Views on the Subject of Multilevel Control

Lefkowitz, I. (1975). Views on the Subject of Multilevel Control. IIASA Working Paper. IIASA, Laxenburg, Austria: WP-75-034

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Abstract

The title of my talk suggests that my remarks be more philosophical than technical, more general and broad brush than detailed and specialized. I will, nevertheless, take the liberty of somewhat limiting the scope in order to focus very specifically on some problems related to the application of multilevel concepts and techniques to control of complex industrial systems.

In the control of industrial systems, we consider the overall goal to be, in a very general sense, the efficient utilization of resources (e.g. material, energy, environmental, labor, capital) in the production of products satisfying quality specifications and consistent with goals and constraints which may be imposed by society. Thus, we are concerned with the broad spectrum of decision-making and control functions (e.g. process control, operations control, scheduling, planning, etc.) which play a role in the effective operation of the system with respect to its production goals. The control problem in this generalized context is extremely difficult to handle; we formulate various multilevel/multilayer, hierarchical structures to provide rational and systematic procedures for resolving the problem.

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