Testing, testing, podcast on independence

This is a 10-minute podcast on Scottish independence - What Does it Mean and What Are The Big Questions? - recorded on my Ipad. The production values are fairly low and, on two occasions, it seems to flicker a bit (much like in those horror or sci-fi films where things go a little bit, spookily, wrong). I also get a text which distracts me a bit. Then I sound like I am getting bored and more sarcastic from 8 minutes (any of my former students will be used to that). Other than that, it is OK, as long as you like the Andy Murray style monotone (although our accents are very, very different).

You can get it here: VR Online Service: 2013-06-18 12_01_14 if you have Flash

Or here http://paulcairney.podbean.com/mf/play/ktgeh8/Independence18613.mp3 to listen

Or here to download http://paulcairney.podbean.com/mf/web/ktgeh8/Independence18613.mp3

or here https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B-vqUYxLrgufYTFISmZRZmJrUkU/edit?usp=sharing  just for the MP3

The book is out in August and it won't really be £25 - http://www.palgrave.com/products/title.aspx?pid=569083

Why is there more tobacco control policy than alcohol control policy in the UK?

The obvious answer is that drinking is less bad for you than smoking. Or, if you are the optimistic sort, drinking is really, really, really, really, really good for you – mm, mm, delicious and nutritious. And it’s cool. And it’s sexy and it makes you sexy. Especially when you are pissed.

The non-obvious answer is that, although the same sort of public health evidence has been produced to suggest that: (a) both smoking and drinking are unhealthy; and, (b) both should be controlled using similar instruments – the alcohol-is-unhealthy evidence is less accepted in government and alcohol control policies are a harder sell (for now).  Alcohol can still be advertised, there is less tax on booze and the alcohol industry has a regular say in the interpretation of the evidence (and what we should do about it).

The aim of this ICPP paper (link) is to explain the difference between policy choices in tobacco and alcohol. It says: here is what would have to happen for alcohol control to mimic tobacco control (I do the same in a comparison of tobacco controls in different countries here). We can break the policy process down into five key factors:

1.      Institutional change. Government departments, and other organisations focused on health policy, would take the main responsibility for alcohol control, largely replacing departments focused on finance, trade, industry, tourism and employment (and crime).

2.      Paying attention to, and ‘framing’ the problem. The government would no longer view alcohol primarily as a product with economic value, central to the ‘night time economy’.  It would be viewed primarily as a public health problem; a set of behaviours and outcomes to be challenged.  This happened with tobacco, but it is trickier in alcohol because the government may only be worried about aspects of alcohol consumption (such as the binge drinking and anti-social behaviour of certain individuals) rather than the broader notion of public health.

3.      The balance of power between participants.  The department of health would consult public health and medical groups at the expense of groups representing the alcohol industry. This is central to the type of evidence it gathers, the interpretation of the evidence, and the advice it receives. 

4.      The socioeconomic context.  The economic benefit of alcohol consumption would fall (or, the tax revenue would become less important to the Treasury), the number of drinkers would fall and opposition to alcohol control would decline (although it already seems fairly low). 

5.      The role of beliefs and knowledge.  The scientific evidence linking alcohol consumption to ill health would have to be accepted and ‘set in stone’ within government circles.  The most effective policies to reduce alcohol consumption would also be increasingly adopted and transferred across countries. 

Change in these factors would be mutually reinforcing.  For example, an increased acceptance of the scientific evidence helps shift the way that governments ‘frame’ or understand the alcohol policy problem.  The framing of alcohol as a health problem allows health departments to take the policy lead.  Alcohol control and alcohol use go hand in hand: a decrease in drinking rates reduces the barriers to alcohol control; more alcohol control means fewer drinkers (or less drinking). 

It is tempting to think that this sort of process is more likely under Labour and less likely under the Conservatives – and there is some evidence to back up this argument. However, the point of the paper is that these long term processes develop during the terms of both parties. Major policy change, of the level we have witnessed in tobacco (but not as much in alcohol), takes several decades. Indeed, you can be suitably impressed or depressed with my hunch that alcohol control is at least a decade (if not two or more) behind tobacco.

