Dealing Wisely with Technical Issues Homepage - Left Column

The Challenge

We live in an complex world in which we are utterly dependent upon experts to operate the machinery of society successfully. The challenge addressed by this aspect of the Governance Commons is to find better ways of assuring that these experts provide advice that is trustworthy, trusted, understood, interpreted, and applied sensibly. The issues that need to be addressed include: 

• Political Irony – Governance processes are often the scene of great political fights where the parties mobilize all of their political power in an attempt persuade society to pursue a particular option. The irony comes when, due to a poor understanding of basic facts--about economics, environmental dynamics, social systems, etc., that option fails to deliver the desired results. It is not uncommon for decisions to deliver quite the opposite from what was intended.
• Confusing Facts and Values – Experts should be in the business of developing options for dealing with particular problems and identifying the likely consequences of pursuing each option. They should not, however, be in the business of deciding which option is more desirable. Those are value judgments that need to be made through political processes--ideally by representative institutions of governance. 
• Analysis Paralysis – Decision-makers are often uncomfortable with the inherent limits of technical analysis and may be reluctant to make a decision until they are confident that everything has been thoroughly investigated and all the facts are known This can lead to "analysis paralysis" and the avoidance of making necessary but tough decisions, even when certainty is not possible to acheive.
• Lying with Statistics -- It is commonplace for people to attempt to strengthen their positions by using self-serving, pseudo-science that presents information deceptively in order to justify a predetermined conclusion. Good governance requires effective mechanisms for combating this, while at the same time making good data understandable by lay people as well as scientists.
• Contradictory Expert Problem – With respect to most controversial issues, decision makers and the public are bombarded by contradictory statements from opposing "experts." It is not surprising that people conclude that the experts really don't know anything, and therefore decisions are made without considering relevant facts. Good governance requires an effective system for enabling decision makers and the public to reliably assess the quality of expert opinion and to utilize the relavent science to inform the political decision-making proces.