Abstract
The paper presents a discrete element perturbation method for stress and stability analysis of elastic structures. The method which utilizes the concept of localised rotation in conjunction with a discrete perturbation procedure is applied to a variety of problems with emphasis on the initial post bifurcation behaviour of elastic structures such as elastic rings under configuration dependent external pressure and torsional lateral postbuckling of beams. A linearized discrete element matrix formulation, which lends itself for computer programming, is given.