Crossing the Bridge: Policymakers vs Technical Specialists

In a few weeks, I will board a series of flights to COP28, where I will be a rare and slightly invasive species: a scientist among a world of climate policy specialists. Like my ill-fitting suits, the 10 days spent in this exotic habitat will be uncomfortable. But I am there to learn and, as much as I can, to support effective resilience. The actions do not come naturally to me.

One of my old friends is an engineer who has been working on adaptation projects and decision making for almost two decades. He was born in South America and works for a US federal agency, but I would prefer to describe him as a global citizen in his outlook and actions. He’s taught me a lot about how to make adaptation and resilience tangible, practical, and successful.

One of his favorite proverbs for me is that the best technical solution is almost never the best political solution. He might sound cynical or calloused, but he’s not.

Instead, he means that we, as technical professionals, often see the world with overly narrow blinders — we look at a big problem as an engineer, planner, lawyer, hydrologist, or economist. Those disciplines have their own ways of framing problems and solutions, and they unfold and unpack ideas according to their own disciplinary logic. Something similar is true too about certain kinds of institutions, such as a natural resource agency vs a community health organization or a manufacturing company. They have distinct ways of seeing.

Instead of disparaging policymakers as continuously making the “wrong” decision, we might need to see them as some of the few individuals who actually are trying to see a problem whole, in all of its complexity. They see tradeoffs where we might see simplicity. For an honest, open minded broker faced with a complicated decision, what we consider a failure may be more of a result of technical practitioners not communicating about how a policymaker could incorporate a new or unfamiliar aspect of that complexity. And for that, we need to speak their language — or translate our way of thinking into theirs.

What I’ve tried to take away from my friend is that we also need to learn at least some of the other disciplines and issues that are worth negotiating with. As an ecologist, learning how an engineer sees the world is a painful but also powerful lesson, and one that needs regular updating. Unfairly, some languages such as economics and finance more readily convert themselves into policy than others. We may be borne into a specific field, but we can grow and become more effective by finding our complementarities.

That’s what this newsletter is all about.

John Matthews

Corvallis, Oregon, USA