Everyone knows (sort of) that we live in a “complex world.” But what does that demand of us? This is a double “us”: regarding political policymakers as well as individual citizens.

Let’s start with legislators, bureaucrats and the like. Given how numerous government functions have become, it’s only natural that each department focuses on its specific professional specialty. However, that comes with a huge downside: the real world itself is not “modular” – most everything is connected to everything else. Here’s a fascinating example from the 1970s in the U.S.

Over several years there were two cases of a plane stopping very short on the takeoff runway. At the time, babies did not have to have their own seats but rather simply sat on their parent’s lap. Two such babies died when thrown into the bulkhead with the plane’s quick halt. A commission was set up to determine whether to require seat purchases for every child, regardless of age. After due deliberation their recommendation was a strong “NO”! Why? Because after taking “everything” into account, they found that such a requirement would force many families to drive by car from one relatively nearby city to another – and then far more such travelers would die in ensuing traffic accidents than in airplane stoppages (or any form of in-flight crash).

In short, here was a rare case of a government body considering the complexity of life: transportation, psychology, economics, statistics, etc.

In real (bureaucratic) life, unless an interdisciplinary commission is set up, such broad-based thinking does not get done within any specific department, given the deep but narrow knowledge base of its policymaking structure.

An Israeli case in........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)