Working groups (10/29/13)

Confronting Wicked Problems in the Metropolis: Is it Possible to make these Problems Tame?

Jered Carr, Department of Public Affairs ([e-mail])

University of Missouri- Kansas City
These problems facing many metropolitan regions in the U.S. are “complex, open-ended and intractable” (Head, 2008: 101). The obstacles to regional cooperation created by a lack of consensus on these issues are the root of the criticisms of the interlocal collaborations highlighted by the Institutional Collective Action framework. We draw on the concept of nested institutional action situations to illustrate the intractability of metropolitan wicked problems and to suggest a research agenda for studying intergovernmental collaboration on problems requiring the development of consensus about the nature of the problem and acceptable solutions. We discuss the limitations of two popular approaches to analyzing metropolitan problems: New Regionalism and the Institutional Collective Action framework. The self-organized solutions described by these frameworks operate largely on the basis of consensus and this creates a bias toward solving low-conflict problems where consensus already exists (Norris, 2001). We use the Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework to identify strategies for taming wicked problems that have been used in previous research on western water rights and South American forestry, in particular. The implications are that wicked problems are tamed through iterated games, and that institution-making at the collective-choice level can then be scaled up to achieve agreement at the constitutional level of analysis.
The Problem of Getting Old: Policy Solutions that Create Wicked Problems

Brent Never, Department of Public Affairs ([e-mail])

University of Missouri- Kansas City
Aging in community, where older adults are provided the human and medical services necessary to remain in their homes as long as medically possible, has become the preferred policy solution to an aging population; it is psychosocially and economically preferable to institutionalized care such as assisted living facilities. This paper argues that the public policy prescription creates a wicked problem in itself. As many caregivers can attest, aging in community exists for most Americans as a matrix of services that begin and end at geographic and funding boundaries. I argue that disentangling the nesting of institutional rules in use provides a starting point for understanding how to better create channels through which caregivers can choose the appropriate services for their loved ones.
Policy Learning to Solve Problems in Multi-Level Governance

Jessica Terman, Department of Political Science ([e-mail])

University of Nevada- Reno
The United States is often characterized as a hyper-federal system with nested governance institutions and multiple layers of decision-making structures. While this allows for more decentralized decision-making and policies tailored to local preferences, it creates challenges for solving problems that span multiple jurisdictions. This is particularly true in the case of public responsiveness to climate change. In the absence of a comprehensive federal response to climate change, local governments have begun to develop their own climate adaptation and mitigation strategies. However, there is enormous variation across local governments. This project examines how the configuration of state and regional climate policies and distribution of information influences local government adoption of climate adaptation strategies. In particular, the project examines how local governments interact with other levels of government on climate policy and the methods of policy learning that influence local climate adaptation policies.
Scale issues in complex commons: Learning from the Tahoe Bi-state Compact
Derek Kauneckis, Department of Political Science ([e-mail])

University of Nevada, Reno

While the classic public goods typology has provided an important foundation for understanding the nature of a variety of social dilemmas, it has also obscured the complexity of many common pool resource (CPR) systems. Quite simply, not all commons are created equal. CPR dilemmas take multiple forms and require an expansion of the tradition typology to include the variety of CPR dilemmas. This paper develops a typology of CPR systems based on scale issues and the nature of production and provisioning problems. It uses the case of the Tahoe Bi-state Compact for theory development and to illustrate the necessity of expanding CPR theory. By focusing on the scale of production and provisioning systems, institutional production, levels of decision-making, and the path dependency of administrative boundaries a better understanding of the specific social dilemma in different types of CPR systems can be determined.

49 (The) Workshop as Part of Civic Studies

Coordinator: Karol Soltan ([e-mail])
Abstract: This panel will consider the emerging field of civic studies as an intellectual context for the Workshop tradition. Elinor Ostrom was among the authors of a call for such a new interdisciplinary discipline adopted after a 2007 meeting at University of Maryland. The agreed text now serves as a Framing Statement for the Summer Institute of Civic Studies at Tufts. The goal of civic studies is to develop ideas and ways of thinking helpful to citizens understood as co-creators of their worlds (note plural). And the work of the Workshop is among the most important traditions contributing to the mix of perspectives in civic studies.

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SINGLE PAPERS
Confirmed Paper

Food Aid and Pro-Poor Growth: The Functional Relationships between Food Aid, Food poverty and GDP in Africa and Middle East

By Dr. MAHGOUB Emad Ahmed
Possible Papers
Alessandra Bulgarelli – economist

Edgar Cahn – paper on co-production and participating (needs funding assistance)

Lucinda Carspecken

Paolo Graziano

Arlene Hopkins

Gloria Lillo Ortega