Centralized critical infrastructure makes single destructive acts vastly more consequential
Evidence
The fourth feature that contributes to a heightened sense of personal and societal vulnerability is the highly centralized nature of essential service systems in modern life. When populations were more widely dispersed, the consequences of any given aggressive act were confined mainly to the persons against whom the behavior was directed. However, with increasing urbanization, the welfare of millions of people depends on the smooth functioning of intricate, interdependent service systems. A single destructive act can instantly harm vast numbers of people and frighten many more by disrupting communications, transportation, and electricity or contaminating water and food supplies. The combination of unpredictability, grave consequences, perceived inability to protect oneself, and vulnerable interdependence is especially intimidating and socially constraining (Bandura, 1997). — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 2113
Categorization
Category: Causal Relationships
- XREF: Connects to infrastructure-vulnerability literature and the fragility of networked systems; resonates with how one act (a water contamination, a grid failure) cascades in digitized societies.
- SEED: Essay angle: how the Fourth-Industrial-revolution centralization of life-support systems has transformed the effective power of a single saboteur, and what that means for both security and civil liberties.