 

Making Sense of Policymaking: why it's always someone else's fault and nothing ever changes

I am writing a paper about the ability of policy scholars to describe and explain policymaking in a way that is understandable to policymakers and practitioners (it will appear here and here). The background discussion is about the extent to which there is too much jargon in the literature. If so, it may act as a barrier to meaningful discussions between academics and policymakers (which may be seen as particularly problematic in this new age of academic ‘impact’). The paper suggests that many academic insights are useful, as a basis for discussion with policymakers, if we take the time to discuss them together.

The aim of this post is a bit different: to see if I can summarise and translate the concepts to the readers of the post *without* any discussion! I will do it by removing almost all of the jargon from the paper (which often means more words – the jargon is a useful shorthand). I think that this task is made much easier by the slow trickle of these ideas into the public consciousness. For example, one conclusion you can take from the discussion is that a change of party in government does not produce a massive change in policy. This is something that you tend to hear in public discussions (although I admit that the discussions may not draw much from policy theory). So, I will continue this theme, by outlining some common phrases (associated largely with the pathology of policymaking) and using policy theory to help explain them in a way that might, in some cases, make the whole business of government a bit less disheartening. Or, I will make up these phrases for effect. Definitely one or the other. I will also put those phrases in capital letters, so that you can imagine them being shouted by someone looking for attention.

IT’S ALWAYS SOMEONE ELSE’S FAULT – NO ONE EVER TAKES THE BLAME.

I think that you can divide this sort of frustration into two main parts: ministers generally don’t take the blame for things going wrong; and/ or no-one seems to get the blame for something going wrong in individual cases (such as in cases of child cruelty or hospital mismanagement).

The argument with ministers is so strong because we support the idea that governments are accountable to the public via Parliament. So, ministers are in charge and they report to Parliament. Or, they get a telling-off from Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight. Yet, ministers have two good reasons not to take the blame.

First, policy is often now made at many levels (and types) of government. For example, something like ‘tobacco policy’ is actually a collection of policies made by the European Union, UK and, in some cases, devolved governments (and sometimes local authorities). Policy is also often carried out by a range of bodies which often operate at ‘arms length’ from ministers. In some cases, this looks like ministers are simply passing the buck to other bodies, to avoid making controversial decisions. In others, there is good reason to maintain these arrangements. My favourite example is in mental health where there are arms-length bodies there to make sure that doctors and social workers use the Mental Health Act correctly when they ‘section’ people. Those bodies have to exert a degree of independence to assure the public that they are not simply there to back up the decisions of others.

The outcome of these multi-level and arms-length arrangements is that ministers cannot simply make policy. Instead, they are increasingly obliged to negotiate policy with a wide range of other bodies.

The second defence for ministers is that they cannot pay attention to all of the issues for which they are responsible. In fact, they can only pay attention to a tiny proportion – which makes it entirely plausible for them to look shocked when a decision, made in their name, has gone badly. This is also why regular changes of government do not cause wholesale shifts in policy: most decisions are beyond the reach of ministers.    The sheer size of government means that it could easily become unmanageable. So, governments break policy down into more manageable departments, and a large number of divisions within departments, dealing with issues that involve a smaller number of knowledgeable participants.  Most policy is made at a level of government not particularly visible to the public or Parliament, and with minimal ministerial or senior civil service involvement.  These arrangements exist because there is a logic to devolving decisions and consulting with certain groups.  Ministers rely on their officials for information and advice.  For specialist issues, those officials rely on specialist organisations.  Organisations trade that information and advice (and other things, such as the ability to generate agreement among large and influential groups) for access to, and influence within, government. Ministers are *responsible* for this activity, and they can set the tone of many of the debates, but they cannot pay attention to everything going on. In fact, paying attention to one issue means ignoring most others. So, that look of permanent befuddlement on Newsnight may be entirely understandable.

