change in the built environment. In this article, a neglected barrier to the transformation of a small campus into a zero emission campus is revealed, described and addressed.FindingsIn terms of substantive findings, first, it is demonstrated how parts of infrastructures that – often for good reasons – have been neglected in efforts to reduce climate impacts can be identified with the help of a historical exploration of the site and through close collaboration with local facilities managers. Second, a temporary low-tech intervention is presented that addressed the critical problems related to these “reverse salients”.Research limitations/implicationsThe limitations of a case study approach apply to this study. Particular caution has to be exercised in terms of generalisation. Moreover, the intervention would benefit greatly from stricter control and additional iterations of the intervention which have not yet been performed.Practical implicationsIn addition to technology-focussed, top-down initiatives, which often struggle with actually reaching their ambitious goals in routine operation, neglected parts of campuses can contribute greatly to energy and emissions reductions. Moreover, it is demonstrated that and how local technical personnel has an important part to play in infrastructural transformations.Originality/valueConcepts developed in the study of socio-technical system building have not yet been applied in the study and practice of sustainable infrastructural transformation. Their contribution is demonstrated. Moreover, living labs are notoriously difficult to evaluate. In this case study, processes and effects of an innovative living lab intervention are described and analysed. This enables a better understanding of restrictions and possibilities of experimenting in real-life settings.

Acting as an innovation niche seeder:how can the reverse salient of southeast Asian economies be overcome?

Taking Southeast Asian emerging economies as an empirical case, this study explores how the reverse salients that have emerged during the transitional process may be overcome efficiently and effectively. In particular, three action-oriented case studies derived from a heuristic research approach are presented to show how Taiwan is empowering its universities and public research institutes to act as innovation niche seeders for Southeast Asian economies, thereby compensating for the weakness of their socio-technical systems (i.e. the reverse salients). Presently, the government-led policies of Southeast Asian countries are largely oriented towards incentivizing foreign multinational corporations to lead the development of domestic production networks. This strategy allows these countries to acquire the necessary resources for an economic transition in the era of digitalization, although at the expense of developing their own innovation niches. This study presents the urgency of a need for a new approach, and a new avenue for emerging countries to develop an effective and efficient governance model. The proposed model would allow external institutional mechanisms, such as universities and public research institutes, to act as critical intermediaries providing an alternative solution for the dilemmas faced by small and medium-sized enterprise-centric emerging countries. Policy implications for building sustainable socio-technical regimes in Southeast Asia’s transitional emerging countries are also discussed.

Building ‘mass’ and ‘momentum’ – a latecomer country’s passage to large technological systems – the case of China

ABSTRACTThis paper focuses on how a latecomer country can bring a large (infrastructural) technological system (LTS) to a market already dominated by the entrenched systems of global technology leaders. We construct a conceptual framework, building on Hughes LTS theory (1983) and insights from social studies of technology into the specificities of infrastructural sociotechnical systems to analyse the development of China’s 3rd Generation mobile telephony system. We explore the complex dynamics surrounding the distributed governance of innovation, highlighting changes in key system builders. We note the role of the state in addressing critical problems (‘reverse salients’), both in terms of aligning players through legitimating and sense-making and also, building the necessary mass and momentum. This includes a more radical reconfiguring of the field to secure the substantial commitments needed to materialise and embed a new LTS infrastructure.

Moving to a Circular Economy in China: Transforming Industrial Parks into Eco-industrial Parks

China’s moves to introduce a Circular Economy have attracted wide attention as a solution to severe problems of resource inefficiency and lack of resource productivity. This article highlights the distinctive strategy of focusing such efforts on existing industrial parks, turning them into eco-industrial parks. It provides three case studies and highlights the management issues involved as overcoming reverse salients and capturing network advantages. China is an especially instructive case because it starts well behind the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries and thereby has much to gain by adopting comprehensive policies.

The Problem with Pilots: How Physicians, Engineers, and Airpower Enthusiasts Redefined Flight by Timothy P. Schultz

