Friends,
Three common issues run through this excellent thread.
One is the idea that problems involve legitimate problem owners, that
is, stakeholders. Stakeholders have greater or lesser stakes in any
problem. One reason that wicked problems become wicked is the fact
that different stakeholders see the problem in different ways.
Different positions and interests will constrain the possible
solutions that any stakeholder or stakeholder group will accept.
The second issue arises from the legitimacy of stakeholder interests.
Human beings reasonably understand and respect the legitimacy of
their own interests and the interests of their allies. They often
fail to understand or respect the legitimacy of stakeholder interests
among groups that fall outside the group they would consider peers,
equals, or allies. (This is a poor shorthand description of a lengthy
analytical argument. It involves the issue of how individuals and
groups attribute standing, status, and legitimacy to other
individuals and groups.)
Problems become difficult to solve when legitimate stakeholders say
"we own that problem" without recognizing the equally legitimate
claims of other stakeholders. Many problems are essentially political
[see definition, below] in the largest sense of the term that
includes the governance of organizations or communities. Generating
political solutions to problems involves the application of power. If
stakeholder groups disagree on the legitimacy of the political
process, they will not agree that the problem has been solved.
The third issue involves the question of resolving such problems.
Klaus and others captured the issue beautifully in discussion the
distinctions between "solution" and "resolution." The solution space
to many problems opens when we resolve political priorities or shape
agreements between and among stakeholders.
Those of us who have attended Anders Skoe's strategic problem solving
workshops at La Clusaz and elsewhere have seen the rich array of
techniques available for identifying and understanding a wide variety
of stakeholder interests, representing these to all participating
stakeholders, and reaching a negotiated agreement at different stages
of problem identification and solution choice. Skoe's method is
especially interesting because it often explicitly asks stakeholders
to recognize that a problem identification or solution choice is not
their preferred choice while accepting it as legitimate given the
legitimacy of the process and the understanding that it will be
possible to review the results at a later time.
One of the most interesting writers on the entanglement of interest
and policy at the macro-economic level is Albert O. Hirschman. The
title of his 1977 study summarizes the issue nicely: The Passions and
the Interests. Some of the new work on complexity studies in
organization theory and economics addresses the difficulty of
understanding the process, while suggesting slow steps toward better
ways of working.
In design research, Dori Tunstall is working on some of these issues
in her work on design and governmentality.
I look forward to the continuing thread.
Ken
--
Merriam-Webster's (1993: 901) defines politics as:
1 a: the art or science of government b: the art or science concerned
with guiding or influencing governmental policy c: the art or science
concerned with winning and holding control over a government. 2:
political actions, practices, or policies. 3 a: political affairs or
business; especially: competition between competing interest groups
or individuals for power and leadership (as in a government) b :
political life especially as a principal activity or profession c :
political activities characterized by artful and often dishonest
practices 4: the political opinions or sympathies of a person 5 a:
the total complex of relations between people living in society b :
relations or conduct in a particular area of experience especially as
seen or dealt with from a political point of view <office politics>.
--
References
Hirschman, Albert O. 1977. The Passions and the Interests. Political
Arguments for Capitalism before Its Triumph. Princeton: Princeton
University Press.
Merriam-Webster, Inc. 1993. Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.
Tenth edition. Springfield, Massachusetts.
--
Prof. Ken Friedman
Institute for Communication, Culture, and Language
Norwegian School of Management
Oslo
Center for Design Research
Denmark's Design School
Copenhagen
+47 46.41.06.76 Tlf NSM
+47 33.40.10.95 Tlf Privat
email: [log in to unmask]
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