The other sort of problem relates to things going wrong in local and health authorities when, for example, a child is not protected or a patient is treated badly while in care. Organisations hold inquiries and learn lessons but no one is necessarily strung up and blamed for the problem. The defence in this case is that public sector professionals do not have the ability to carry out all of their responsibilities. They are subject to such a wide range of rules, regulations and expectations from government that they cannot pay attention to them all (I tend to think of this comic strip, but it’s not that bad - http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1995-06-25/) . Instead, they use their judgement to satisfy an adequate proportion of government objectives. As a result, things go wrong and we find that some people or organisations did not carry out government policy. In these cases, it is not easy to blame an organisation – they *have* to ignore some directions to make sure that they follow others. It is also difficult to blame ministers, because the chances are that they already have policies in place to deal with these sorts of things – they just weren’t carried out.

IT’S ONE IDEA AFTER ANOTHER WITH THIS GOVERNMENT – THEY HAVE THE ATTENTION SPAN OF A GNAT …

The explanation for this practice is quite similar:  policymakers can only pay attention to a small number of the issues for which they are responsible.  So, they ignore most and promote a few to the top of their agenda, often following a major event or a successful media campaign by certain groups. So, for every issue to which ministers (and senior civil servants) pay attention, they must ignore (say) 99 others.  The tendency to focus on that one issue *might* produce major policy change when, for example, so much pressure is required to get ministerial attention that, when they do, it is a bit like a dam busting; a wide range of people get involved to influence policy in a short space of time.  However, the logical consequence to their attention to that one issue is that the same thing does not happen in most other cases. In most cases, it is business as usual, since so much policymaking is devolved to people who operate out of the public and political spotlight.

… AND YET NOTHING EVER CHANGES.

I said that this concentrated attention on some issues *might* change things because it also might not. There are four main reasons to expect less than radical change following these bursts of attention. First, people might find that there is no easy solution to the problem receiving so much attention. Good, sensible, acceptable solutions take time to develop and it is possible for public and ministerial attention to lurch to another issue before this problem is solved (or at least solved to the satisfaction of policymakers and influential groups). Indeed, as silly as it sounds, a key feature of policymaking is that the solution to a problem may be devised *before* there is significant attention to the problem. Second, policymakers do not have the brain power or resources to consider all options and the consequences of their policies. So, many rely on trial-and-error policymaking or depart from current policy in a series of steps. For policymakers, this has the added benefit of reduced controversy: radical policy change always produces winners and losers; a government could try to impose its will, but this can be politically expensive and governments can only spend so much. Third, governments inherit policy before they choose. Any ‘new’ policy is likely to be a revision of an old one, perhaps following some degree of failure. They might want to make serious changes, but they are also constrained by decisions made by governments in the past – decisions that produce organisations, rules, regulations and employees that are difficult to remove.

Finally, things don’t change overnight because people’s beliefs don’t change overnight. In most cases, policymakers ‘learn’ from their experience (which includes their mistakes) but their learning is influenced heavily by the way that they understand the world. Or, in a wider sense, there may be a particular understanding of the policy problem, and its solution, that is promoted by a wide range of powerful groups. Events may draw attention to policy problems without changing that balance of power or the fundamental beliefs of those involved. Maybe the most obvious example just now is the banking crisis which produced some changes but not radical change in the way that governments treat the financial sector – but the same point could be made whenever we see crises in areas such as health or education. 

WHY DO I FEEL POWERLESS?

The final point to remember is that the study of policy is the study of power: the relatively powerful and the relatively powerless; the winners and the losers. Importantly, power is not simply about visible conflicts in which one group wins and another loses. Rather, it can take at least two other important forms. First, groups may exercise power to reinforce social attitudes. If the weight of public opinion is against government action, maybe governments will not intervene. The classic example is poverty – if most people believe that it is caused by fecklessness, what is the role of government? In such cases, power and powerlessness may relate to the (in)ability of groups to persuade the public, media and/ or government that there is a reason to make policy; a problem to be solved.  In other examples, the battle may be about the extent to which issues are private (with no legitimate role for government) or public (and open to legitimate government action), including: should governments intervene in disputes between businesses and workers? Should they intervene in disputes between husbands and wives? Should they try to stop people smoking in places that might be considered private or public? If you reached this blog via twitter, you will be very familiar with how this process looks in practice: people make policy suggestions, they receive some support, then they receive an absolute barrage of criticism, and often abuse, by others. In this context, groups may be powerful if they are able to reinforce the anti-policy-change attitudes already held by many people.

