510 assignment
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Complexity Theory for Public Administration and Policy
Jack W. Meek University of La Verne, USA
C omplexity theory offers enormous po- tential for improving our understand- ing of both policy development and
public administration. The central concepts of non-linearity, emergence, self-organization, complex adaptive-systems provide attractive insights about behavior that helps address the limitations of rationally based policy and ad- ministrative logics that have guided much of our efforts in these areas of inquiry. Early work on connecting the study of Public Policy and Administration with con- cepts related to complexity theory can be traced to the work of scholars familiar to readers of this journal, including Douglas Kiel (1989, 1994), E.H. Klijn (1996), Sam Overman (1996a, 1996b), Kickert, Klijn and Koppenjan (1997), Morçöl (1997), Morçöl and Dennard (2000). Goktug Morcol (2002) contributed to the policy sciences by addressing the assump- tions and flawed underpinnings of positivism and outlines the central features and value of postpositivism for the policy sciences. This area of research has received continued interest with the work of a number of authors. There is recent work offers evidence of continued inter- est in examining the implications of complex- ity theory for policy analysis (Dennard, Rich- ardson & Morcol, 2005, 2008) as well as how complexity theory can be usefully applied in our governance systems (Trochim & Cabrera 2005; Teisman & Klijn 2008; Teisman, van Buuren & Gerritis 2009).
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Recognizing limits of linear strategies and related assumptions is no easy task as there is a tradition of accepted administrative prac- tices and experiences framed with rationales and justification. But contributors and readers of this journal are leaders in understanding the task ahead and continue the journey to address a different kind of policy and administrative understanding. This particular symposium continues the work of scholars and practitioners that have contributed to the exploration of com- plexity theory and public administration in the American Society for Public Administra- tion (ASPA) and the Section of Complexity and Network Studies (SCNS). An initial set of papers presented at ASPA was later edited and subsequently published in the Public Adminis- tration Quarterly (Weber 2008). In this sym- posium prepared for Emergence: Complexity and Organization, the papers were presented at the ASPA Annual Conference held in Miami, March 20-24, 2009 and the authors continue their examination as to how the application of complexity theory improves our understand- ing of public administration theory and prac- tice. The practice of policy and adminis- tration has long recognized the limitations of policy and administrative interpretations that do not reflect the diversity and complexity of our human condition. It is Charles Lindblom’s (1959) work that was seminal in indentifying the theoretical and practical limitations of deci- sion-making solely based on rational thinking that lacked an appreciation of the nature of the assumptions locked within decision making approaches that espoused rational comprehen- sive protocols. The symposium begins with the original and classic essay from Lindblom not so much as a representation of complex- ity thinking, but one of providing groundwork for recognizing alterative ways to understand rationalist logics and protocols so as to em-
* I wish to extend my deepest appreciation to Kurt Richardson who eagerly accepted our proposal to have papers from complexity section of the 2009 ASPA annual conference considered as a symposium for Emergence: Complexity & Organization. Kurt’s enthusiasm and support for the exploration of these concepts continues to be a source of inspiration for our continued efforts in this critical area of research and practice.
Editorial
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brace the realities diversity and limitations of assumptions in applying rationally designed hopes and desires. In the opening essay, “The Science of Muddling Through Revisited,” Ronald J. Scott adjusts the lens of the Lindblom’s contribu- tion due to the advancement of intellectual and computing capacity. Scott issues the ar- gument that policy analysis and administra- tion can be informed by a more rigorous and robust analyses with the use of an emergent complex adaptive political system framework. This approach represents a kind of analytical frame from which to develop and implement policy and administration thus limiting the re- liance on “muddling through;” it offers a way for structuring and bounding policy analysis. The key to this revised understanding is in policy implementation, where constant feed- back is derived from a complex policy arena and recognized for its emergent nature. The essay has much to contribute in terms of how unaccounted considerations in policy develop- ment and implementation can be incorporated into contemporary policy analysis and delib- eration. In the end, while the adoption of this complex adaptive political system framework offers more analytical (less muddling through) potential, Scott is concerned that narrowly de- fined political and rhetorically articulated val- ues may trump analytic treatments of policy problems. In the article that follows, “Public De- cision-Making as Coevolution,” Lasse Gerrits argues for a very fundamental shift in how we view rational decision practices in public deci- sion-making with regard to physical systems. Like Scott, Gerrits’s work is concerned with the persistent occurrence of unattended, un- foreseen and unwanted consequences that is characteristic of current public decision-mak- ing. These kinds of consequences—a result of an overreliance on the assumptions of human control of the environment and of compre- hensive planning capacity—can be anticipated with the use of a different paradigm toward the public decision making process that frames policy making as a coevolutionary process be- tween the policy makers and the system they govern. Drawing upon case study analysis of
