A Dynamic Model of Organizational Decision Making: Chemco Revisited Six Years After Bhopal

Howard Kunreuther and Edward H. Bowman
Additional contact information
Howard Kunreuther: Center for Risk Management and Decision Processes, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104
Edward H. Bowman: Reginald H. Jones Center for Management Policy, Strategy and Organization, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104

Organization Science, 1997, vol. 8, issue 4, 404-413

Abstract: The authors develop a dynamic model of organization decision making that is motivated by the decision-making process at a multinational chemical firm, given the pseudonym Chemco, that they visited shortly after the Union Carbide explosion in Bhopal, India, and again six years later. Two major decisions were taken by Chemco that could be attributed in large part to the Bhopal disaster: the divestiture of one of its plants and the sale of a business. An analysis of those actions by Chemco underscores the importance of reference points and constraints in influencing organizational choices.

Keywords: organizational change; decision making; catastrophes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1997
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/orsc.8.4.404 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:ororsc:v:8:y:1997:i:4:p:404-413

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Organization Science from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().