Second, groups may exercise other forms of power to keep an issue off the government agenda. As I said above, policymakers can only pay attention to a tiny amount of issues for which they are responsible. So, groups may exercise power to keep some issues on their agenda at the expense of others.  Issues on the agenda are sometimes described as ‘safe’ – more attention to these issues means less attention to the imbalances of power within society. Again, if you are a follower of twitter, you may get the impression that people pay attention to nothing but safe issues for a few seconds at a time. I’m afraid I can’t do anything to make *that* seem less dispiriting.

From the archives: two Scotsman articles on pornography in newsagents

To celebrate the new 'The Lose the Lads' Mags' campaign by UK Feminista and Object (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22674928), here are a couple of older articles on why the campaign is important:

The Scotsman July 20, 2000, Thursday

BARE FACED CHEEK

BYLINE: Linda Watson Brown

SECTION: Pg. 6

LENGTH: 1336 words

Jennifer is 17, but looks much younger. She is described as a "sex pixie" but looks tired, small and lost. She has an obsession with the Yorkshire Ripper and is photographed with traditional pornographic props in cliched scenarios.

You'd think you would find the pictures in a top-shelf publication - but this is GQ and it is available in your local supermarket and garage. It is one of the new batch of lads' mags which are read openly by young men who would feel some degree of embarrassment about gaping at Hustler or Playboy on a bus. This month GQ focuses on "the Lolita Syndrome" - the main interview is with Jennifer Ellison from Brookside.

Ellison is not underage, but is dressed in revealing beach and underwear, and is described as part of a tempting band of adolescent girls who should make every man ensure he asks for proof of age. The message is clear - although these young girls are not yet legally sexually available, they are irresistible.

By manufacturing a "syndrome" from the Lolita myth, GQ is entering dangerous territory. The content of men's magazines has been disturbing since their inception, but the way in which boundaries are being pushed back and taboos questioned is particularly evident in recent months. These publications have been accused of airbrushing thongs and knickers from images of celebrities who have posed for photospreads. Women are constantly reduced to sexually available objects .

"There is very little difference between the content of loaded and the more obvious pornographic titles on the market," says Catherine Harper of Scottish Women Against Pornography. "But there is much more dishonesty in how it is dressed up. The covers alone are pushing things every month: it has been crotches in your face for a while. Now the content is taking things to a completely unacceptable level. There is stuff here that would not be allowed elsewhere. What is particularly worrying is that a large number of young men get their information about sex from sources like these."

Despite the fact that there has been little debate about the ways in which men are negatively affected by this type of material, the immediate concern has to be with the messages which are being sold - and this month's commodity is underage sex. GQ summarises instances of desirable young women who have only been made more tempting by the fact that sex with them would not only be illegal, it would be rape and abuse too. Jennifer Ellison is photographed half -naked enjoying childish pursuits - on a slide holding her top off, eating ice cream, and, in one particularly questionable image, on a bike surrounded by "real" children. The text raises still more issues: a ten-year-old girl whispers to Ellison that she looks lovely. Is this what we want our daughters to aspire to? A ten-year-old boy suggests that she show her breasts, and we are expected to snigger at the precocity of his early interest rather than be appalled.

Liz Kelly of the Child & Women Abuse Studies Unit at the University of North London believes the links between pornography - in its many forms - and child abuse are clear. "Child pornography is not a separate and distinct genre," she says. While we can all claim to be horrified by such images, the boundaries are not as clear as we may think. " Playboy is particularly devious - the centrefold is depicted from childhood onwards with captions like 'Age one - Playmate material already'; 'Age three - anytime dad'. Children are sexualised in pornography and women are 'childified' by being made to appear as if they are children."

