Wicked Problems
Highly complex problems which cannot be solved in a straightforward way, and may not be soluble at all. We need to be aware of their existence because the problems we are now facing are wicked. If we cannot see a solution, that does not necessarily mean that we have not understood the problem; it may mean that there isn’t one.
The main features of a wicked problem are:
Vagueness: they lack clear definition because they spill over into many different issues and systems.
Hard to grasp: they can be recognised from one or two perspectives, but are too complex to understand in the round.
Populated: they affect many people: solutions are likely to be social rather than technical.
No right answer: the best that can be done is to pick the least bad response.
Changeable: the problem, and attitudes both to it and to solutions, are constantly changing.
No definition: the problem may be hard even to identify in a form that allows it to be shared.
No solution?: there is no objective clear definition of the problem, so no definitive solution.
No clean ending: the problem-solving ends when money and time run out.W31
But do not believe that a problem is wicked because someone tells you so. Look again.
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Fortitude, Exhilaration, Climate Change, Growth, Squalid, Systems Thinking, Success.
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