Reviewed by: The Problem with Pilots: How Physicians, Engineers, and Airpower Enthusiasts Redefined Flight by Timothy P. Schultz Alan D. Meyer (bio) The Problem with Pilots: How Physicians, Engineers, and Airpower Enthusiasts Redefined Flight. By Timothy P. Schultz. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2018. Pp. 280. Hardcover $44.95. In 2015, the Secretary of the Navy announced that the new F-35 jet would "almost certainly be the last manned strike fighter aircraft the Department of the Navy will ever buy or fly" (p. xv). Future military aircraft—especially those that serve in direct combat roles—would either be flown remotely by ground-based technicians or operated autonomously without direct human control. Timothy P. Schultz argues that this prediction represents the culmination of a century of efforts by flight surgeons, engineers, and air-power proponents to overcome the inherent shortcomings imposed by "the weakest link in manned flight," the pilot (p. vii). During World War I, pilots attempting to fly above their opponents encountered the debilitating and potentially fatal effects of hypoxia, or lack of oxygen, at high altitudes. They also discovered—too often the hard way—that humans are physiologically incapable of maintaining level flight after entering clouds or fog. By World War II, aircraft could withstand more "G" forces than humans, leading flyers to lose consciousness during violent aerial maneuvers. Schultz describes in fascinating yet highly accessible detail how engineers and flight surgeons responded, working together to discover causes and invent cures for each newly exposed shortfall in the "weakest link" in an increasingly complex technological system. Oxygen masks (and later pressurized aircraft), blind flying instruments that allow pilots to maintain control when they cannot see the horizon, and inflatable "G suits" that prevent blood from pooling in the legs as pilots pull out of a steep dive represent just some of the technological fixes intended to augment human performance in the unforgiving environment of flight. Schultz devotes the last third of his book to the present and future role of pilots (or lack thereof) in the cockpit. This includes a description of current technology such as Auto-GCAS (Automatic Ground Collision Avoidance System), which "at the point of no return, only 1.5 seconds until impact … [automatically] seizes control from the pilot." Designed to prevent a low-flying fighter plane from colliding with the ground (such accidents account for 75 percent of fatalities in the U.S. Air Force's F-16 fleet), this new system required both cutting edge technology and cultural buy-in from the fighter pilots who had to be willing to relinquish control to a computer in an emergency (pp. 140–41). Schultz also explores the evolving relationship between military pilots who actually fly over enemy lines and those who operate Remotely Piloted Aircraft, popularly known as "drones," from a computer console on the ground, as the Air Force struggles institutionally to redefine who deserves to be called "real pilots" (p. 163). He describes the [End Page 994] potential downsides of increasing reliance on cockpit automation as well, including the horrifying case of Air France Flight 447, which in 2009 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean killing all aboard after the pilots were unable to control the highly-automated aircraft (due to lack of practice) in an otherwise survivable emergency situation (p. 130). While many historians address the present and future only briefly in their conclusion, Schultz is writing for two separate audiences: fellow historians of technology as well as mid-career military officers who represent the rising generation of top commanders and policymakers. This may seem a tall order, but the author's diverse background—retired military pilot, Ph.D. in History of Technology, former Commandant and Dean of the U.S. Air Force School of Advanced Air and Space Studies—allows him to bridge this gap. He invokes Thomas Hughes's reverse salients (p. 24), Edward Constant's presumptive anomalies (p. 31), Thomas Kuhn's paradigm shifts (p. 58), and Norbert Wiener's theory of cybernetics (p. 71) to help explain why and how technological changes occurred throughout the past century of flight, offering succinct descriptions of each concept in the text for an educated but non-scholarly audience of military professionals...

The importance of ergonomic design in product innovation. Lessons from the development of the portable computer

The article addresses the role of ergonomic design in product innovation. Designers meet users’ needs by developing solutions to complex trade-offs—reverse salients—between a product’s characteristics. The fundamental ergonomic design challenge in portable computers concerns the reverse salient between two ergonomic factors: screen size and weight. It is easier to view information on larger screens, but portability is negatively affected by the weight of larger batteries required to power larger screens. This ergonomic reverse salient shaped the innovation trajectory of the portable computer, from the selection of the clamshell portable over alterative design configurations, to the search for more efficient batteries and new types of screens. Based on hedonic price analysis on data of ergonomic and technological characteristics, we show that (i) screen size and weight are key components in hedonic price functions, (ii) the interaction between screen size and weight is distinct from interactions between other, technological, characteristics that affect computing power, and (iii) positive prices are paid for the product solutions to the ergonomic reverse salient.

Why has a Korean telecommunications technology failed: A case study on WiBro

This study identifies and analyzes the causes for WiBro’s failure in the Korean telecommunications market within the context of the technological systems framework and the actor network theory. The reverse salients of WiBro were identified according to the activities of the actors from three different domains: technology, government, and business. The findings and implication of this study were obtained through a review of the literature and in-depth interviews with eight key experts. The reverse salients found can be categorized into two types: ‘apparent’ and ‘underlying’. The apparent reverse salients are the lack of investment and inadequate business model of the business actors. The underlying reverse salients are the policies enacted by government actors and are less obvious but heavily influence the creation of the apparent reverse salients and ultimately contribute to the failure of WiBro.

A systematic way of identifying and forecasting technological reverse salients using QFD, bibliometrics, and trend impact analysis: A carbon nanotube biosensor case

Experts have more difficulty identifying reverse salients in R&D because of increasing technological complexity and a shortened technology lifecycle. As an alternative, we suggest a new and systematic method of identifying and forecasting reverse salients using QFD (quality function deployment), bibliometric analysis, and TIA (trend impact analysis). QFD allows users to systematically identify and prioritize reverse salients. An integration of QFD, bibliometric analysis, and TIA makes it possible to specify key performance indicators of reverse salient in order to identify the performance gap between current and market-required performance and to make a probabilistic forecast about when reverse salients will be corrected. Our method will help managers identify a top priority reverse salient, forecast its future, and thus make better R&D decisions with regard to market requirements. A carbon nanotube biosensor technology is used as an example.