This is certainly the case in mainstream men's magazines - this month in GQ sees a glorification of pubescent images and full-frontal shots of women without pubic hair who are represented as innocent and angelic.

The sexualisation of children, and the ways in which society has become desensitised to the danger this can cause, has been researched in-depth by Michele Elliot of the children's charity Kidscape. "Children's images are being sexualised because they sell. Without our knowing, soft-core child pornography has crept into our everyday lives and most of us are unaware that this has happened."

The availability of magazines such as GQ and loaded has contributed to that development. They are full of breasts-out, legs-open shots, and generally feature "celebrities" who are put in their place by being reduced to nothing more than tits-and-bum commodities. These images of availability and accessibility may be the choice of the individuals involved - although that too can be debated - but what they contribute to our stock of ideas about sex and sexuality is much more threatening.

"What we are seeing," says Catherine Harper of SWAP, "is the undermining of women - and now children. They are saying: 'It's OK lads, go for it - adolescent girls are tempting, how can you help yourselves?' They are openly advocating abuse. The messages undermines and debases real lives and real experiences, and people need to realise what's going on."

The fact that these publications are so widely available may make many think they must be acceptable. Major supermarket chains have removed "top-shelf" publications but regularly feature lads' mags at checkouts and petrol kiosks. All of those contacted said it was up to consumers to complain. A spokesperson for Asda says: "We always put these magazines out of the reach of children. That's the rule. If customers or shop colleagues complain about something they find offensive, we will act on it immediately. We will not censor magazine selection, but we will give customers what they want. We have boundaries, and we will act on anything people feel strongly about."

Safeway takes a similar position: "We review on a three-monthly basis. If the front cover is explicit, we would put the magazine on the top shelf where children couldn't get at it. If the content is complained about, we would review the situation. We are aware that these magazines can contain issues which are explicit or contentious, and we need to avoid kids browsing through them. We have family shoppers and if there was a serious complaint, we would take immediate action. In the last three or four years, there have been less than five complaints."

It is clear that many people are not complaining because they do not know what is being sold, and yet retailers say that only a few comments are enough to make them review the situation. The lack of control and regulation in this area is startling and the removal of straightforward pornography from major stores has only gone some way toward removing sexually explicit and offensive material from the high street.

Pornography is, and always has been, big business - yet again it seems as if the only way to have an effect will be to make a financial impact, rather than anything as irrelevant as public concern.

This month's mags

GQ devotes over 20 pages to "The Lolita Syndrome" focusing on pubescent full -frontal shots, "reasons why you should always ask for ID", the "nubile innocents" featured in David Hamilton's photography, and overt references to the "indecently young" Brookside actress who has the "face of an angel on a bod made all for sin".

Loaded has a "Pornalikes" features in which readers select their favourite images from pornographic publications featuring celebrity lookalikes. A naked Angelina Jolie is described as "wanting it like a thirsty mule." There is the usual list of B-list celebs naked or in poses clearly taken from pornographic imagery. One TV presenter is asked how much money it would take for her to have sex with convicted paedophile Gary Glitter.

Maxim relies on the usual half (or completely) naked images of women with headlines screaming "Do you want some?" Women are asked whether they would consider lapdancing, innumerable questions about their breasts, and it all ends with six pages of ads for pornography and sex lines.

The Scotsman November 24, 2000, Friday

YOUR CHANCE TO OBJECT AS WH SMITH BRINGS BACK THOSE MAGAZINES

BYLINE: By Linda Watson-Brown

SECTION: Pg. 15

LENGTH: 757 words

I HAD completely forgotten how modern and entertaining pornography could be. Until recently, I had considered it insulting, dangerous and degrading. Thankfully, WH Smith has put me straight on that outmoded perception. Three years ago, it decided to stop selling glossy pictures of women's genitals in its high-street shops. It still distributed the magazines. It still profited enormously from them. But in terms of its family-friendly consumer projection, they disappeared.

Partially. In terms of the somewhat spurious distinction made between top -shelf magazines and other material, well-known names such as Playboy, Hustler, Men Only, Razzle et al were consigned to the dustbin of unmarketable misogyny. Of course, all that really happened was that they continued to be bought elsewhere - generally provided by the same suppliers - and high-street retailers sold harmful images under other guises, such as lads' mags and photography literature.

