Vulnerabilities of Social Structures - The Black Vault

that local communities defer claims based on special feelingsof deprivation, that individuals continue to accept burdensomepersonal obligations after the most vivid crisis mood hasdwindled, that pre-attack systems of reward and status be reinstitutedin the face of radical differences in the effects ofattack on irdividuals, and that government allow latitude fordissent amid conditions that may require attempts at socialand personal control of lives which go far beyond previous experience.(B. 4. 1) For each of these potential sources ofconflict, there is a demand for social policy and social control.2.4. b. The attainment of economic viability (see ChapterIV) will be one of the most urgent requirements levied upon thestructural-institutional and policy resources of the social system.(B. 4.2 and B. 4. 2. a)3. The requirements of the ecological system of society becomecritical during the Reorganization Period. Upon Emergence into theReorganization Period, the fundamental challenge to both survivorsand their social system is to create the conditions for maintainingthemselves as a society. Immediate subsistence is less critical,though still pressing. Re-establishing a self-maintaining society willrequire a number of specific, critical tasks of adaptation and maintenance;the critical level of behavioral ordering which determines theranges and requirements of these tasks will be the ecological system,a system whose primary function is maintenance and a system whichih. elatively independent of immediate situation. In particular, thehuman population of the society must be inventoried, stabilized in itsphysical environment, and, if necessary, managed as a population.Using social system resources surviving from the Shelter Period forcreating and attaining ecological stability becomes the dominant functionalrequirement in building a basis for a self-maintaining populationin the Reorganization Period. (B. 5)3. 1. The aggregate human resources for recovery are the populationof the society. Not only must the population have the distributionof traits required for the jobs of an industrial society,but the development and use of these traits must be sustained byparticular policies based on the known characteristics of the population.One of the striking possible traits of the American populationafter even low level attacks appears to be a marked increasein the number of orphans. To support this shifted dependencyburden, some system of orphan management would be required.Within the American social setting, placement of orphans withkin appears as a possible, acceptable solution to the burden createdby a large increase in orphans. Such a plan of orphan assignnientis an illustration of the kinds of social welfare policies andsystems which may be dictated by the post-attack population andits management requirements. (B. 5. 1 and B. 5. 1. a)