This book introduces a fundamental approach to a more balanced automation in manufacturing. It is a follow-up to the previous title, Balanced Automation Systems Balanced Automation Systems II discusses the changes in focus imposed by balanced automation and offers human-centered solutions for design frameworks, together with many implementation strategies.<BR>This book is derived from the selected proceedings of the Second IFIP/IEEE International Conference on Architectures and Design Methods for Balanced Automation Systems, sponsored by the International Federation for Information Processing and IEEE and held in Lisbon, Portugal in June 1996. This book will be valuable and essential reading for senior undergraduate and graduate level students taking courses in CIM, production management, and automation systems, and for engineers, EDP managers and R&D personnel.