Now, WH Smith says it is going to reintroduce pornography to its stores. Apparently, in the three years that we have been without gynaecological illustrations of dehumanised women, things have changed. Pornography is now a heterosexual haven of consensual, post-modern relationships.

Does that make those who find such depictions offensive feel a lot better about its renaissance? The next time you go to the Gyle or the Braehead shopping centres in Edinburgh or Glasgow and you see their awards for family -friendly initiatives, will you have any lingering concerns? Previously there may have been a few worries. After all, "novelty shops" stock bondage tape beside their cuddly toys; Marks and Spencer sell bras for girls who should still be wearing vests; major supermarkets peddle paedophile imagery as they punt GQ and Loaded alongside their groceries and two-faced consumer equality strategies.

But now, how will you reconcile buying your children their Barbie and Action Man comics as they stand next to someone perusing a catalogue of exploitation which ensures the buyer that models are "barely legal"? You could justify it in the same way that you will have to if you are a Daily Express reader, for now its new owner will promote his pornography catalogue alongside OK! and the children's comics he has also founded his empire on.

Or, you could realise that something is intrinsically wrong here. And yes, even if it is boring and unfashionable, you could also wake up to the fact that it is morally reprehensible.

If you agree, I am clearly preaching to the converted. If you disagree, there is probably little I can do until you send me the intellectually-challenged letters raising the same, stultifying points which pro-pornographers always rely on. However, if you're not sure, there are a few things for you to think about.

Pornography is not about simple pictures of naked women. It is central in creating and maintaining sex as a basis for discrimination. It is a systematic practice of exploitation and subordination based on sex, and it harms women, men and children. It produces bigotry and contempt. It justifies aggression and hatred. Like other media messages, pornography reinforces and helps create the idea that women are second-class citizens, and it reinforces distorted notions of women's sexuality.

There will always be women who say that they are not exploited by pornography. Personally, I couldn't care less whether every other woman in the world thinks pornography is great. It offends me and it affects me. As such, I have a right to try to do something about it. WH Smith does not believe I, or anyone like me, will exercise that right. The company has stated that it does not believe any of its customers will protest. Indeed, it has said it thinks the publications will be welcomed. I have been told by most stockists of pornography - whether top-shelf or lads' mag in nature - that people simply do not complain. I have also been told that unless those who do write in give their name, address and telephone number, their letter will go straight in the bin. For many people, this is just another effective way of silencing dissent.

I am happy to act as the conduit here. Send me your letters and your petitions, and I will pass them on to WH Smith on your behalf, with personal details made anonymous. If that seems a bit extreme, perhaps you would rather spend your time preparing the best way to explain the joy of iconoclastic pornographic imagery to your five-year-old next time you go shopping.

Howarth's Aggressive Homosexuals

One problem with twitter is that, if you don’t check it often enough, all the good jokes are taken and then everyone moves on too quickly for me to contribute. Here is what I would have come up with on the hashtag #aggressivehomosexuals (following Gerard Howarth MP’s speech, which included the phrase: 'There are plenty in the aggressive homosexual community who see this as but a stepping-stone' ) if someone had just given me the chance to think, then go to bed, then go for a run the next day and listen to ‘Gay Bar’ by Electric 6 . Even then, it’s all a bit tenuous:

• Something about Howarth regretting getting all his information from a few seconds of Radio 1 that he put on by accident in his car (‘let’s start a war, let’s start a nuclear war, at the gay bar’)
• Now tell me do ya, a do ya have any money? I wanna spend all your money, implementing same-sex marriage and then civil partnerships for heterosexual couples
• I've got an amendement to put in you, at the report stage

