UNDERSTANDING THE PROCESS OF OPERATIONAL RESEARCH - COLLECTED READINGS

In recent years there has been an emerging interest in the process by which operational research is carried out in organisations. This has been driven by the rapid developments which have taken place in the discipline throughout the 1980s. During this time Operational Research (OR) has undergone a period of significant reappraisal and as a result a deeper understanding of OR and its use in an organisational setting has been gained. This book provides a broad historical context within which these recent developments can be evaluated and future change can be anticipated. Paul Keys brings together a collection of 19 readings drawn from the 1940s to the 1990s. Arranged in four chronologically ordered sections with introductory essays providing a thematic structure, this material acts as signpost to the major steps in the developments and understanding of OR as it is practiced. The book provides an opportunity for students who are not quantitatively oriented to appreciate the and strengths of the OR approach and will provide undergraduates and graduates with complementary reading to the standard techniques-based OR texts.

About the author Paul Keys graduated from St Andrews University with a degree in Pure and Applied Mathematics. He became a research assistant at the School of Geography, University of Leeds where his work focused on urban modelling and systems analysis. He is currently a senior lecturer at the University of Hull in systems methodologies and OR. He has written many papers in the area and has edited several collections. He is also Director of Undergraduate Programmes in the Department of Management Systems and Sciences.

Partial table of contents:

A DISCIPLINE EMERGES: 1935-45.

Operational Research (P. Blackett).

Reminiscences of Operational Research in World War II by Some of Its Practitioners (D. Christopherson & E. Baughan).

A History of Operations Research (F. Trefethen).

CLASSICAL OR--GROWTH AND STABILITY: 1945-75.

A Comparison of Operational Research in the U.S.A.

and in Great Britain (R. Ackoff).

Internal Organization (R. Tomlinson).

Operations Research in Perspective (H. Miser).

CRITIQUE AND REVISION: 1975-85.

OR/MS: Dead or Dying?

RX for Survival (J. Hall & S. Hess).

The Future of Operational Research Is Past (R. Ackoff).

The Changing Role of O.R. (N. Tobin, et al.).

Could OR Be a Science?

(M. Dando, et al.).

A Materialist Analysis of Operational Research (J. Rosenhead & C. Thunhurst).

OUT OF THE DEBATE: 1985-90.

Discussion and Recommendations (Committee on the Future Practice of Operational Research).

Operations Research: The Next Decade (Committee on the Next Decade in Operations Research (CONDOR)).

OR as a Technology: Some Issues and Implications (P. Keys).

Conclusion: Towards the Future.

Subject Index.