terry,

grumpy i am far from it, but i admit that i get annoyed when i see people
dismissing the ideas of others by peddling in empty generalities.  you post
was full of them.

i didn't ask you to google "wicked problems" to evaluate the quality of
various literatures using the term, but to become a little more humble and
perhaps question your claim that rittel's contribution is overrated and
outdated by better conceptions.  if someone is the origin of a term that now
googles over two million hits, he couldn't have been that insignificant.  i
am sure sigmund freud's creations yield far more hits than rittel's, who
actually published very little.  i invite you to take a word or phrase that
you have contributed to the literature and see how many hits you get for it.

i wouldn't question you on the fact that many users of the term have not
read rittel's definition much less other watered down versions, but this is
not the point because in your post you do not exhibit specific knowledge of
the concept nor do you intelligently interrogate its details.  you assert
that a concept that has varied uses and takes too much effort to explain is
somewhat worthless.  I'd say you had a chance to clarify your understanding
but you didn't 

i tried to look into the reviews for which you provided links, could find
your dissertation but the others could not be found.  your dissertation is
primarily engineering oriented, stated already in its title, which is
consistent with the contributions you typically make to this list.  you
reduce the social factors you include in your discussion to objective, i.e.,
observer-independent engineering terms, not truly expanding design into the
social dimensions.  

in your dissertation, you mention rittel quite a number of times but when it
comes to wicked problems you associate wickedness with novelty/non-routine,
ill-defined, ill-structured, lack of systematic methods, and with intuition.
associations explain little, but your use of the term ill-defined not
well-defined reveal a concept that deviates from rittel from the start.
rittel recognized that wicked problems are of a kind very different from
tame problems.  you, however see wicked problems as deviant from the
desirable form.  it is therefore understandable that you have difficulties
with handling wicked problems as legitimate forms.  you apparently are
considering tame problems as the legitimate kinds and wicked problem worth
solving only if one can tame them.  your conceptual framework is apparently
trapped in one preferred conception, unable to consider deviant kinds as
legitimate design issues.

to make my point even clearer, at one place you even assert that you
consider wicked problems not appropriate for design. in effect, you define
design so as not to have to deal with wicked problems.  personally this
would seriously impoverish design.  i would not accept such limitations

klaus

 

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
research in Design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Terence
Love
Sent: Wednesday, April 25, 2007 1:15 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: History - design research and the minor role of the wicked idea

Dear Klaus,

Thanks for your message. It made me think. You sound grumpy.

I’ve read Rittel’s work and I think I understand it. It has significance
alongside other similar concepts of that era but the ay it seems in the
current writing much of its current use seems to be driven by populist
opinion rather than research utility. Contrast for example 'morphological
analysis' and 'solution set analysis' both of which predate Rittel's
wickedness and which offer practical approaches to addressing similar
difficult design issues.

You asked me to Google 'wicked problem'. In any practical research domain
there are typically three very distinct discourses. The first is the
research discourse. This discourse aims at precision and  focuses on
reducing ambiguity (by carefully defining terms and concepts), careful
reasoning, avoiding fallacies and sophism and making reasoning transparent.
The second discourse is  the consultant’s or practitioner’s (designer’s)
form of discourse that hopes to aspire to the aims of the research discourse
whilst focusing on using terms and concepts that are common to all
constituencies that are involved. Naturally, this discourse is typically
epistemologically  compromised. The third form of discourse is the loose
everyday talk in which precision of meaning is not expected beyond what is
necessary to have an appropriately amiable social chat. I’ve discussed this
discourse issue and its implications for design research in more detail in
Love, T. (2005). The Practical Implications of the Essentially Two-faced
Nature of Design. In E. Corte-Real, C. A. M. Duarte & F. Carvalho Rodrigues
(Eds.), Pride & Predesign The Cultural Heritage and the Science of Design
2005 (pp. 251-254). Lisbon: IADE/UNIDCOM A preprint is available at
http://www.love.com.au/PublicationsTLminisite/2005/Two%20faces%20of%20discou
rses%20of%20design.htm

Your suggestion for me to Google “wicked problem” to justify your position
reveals that most of the items about 'wicked problems' are in the second and
third forms of discourse. Similar findings emerge from Googling say
“quantum” or “pornography”. In the case of 'quantum' a small number of items
are from physicists using the term quantum as carefully defined in research.
The remainder are in the other forms of discourse .