This is How You Set Targets

As fans of the UK Government know, it is important to set targets. For those targets to work, they need to be measurable. In other words, you have to know when they have been met. There should also be safeguards so that people don't game the system and meet targets at the expense of the underlying aim of the policy. Finally, when those targets have been met, the policymaker should be congratulated for the aim, the effort and the outcome.
It is in this context that I would like to present one of my personal targets: to get more Twitter followers than my daughter within a year of joining Twitter. At the time, this felt like an ambitious target, not least because she had benefited from an artificial bump in her figures after being tweeted by minor celebrity Chipmunk (I think his tweet was ;) or something like that). However, I then benefited from the short attention spans of Evie's followers, and her score has fallen to a highly achievable 537. Tonight, after 11 months on Twitter, I reached the heady heights of 538 followers. I don't think that I gamed the system. I am being followed by someone selling boxes and one or two people selling some dodgier looking things, but I did not invite those organisations to follow me. I might have once made a plea for more followers, but only to level the Chipmunk field (and I think I only got 20 followers from the appeal). Otherwise, I have developed a small but good quality following with a triple Twitter strategy: blogs for students/ academics, vague complaints about Scottish politics and more general inane drivel as it occurs to me. So, congratulations are in order. I hope you will understand that, although I love my children very dearly, I am also a very petty person who likes to wind up close family members on a regular basis. This fits the bill nicely.

Please note: if you want to wind me up by following my daughter, to get her numbers above mine again, you should know that we are one of those trendy families in which our children share the surname of their mother, not father. So, you will have to make quite the commitment to the joke.

UPDATE 8th June 2013 -  I have now been on twitter for a full year and have 661 followers. I now need a new target. I reckon it should be: go from 9 tweets per day to 8.

What is ‘Evolution’? What is ‘Complexity’? [and How does it inform the study of policymaking?]

There is a long history in the social sciences of using the natural sciences as a source of comparison. Much of the comparison is based on little more than the (often very useful) metaphor. There is now an equally important but shorter history of trying to draw more direct parallels; to say that this process in a social system is directly comparable to a process in a natural or living system. The study of evolution provides the potential for that sort of direct comparison, and we can find the use of terms such as ‘complexity’ (or ‘complex systems’) employed partly to that end. However, there are two major obstacles to this sort of direct comparison (and indeed to the use of evolution-based metaphors):

1. We may not agree about the meaning of evolution. For example, when it is used loosely in everyday language, ‘evolution’ tends to refer to a very long term, gradual process of change. However, evolution can also refer to the idea of ‘punctuated equilibrium’ in which long spells of gradual change are interrupted by relatively short but profound bursts of activity and change. Consequently, the study of evolution is instantly confusing because it can refer to the *opposite of* and/ or the *same thing as* revolution. There are also some other sources of potential confusion about, for example, the nature of evolution (does it necessarily refer to advancement?) and the nature of ‘selection’ (do species simply respond blindly to their environments or help create them?).

2. Some people have really ruined evolution for the rest of us. We can blame so-called ‘social-Darwinism’ for the racist/ sexist idea that some people are more evolved than others. In other words, ‘evolution’ comes with a lot of baggage when we apply it to social science discussions.

This sort of confusion can be found in the study of public policy where evolution can refer to a wide range of things, including:

• the cumulative, long-term development of policy solutions;

• major disruptions in the way that policy makers think about, and try to solve, policy problems;

• the maintenance *or* radical reform of policy-making institutions;

• ‘emergent’ behaviour within complex systems

• the trial-and-error strategies adopted by actors, such as policy entrepreneurs, when adapting to their environment

• the coming together of multiple factors to create the conditions for major policy change (which can be a creative, ‘window of opportunity’ style process, or a destructive, failure-related ‘perfect storm style process).

This range of understandings may not put us off evolutionary discussions completely, but it shows us that we should be super-clear about our meaning of evolution when we seek to make these sorts of comparisons with evolution in nature.

I suppose this has been a roundabout way for me to advertise the fact that I have just published a journal article about this very topic (if you can't access it, I can send you a *non-final* version or you can try getting it through a free trial). It compares the most prominent theories of politics and policymaking which draw on references to evolution in different ways. For example:

Multiple Streams Analysis (Kingdon) – uses the term ‘policy primeval soup’ to suggest that, although policymaker attention may lurch from one problem to another, problems will not be addressed until policy solutions have evolved sufficiently within a policy community and policymakers have the motive and opportunity to adopt them. ‘Evolution’ describes the *slow progress* of an idea towards acceptability within the policy community.

