Read the following passages and answer the question given below

Punctuated equilibrium is A much-used metaphor in the new economics. In nature, it occurs when periods of relative calm and stability are interrupted by violent, stormy interludes. These often result in A dramatic restructuring and change – even, periodically, in the destruction and replacement of plant or animal species. Stephen Jay Gould, the writer of popular paleontological history has illustrated from his studies of fossils how evolution came about largely through such big, traumatic events, rather than by the Darwinian interpretation of gradual incremental adaptation.
What such traumatic events do is move the patterns of growing closer to the ‘edge of chaos,’ A term originally coined to describe the arena in nature where revitalization takes place, caught between equilibrium and chaos. Hurricanes, typhoons and catastrophic forest fires are simple examples of traumatic events that operate on the edge of chaos; violent weather changes disturb the oceans and the atmosphere, cleaning and replenishing them with oxygen, carbon dioxide and other nutrients as well as clearing out dead or insecure plant life. “Major environmental disturbances such as asteroid impacts or radical shifts in weather can trigger the proliferation in new species and accelerated adaptation within species,’ writes Pascale in his latest book. Surfing the Edge of Chaos, based on his Santa Fe work. Fires as ecologists find that A stretch of prairie or savannah is essential for the regeneration of biodiversity. Some plants typical of the habitat are simply doing not reappear in the controlled re-growth, and the reason has proved to be the absence of fire.
Relating these findings to business activities offers some obvious parallels: booms and busts in the stock market, or massive technology shifts that put old- economy models under severe strain and soon break them and reinvent them, or render them obsolete. Not surprisingly, the edge of chaos has become A phrase beloved of the business guru industry; though it is often just another way of describing the forces that periodically unnerve old, complacent industries. Not long ago, market hurricanes in the shape of ‘category killer’ entrants such as WalMart and Toys ‘‘r’ we sent traditional retailers into A tailspin from which many had barely started to recover before they were hit again by the Force 12 arrival of e-commerce. Apple’s personal computer was A business earthquake that erupted under the mighty market leader IBM, forcing radical change in an organization that had been accustomed to decades of dominant equilibrium.
Every standard text on change advocates radical, in the sense of root- and- branch, treatment, rather than allowing resistance to build and undermine the process. Niccolo Machiavelli, the Renaissance master of manipulative diplomacy, understood this when he advised the new rulers of A captured state to take the most difficult, ruthless decisions first.
Historically, says Eric Beinhocker, ‘the equilibrium view of strategy has focused on how to be A good competitor, not A good revolver. There are tensions and trade-offs between the two. Yet the most successful companies do not simply strike A middle ground but manage to excel at competing and evolving simultaneously, despite the tensions. Among the essentials of successful evolution is what Beinhocker describes as ‘being both focused and robust’, or in another academic paper, as populations of robust strategies. This phrase relates to nature’s tendency to foster A flock of alternative survival plans in order to test the fittest for any future environment. In business terms, the Californian venture capital enterprise idea lab does is by backing does it by backing hosts of potential start-ups. It can tolerate those that fail to make the grade because it is more than compensated by the few that make it big. Capital One, the credit card- issuing virtual bank, follows A similar strategy in ties scatter-gun marketing, offering low entry borrowing terms to huge numbers of people, only A fraction of whom will prove profitable customers for the bank. Bill Gates flummoxed both customers and competitors by simultaneously investing in Windows and in its principal rival technologies, but he was effectively hedging his bets by fostering A population of alternative strategies.
Robust strategies, says Beinhocker, differ from scenario analysis because they do not attempt to identify the most or least likely future. Instead to quote Francis Crick, the co-discoverer of DNA, they accept that ‘evolution is cleverer than you are. in effect, the concept ‘ makes A company more like A market, with A population of strategies that cover A broad array of possibilities and evolve over time, some success ding and some failing.’