A second and perhaps more visible concern is  - if the potential conceptual
clarification and precision offered by ‘wicked’ and ‘tame’ was so clear then
it wouldn’t need so much explanation. Some of the Google items on ‘wicked
problems’ and some of the discussion on this list read like politicians
trying to explain and justify a politically convenient soundbite. I’m
reminded of Clinton explaining his interpretation of “I did not have sex
with that woman" and Blair’s explanation of why Britain went to war in Iraq!

If the concepts of 'wicked' and 'tame' were that useful and accurate and
capable of clearly distinguishing one thing from another, they would be
easier to explain. Contrast for example the concept of “indeterminate
problem” – a problem that has more degrees of freedom in its solution than
the number of degrees of freedom constrained by the knowledge of the
designer(s). That reminds me, Ranulph Glanville recently sent me a pointer
to a great cybernetics paper which I can’t put my hand to at this time of
night.

You asked me to provide more analysis, more justification and a full
description of the concepts around in the early days of design research. I
had thought that background reading of the origins of design research was
the sort of thing that would be expected of everyone researching at doctoral
level in design research. It would be in many other disciplines.
Its a tall order to knock off in an evening but ok. In this case, I’ll
provide a review from the point of view of engineering design research. In
the early stages of the design research field this aligns fairly well
because much of design research at that time was shaped by engineering
design.


I’ve done a review of the literature from the 60s until recently and that
can be found at
http://www.love.com.au/PublicationsTLminisite/Pre2000/1998%20SEED
<http://www.love.com.au/PublicationsTLminisite/Pre2000/1998%20SEED&DT_WP_App
e> &DT_WP_Appe
ndix%201.htm

An annotated bibliography I wrote of the way the concept of ‘design’ was
coined in the literature during that time can be found at
http://www.love.com.au/PublicationsTLminisite/Pre2000/1998%20SEED
<http://www.love.com.au/PublicationsTLminisite/Pre2000/1998%20SEED&DT_WP_App
e> &DT_WP_Appe
ndix%202.htm

There is an analysis (my PhD) of the underlying epistemological foundations
of different design research and theory positions and concepts relating to
social, environmental, ethical and technical aspects of design and the
development of epistemologically coherent design theory (Love, T. (1998).
Social, environmental and ethical factors in engineering design theory: a
post positivist approach. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Western
Australia, Perth.) It can be found at
http://www.love.com.au/PublicationsTLminisite/Pre2000/PhD_TL.doc

Anything else?

All the best,

Terry

PS That reference to Rittel (Rittel, H. W. J. (1971). Some Principles for
the Design of an Educational System For Design. Design Methods Group
Newsletter, 4(4).) is one that often doesn't get a mention. It shows much of
Rittel's work (as you would expect) was dependent on the already well
established systems field. Perhaps the better advice would be for design
researchers to read about systems thinking rather than Rittel?


-----Original Message-----
From: Klaus Krippendorff [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wednesday, 25 April 2007 3:39 PM
To: 'Terence Love'; [log in to unmask]
Subject: RE: History - design research and the minor role of the wicked idea

terry,

i read your dismissal of rittel's distinction between tame and wicked
problems as overblown in its significance.  i like to invite you to read his
criteria for deciding which is which and the reasons for why this
distinction is helpful methodologically. rittel did not write much, but he
had a major impact on the literature (google wicket problems).  he deserves
a fair interrogation of what he said.

