modularism as the attempt to lend greater durability to a whole structure by shortening the life span of its components.

when change is accelerated, more and more novel first-time problems arise, and traditional forms of organization prove inadequate to the new conditions. They can no longer cope.

self-renewal, as Gardner puts it—is a necessary, an unavoidable response to the acceleration of change.

And when a reorganization sharply alters this structure by redefining or redistributing these roles, we can say that the old organization has died and a new one has sprung up to take its place.

An organization, after all, is nothing more than a collection of human objectives, expectations, and obligations. It is, in other words, a structure of roles filled by humans.

instead of being trapped in some unchanging, personality-smashing niche, man will find himself liberated, a stranger in a new free-form world of kinetic organizations. In this alien landscape, his position will be constantly changing, fluid, and varied. And his organizational ties, like his ties with things, places and people, will turn over at a

Just as every act in a man’s life occurs in some definite geographical place, so does it also occur in an organizational place, a particular location in the invisible geography of human organization.

How fast should children—or adults for that matter—be expected to make and break human relationships? Perhaps there is some optimum rate that we exceed at our peril? Nobody knows. However, if to this picture of declining durations we add the factor of diversity—the recognition that each new human relationship requires a different pattern of

It is as though they wished, where possible, to avoid new human ties that might only have to be broken again before long—as if they wished, in short, to slow down the flow-through of people in their lives.