Matematica e organizzazione. Un capitolo della storia della matematica applicata

Millán Gasca, Ana

La Matematica nella società e nella cultura, Série 1, Tome 2 (2009) no. 1, pp. 127-156

Résumé

This paper considers the evolution of the mathematical study of management problems in the military, in industrial production systems and in bureaucracy, through the analysis of the cultural sources of operations research. OR is sometimes considered a branch of applied mathematics, or a synonymous of management science or of industrial engineering. In a few decades of impetous growth, OR has tried to maintain a balance between the expectations (a rational, ready answer to very complex problems in practice) and the systematic development of a theoretical corpus; and OR practitioners have often criticized the OR "ecosystem" and the current research trends. Historical studies of OR have considered several partial aspects, such as national contexts (English, American, French, Russian), mathematical techniques, application contexts (main characters and institutions in the military, in industry). History of mathematics offers a general cultural framework in which OR can be better understood as a cultural project that shares with biomathematics and mathematical economics a common root in the Enlightenment views of a mathematical rationality that can be found in natural phenomena or can be used to control human and social behaviour; as a cultural project typical of the 20th century as the age of a mathematical "systems approach"; as a cultural project that was stimulated by the development of mathematical modelling and by the new ideas of the early 20th century mathematics.