you are playing a version of the well known but cheap game of saying that
someone else's idea is older than mine or has been overshadowed by more
recent developments that i know of but wouldn't tell you; or that it derived
from an area that is no longer of interest, without saying what it is that
has outdated interest in the concept.

i am genuinely opposed to defining design so narrowly that only one or a few
preferred paradigms become admissible, like problem solving, which is only
one way of designing.  any generalization should embrace a diversity of
practices, it should build upon or add to past distinction, not reduce them
to insignificance.  this is how theories in the sciences grow: embracing
more and finer distinctions, not imposing increasingly narrow conception,
here about design.

you are making references to many design theorists of rittel's time and of
more before and after him.  you gave only one pair of names, the editors of
the 1963 design research conference, jones & thornley.  i invite you to put
some substance to your generalizations.  by that i do not mean giving us a
list of references to literature or the list of the many names of design
theorists you claim to have made contributions to understanding design.
please tell us what these theorists actually did, how they defined the
empirical domain of their theory, and what the theory actually suggested,
predicted or explained.  you owe us the details that your generalizations
left uncomfortably empty.

you speak of the rich literature in many design disciplines.  i know of your
admirable effort to catalogue such design disciplines.  it would be
interesting to go beyond this list and hear what they have in common (other
than the name design), what methods they follow, what we can learn from this
supposedly rich literature.  since i am not acquainted with the literature
of these many design disciplines, it does not exist for me unless you prove
otherwise.  this is what good scholars do.

in much of our discussions, you have been notably uncomfortable with the
concept of wicked problems and disagreed with the notion of stakeholders.
your discomfort or perhaps lack of understanding is no justification to
consider the concept of ‘wicked’ problems a "furphy" (not in my dictionary),
a ‘sound bite’ for design educators or design proponents bidding for
funding.  your claim that there are better concepts needs to be
demonstrated, not merely declared.

let me add that yes, every author writes in his or her time and cultural
milieu.  also, no author can be an expert on everything.  this applies to
rittel as well.  he never claimed to be a design theorist.  he just
conceptualized what he was confronted with and left us with much to talk
about and digest.  to me this is enough not to dismiss his ideas.

klaus 


-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
research in Design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Terence
Love
Sent: Wednesday, April 25, 2007 12:08 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: History - design research and the minor role of the wicked idea

Hello,



I think it is helpful to remember that there are many other concepts that
predate and in many ways more powerful than Rittel’s idea of ‘wickedness’.
Historically, Rittel's 'wicked' problem idea has a minor role in the overall
development of concepts in design theory that has become conceptually
overblown.



Rittel’s idea of a ‘wicked’ problem is historically located in the
development of the fields of town planning, urban planning and urban design.
Somehow, people seem to have forgotten that its primary reason for existence
was in education development in these areas (see, Rittel, 1971).



In the late 60s and early 70s, theory was relatively undeveloped in urban
planning fields in spite of their long history as a practical discipline. In
many ways, theory of planning at that point was primarily defined by three
geometric topoi: tessellation (laying out of shapes/tiles), reticulation and
graph theory (connecting shapes with each other/ passing things down a
channel), and the four and five colour pencil constraint (to cover a 2D
surface without ever having two similar regions together you need 4
different types of entities/colours. Until relatively recently, it was
believed that you needed five colours). Allocation of land uses and the
documentation of decisions were strongly shaped by these.



As a result, urban planning theory was in character rather more
functionalist in theory terms than many other design disciplines at that
time.



In parallel, during the 60s and early 70s was the development of the
foundations of what is now ‘the design research movement’. Many credit a key
point in its origins the 1963 conference organised by Jones & Thornley
(Jones & Thornley, 1963) and the work of the contemporaneous Design Methods
Group in the US. In general, the primary hope and direction of design
research at this time was to identify a universal design process to automate
the identification of the ‘best’ design outcomes. Many of these approaches
in the fledgling ‘design research society’ focused on developing design
methods to systematically automate design. To some extent, Rittel’s early
‘wicked’ thinking triangulates into this discourse.