Punctuated Equilibrium theory (Baumgartner and Jones) – suggests that that ‘incremental’ policy change in most cases is accompanied by ‘seismic’ change in a small number of cases – an outcome consistent with ‘power laws’ found in the natural and social worlds. Kingdon’s picture of slow progress producing partial mutations is replaced by Baumgartner and Jones’ *fast, disruptive, pure mutation* (in some cases).

Then there is complexity theory, which I have discussed in my blog here. The relevance to a discussion of evolution is that complexity theory may help us understand processes in which people, institutions and their environments are interacting constantly to produce rather unpredictable outcomes (or, at least, outcomes may ‘emerge’ locally, in the absence of central control). This might be broken down into three steps:

1. Institutions, as sets of rules and norms, represent ways for people to retain certain ideas and encourage particular forms of behaviours.
2. Complex systems represent (partly) a large number of overlapping and often interdependent institutions.
3. New behaviours and rules arise from the interaction between multiple institutions and the actors involved.

In other words, different ‘worlds’ are in constant collision, producing new ways of thinking and behaviour that ‘emerge’ from these interactions. They are then passed down through the generations, but in an imperfect way, allowing new forms of thinking and behaviour to emerge.

To describe these processes as ‘evolutionary’, we really need to use the language of evolution - variation, selection and retention - to describe and explain outcomes. The idea in the natural world is that living things want to do at least two things: (1) pass on their genes; (2) cooperate with others to secure resources and share them out to their kith and kin. The idea in the political world is a bit different and perhaps a bit of a stretch, but here goes:

• The equivalent of passing on genes is passing on ‘memes’, or ideas (beliefs, ways of thinking – as described in the 70s by Richard Dawkins before he moved onto God).

• ‘Variation’ refers to the different rules adopted by different social groups to foster the collective action required to survive.

• ‘Selection’ describes the interaction between people and their environments; particular environments may provide an advantage to some groups over others and encourage certain behaviours (or, at least, some groups may respond by adapting their behaviour to their environment).

• ‘Retention’ describes the ways in which people pass on their genes (memes) to ensure the reproduction of their established rules (we might call them ‘institutions’).

The key difference in the study of evolution and policymaking is the idea of passing on memes through the generations. We think of passing on genes through the generations as a process that takes hundreds, thousands or millions of years. Passing on memes through the ‘policy generations’ is more like the study of fruit flies (months), viruses or bacteria (days or weeks). In other words, ways of thinking, and emerging behaviour, change constantly as people interact with each other, articulating different beliefs and rules and producing new forms of thinking, rules and behaviour as they interact. Big jumps in ways of thinking may be associated with key generational shifts, but that can take place, for example, as one generation of scientists retires or, more quickly still, one generation of experts is replaced (within government circles) by another.

Complexity theory may be used to capture, describe and explain that sort of interaction on a grand scale. We can zoom in to see individuals interacting with each other, or zoom out to observe mass behaviour and the sorts of outcomes that emerge from them. For me, this means that the field is wide open when it comes down to research methods. If we are interested in people understanding this complex process of interaction, we can study those individuals using interviews and/ or various forms of observation. If we are interested in the whole system, we might adopt mathematical models and computer simulations. There is nothing to stop us combining such methods (and more) if we avoid the sort of people that adhere slavishly to one fixed understanding of the world and, therefore, one method to help us understand it.  

I don’t hold out much hope of this sort of discussion capturing the public imagination. However, the chances are that this sort of discussion of evolution (and its relationship to complexity theory) is taking place in a wide range of disciplines without much exchange between them. So, if you see a blog like this written by someone else in some other field, please let me know.  

Cairney, P. (2013). What is evolutionary theory and how does it inform policy studies?. Policy & Politics, 41(2), 279-298.

http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/tpp/pap/2013/00000041/00000002/art00008