Beyond Garbage Cans: An AI Model of Organizational Choice

Part of this research was conducted during Michael Masuch's stay as a scholar of the Dutch National Science Foundation at the Graduate School of Public Affairs, State University of New York at Albany. Thanks are due to faculty and staff of the GSPA, and especially to Ron Hoskins, for all kinds of support, and to Maureen Donahue and Min Yuan for their assistance. Additional support came through grant #500-280-101 of the Dutch National Science Foundation and a Study Contract with International Business Machines Co. This study builds on the simulation methodology on which the metaphor of garbage can decision making was originally based, presenting a new model of organizational decision making that complements the original garbage can model by combining ambiguous choice with decision making under conditions of structure. The new model overcomes important, design-related limitations of previous studies by adopting tools from artificial intelligence (Al). Based on the interplay of actors, skills, actions, issues, and structure, the model represents human decision making as symbol-driven search activity. The results of the simulation indicate that decision making in organized structures may become as disorderly as decision making in organized anarchies, but for different reasons.'