In many design disciplines, however, there were already rich
well-established literatures about design activity that predated the efforts
of these new 60s mini groups of theorists on design research by decades or
in some cases hundreds of years.



The new groups that would become the design research society and the design
methods movement were tiny and their research relatively naïve and
insignificant relative to these established discourses. What the new design
research groups offered, however, was a new and tight focus on the specifics
of the design process itself – in particular, the development of new methods
for designers to use. (This is reflected in the fact that design research
was known as ‘design methods’ or ‘design methodology’ until the mid 90s.)



Somehow, things have got confused. Rittel’s idea of ‘wicked’ problems was
relatively insignificant in theory terms in the broader picture of existing
design theories of that time. The same idea was already better expressed in
the established discourses and concepts in a wide variety of design fields
along with related disciplines such as economics.



This historical reality seems to have been overlooked in this phd-design
discussion, as have the concepts themselves.



The role of ‘wicked’ was not primarily as a theory. In fact, it is poor
theory compared to what already existed at the time and has been developed
since. The primary role of the idea of a ‘wicked’ problem was as a
‘soundbite’ to simplify discussion about developing new design methods and a
new direction in education for urban planners. More particularly, it offered
a simplified concept of use in the education of students and for discussion
with people who hadn’t read the more difficult material.



For some weird reason, design researchers (perhaps without reading the other
material) have assumed that the idea of a ‘wicked problem’ was a) new b) a
theoretical concept, and c) replaced other concepts of the day. It was (and
is) none of these.



In parallel, naively, some design researchers assume that design theory was
purely rationalist prior to the 70s. The literatures shows that design
theorists at that time and before were well aware that most design problems
did not have unique solutions, and that the choice of ‘best’ solution
depended on its interpretation by multiple constituencies, as did the
identification of the detail of a ‘problem’. In fact, all the
characteristics attributed to the idea of ‘wickedness’ in design problems
and the relation to routine solutions were already a deep part of the
discourse in many design fields – and rather better analysed. It was rather
late in the day that Rittel’s ‘wicked problem’ concept brought urban
planning into this already well-established discourse.



One of the faulty presumptions sometimes presented by design theorists is
that some design fields are rational and deterministic and others not so.
The literature in for example engineering design shows this. Earlier authors
in this design research tradition demonstrate clear awareness of the role of
human issues, differences in perspective and perception, and the
understanding of the reality that most designs are not determined rationally
and are rather the product of informed discourse. A similar confusion is
found in people’s interpretation of systems theory as rationalist (including
the interpretations of systems theorists!). For example, Bertalanffy’s
detailed discussions of systems clearly cover similar ground to that pointed
to by Rittel decades later and include systems that are not determinable,
involve non-linear approaches to understanding them and whose functioning is
determined by people, politics, power and prejudice.



The concept of ‘wicked’ problems. It’s a furphy. It might be of use as a
‘soundbite’ for design educators or design proponents bidding for funding.
As a concept, however, there are better.



Best wishes,
Terry
____________________
Dr. Terence Love, PhD, FDRS, AMIMechE
Design-focused Research Group, Design Out Crime Group Key Researcher at
Centre for Extended Enterprise and Business Intelligence Research Associate
at Planning and Transport Research Centre Curtin University, PO Box U1987,
Perth, Western Australia 6845
Mob: 0434 975 848, Fax +61(0)8 9305 7629, [log in to unmask] Visiting
Professor, Member of Scientific Council UNIDCOM/ IADE, Lisbon, Portugal
Visiting Research Fellow, Institute of Entrepreneurship and Enterprise
Development Management School, Lancaster University,Lancaster, UK,
[log in to unmask] ____________________

 References

Jones, J. C., & Thornley, D. G. (Eds.). (1963). Conference on design methods
: papers presented at the Conference on Systematic and Intuitive Methods in
Engineering, Industrial design, Architecture and Communications, London,
September 1962. Oxford: Pergamon Press.