Identification and Forecasting of Emerging Technology Commercialization by Reverse Salient

 Abstract—The identification and forecasting of reverse salients of emerging technology is becoming harder because technology is getting complex. This study presents a systematic method of identifying and forecasting reverse salients. Experts evaluation, bibliometric analysis and forecasting techniques are integrated to specify reverse salients, to figure out the gap between current and market required performance, and to forecast when a reverse salient is resolved. This study will contribute to practitioners with regard to R&D investment of private sectors and governments, planning and technology commercialization. A carbon nanotube biosensor technology was analyzed as an example.

Determining reverse salient types and evolutionary dynamics of technology systems with performance disparities

Technological system evolution is marked by the uneven evolution of constituent sub-systems. Subsequently, system evolution is hampered by the resulting state of unevenness, or reverse salience, which results from the presence of the sub-system that delivers the lowest level of performance with respect to other sub-systems, namely, the reverse salient. In this paper, we develop absolute and proportional performance gap measures of reverse salience and, in turn, derive a typology of reverse salients that distinguishes alternative dynamics of change in the evolving system. We subsequently demonstrate the applicability of the measures and the typology through an illustrative empirical study of the PC (personal computer) technological system that functions as a gaming platform. Our empirical analysis demonstrates that patterns of temporal dynamics can be distinguished with the measurement of reverse salience, and that distinct paths of technological system evolution can be identified as different types of reverse salients emerge over time.

Reverse Salients at the Meta‐System Level: The Case of Containerization

Abstract The power of Hughes’ concept of reverse salients is evident in its widespread adoption and use in areas as diverse as water distribution, metals production, and mobile music businesses. In all these studies the reverse salient concept has been mainly applied to internal problems in the development of a large‐scale system. We focus not only on reverse salients within a system but also at the meta‐system level, wherein different systems come together to create a system of systems. We draw on the experience with containerization, which is a particularly interesting case study because it developed in response to the reverse salients at the meta‐system level—the bottlenecks at the interfaces between motor carriers, railroads, and water carriers, the three systems that together form the overall surface transportation system. We examine the processes both within each system and also at the meta‐system level and expand our understanding of reverse salients as a system development phenomenon.

KR09 Using Historical Lessons‐Learned in the Systems Engineering Process

AbstractSystems engineers often do not have a way to systematically apply historical “lessons‐learned’ in their day‐to‐day activities, especially when applied to non‐traditional areas of engineering management. Risk analysis has become the standard systems engineering decision‐making tool to evaluate uncertainties in cost, schedule and performance. Therefore, such historical insights need to be modeled within that framework to be mutually comprehensible and useful to both historians and systems engineers. To demonstrate this framework, I examine historical “lessons‐learned” in several relevant areas: the implications of operational flexibility on system design; complex system‐accident theory; and the considerations of technological “reverse salients”. The insights developed through historical analyses can be used as a decision‐making tool for systems engineers, by developing a subjective “risk rating” assessment as a part of the overall set of decision aids to estimate uncertainty in performance, cost and schedule. This interface between historical insights and the priorities of systems engineers can enrich the basis of programmatic decision‐making.

DYNAMICS OF REVERSE SALIENCE AS TECHNOLOGICAL PERFORMANCE GAP: AN EMPIRICAL STUDY OF THE PERSONAL COMPUTERTECHNOLOGY SYSTEM

The evolution of technological systems is hindered by systemic components, referred to as reverse salients, which fail to deliver the necessary level of technological performance thereby inhibiting the performance delivery of the system as a whole. This paper develops a performance gap measure of reverse salience and applies this measurement in the study of the PC (personal computer) technological system, focusing on the evolutions of firstly the CPU (central processing unit) and PC game sub-systems, and secondly the GPU (graphics processing unit) and PC game sub-systems. The measurement of the temporal behavior of reverse salience indicates that the PC game sub-system is the reverse salient, continuously trailing behind the technological performance of the CPU and GPU sub-systems from 1996 through 2006. The technological performance of the PC game sub-system as a reverse salient trails that of the CPU sub-system by up to 2300 MHz with a gradually decreasing performance disparity in recent years. In contrast, the dynamics of the PC game sub-system as a reverse salient trails the GPU sub-system with an ever increasing performance gap throughout the timeframe of analysis. In addition, we further discuss the research and managerial implications of our findings.

PVC plastic: a history of systems development and entrenchment

PVC (polyvinyl chloride) is currently one of the most produced and used plastic materials, although its' development has been far from straightforward. This paper describes how this material, from its early commercial production on until recently, has been subject to various criticisms concerning health and environmental hazards, but despite and thanks to these criticisms became deeply entrenched in society. Hughes' systems approach proves useful to understand this history; various ways of how the PVC industry has been dealing with reverse salients are revealed. However, to understand these processes, the systems approach has to be broadened with a network-oriented perspective. Outside influences on the system have to be accounted for, as well as negotiation processes between different (sub) systems. Finally, the PVC history suggests that the dynamics of the inter-system relations might be used for de-entrenchment strategies, by addressing higher system levels or overlapping systems, or by stimulating the entrenchment of alternative (sub) systems.