planning ports extensions in Hamburg Ger- many, Gerrits demonstrates that the anthro- pocentric nature of planning ignores the erratic and whimsical nature of the intended target of planning leading to unwelcome outcomes. The lack of assuming a more systemic frame of ref- erence contributes to unattended outcomes re- sulting from policy implementation. The rec- ognition of complex and changing conditions calls upon a coevolutionary revision of tradi- tional approaches to planning practices that currently rely on narrowly defined assump- tions. The research by Jean-Marie Buijs, “Un- derstanding Connective Capacity of Program Management from a Self-organization Per- spective,” continues the theme of improving public policy implementation through an im- proved understanding of the policy context. In this essay, Buijs reviews the traditional concep- tualization of program management suggest- ing its limitations from a self-organizational perspective. The limitations of the traditional perspective are traced to not recognizing the connective capacity in the complex governance processes illustrated by insights from conser- vative and dissipative self-organization that is representative of complex systems. The research by Jack W. Meek and Hong Kyu Lyu, “Bridging Jurisdictions: Conser- vancies Working Across Borders as Adaptive Systems” considers the potential of viewing conservancies as unique self-organizing com- ponents within metropolitan systems. The paper seeks to examine the nature of conser- vancies and their potential in influencing sys- tem behavior and outcome. The paper views conservancies as intermediate structures—a combination of market, government and citi- zen networks—actively working across tradi- tional jurisdictional boundaries, learning from experiences within the system and expand- ing in both number and individual member- ships. As a result, conservancies are viewed a potentially emergent networks promoting lo- cally constructed environmental values. As these intermediate structures expand, bonds among normally competing system elements are formed offering new kinds of collaboration and legitimacy that attract attention and con-
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nectivity in the system. In his essay, “Issues in Reconceptualiz- ing Public Policy from the Perspective of Com- plexity Theory,” Göktuğ Morçöl continues his previous work designed to assist our thinking in reconceptualizing public policy from the perspective of complexity theory. In this essay, Morçöl offers Giddens’s structuration theory as a meaningful contribution to complexity theory and public policy and administration. Continuing the theme of this symposium, the assumptions of reducibility and social causa- tion are viewed as problematic for public pol- icy and administration. Central components of work of Giddens—particularly the concepts of duality of structure and distanciation—are viewed as useful in addressing conceptual problems of the dynamic nature of public pol- icy in the application of dynamic public policy. Complimenting the work of Gerrits and Buijs in this symposium, Morçöl seeks to view com- plexity theory constructs of self-organization, coevolution, emergence and dissipative struc- tures—as referents to the dynamic nature of the policy context. Policies enacted in complex metropolitan governance systems in this per- spective are to be viewed not as tools of policy makers but as system components that have their own dynamics. The concluding essay of the sympo- sium (in the Philosophy Section), “Aspects of Complexity Theory in Liberal Political Thought,” Rob Bittick offers the first of two essays that address philosophical connections among complexity theory and public policy and administration. Bittick’s contribution is to trace aspects of complexity theory found in the writings of Liberal political philosophers John Locke and Immanuel Kant. Bittick’s find- ing is that while complexity theory and Liberal political philosophy are compatible concern- ing emergent order, they are constructed from unique foundational norms. This distinction is this important because Liberal political phi- losophy is a significant part of the foundation of the United States political order and impacts how public administrators implement public policies. In summary, this symposium contin- ues the long-standing dialogue around how
complexity theory can meaningfully inform public policy decision-making and public ad- ministration. The central concepts complex- ity theory examined here—self-organization, non-linearity, coevolution, connective capaci- ty, emergence, dissipative structures, interme- diate structures—receive continued attention as to how they can assist our understanding of the dynamic and evolutionary nature of the policy context and how policy-makers are to consider their own interactive and emergent, even coevolutionary role in the policy context.
References Dennard, L ., Richardson, K.A. and Morçöl, G. (2005).
Complexity and Policy Analysis: Special Issue, Emer- gence: Complexity & Organization, ISSN 1521-3250, 7(1).
Dennard , L ., R ichardson , K .A . and Morçöl , G . (2008). Complexity and Policy Analysis: Tools and Methods for Designing Robust Policies in a Complex World, ISBN 9780981703220.
Kickert, W.J.M., Klijn, E.H. and Koppenjan, J.F.M. (1997). Managing Complex Networks: Strategies for the Public Sector, ISBN 9780761955474.
K iel, D.L . (1989). “Nonequilibrium theor y and implications for public administration,” Public Administration Review, ISSN 0033-3352, 49(6): 544-551.
Kiel, D.L . (1994). Managing Chaos and Complexity in Government: A New Paradigm for Managing Change, Innovation and Organizational Renewal, ISBN 9780787900236.
Klijn, E.H. (1996). “Analyzing and managing policy processes in complex networks,” Administration and Society, ISSN 1552-3039, 28(1): 90-119.
Lindblom, C.E. (1959). “The science of ‘muddling through’,” Public Administration Review, ISSN 0033-3352, 19(2): 79-88.
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Morçöl, G. (2002). A New Mind for Policy Analy- sis: Toward a Pos t-Ne wtonian and Pos tpos- itivist Episte molog y and Me thodolog y, I SBN 9780275970123.
Morçöl, G. and Dennard, L . (eds.) (2000). New Sci- ences for Public Administration and Policy: Con- nections and Reflections, ISBN 9781574200706.
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Overman, E .S. (1996). “The new sciences of ad-
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ministration: Chaos and quantum theory,” Public Administration Review, ISSN 0033-3352, 56(5): 487-491.
Teisman, G.R. and Klijn, E.-H. (2008). “Complexity theory and public management: An introduction,” Public Management Review, ISSN 1471-9037, 10(3): 287-297.
Teisman, G.R., van Buuren, A. and Gerrits, L. (2009). Managing Complex Governance Systems: Dynam- ics, Self-Organization and Coevolution in Public Investments, ISBN 9780415459730.
Trochim, W.M.K. and Cabrera, D. (2005). “The com- plexity of concept mapping for policy analysis,” Emergence: Complexity & Organization, ISSN 1521-3250, 7(1): 2-10.
Weber, J.E . (2008) “Symposium: Complexity of public policy and public administration,” Public Administration Quar terly, ISSN 0734-9149, 32(3).
Jack W. Meek is Professor of Public Admin- istration at the College of Business and Public Management at the University of La Verne and Visiting Professor of Government at Clare- mont McKenna College. Professor Meek offers courses in research methods, policy analysis and collaborative public management. His re- search focuses on metropolitan governance including the emergence of administrative connections and relationships in local govern- ment, regional collaboration and partnerships, policy networks and citizen engagement.
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