Subject: Forest Planning: A New Era?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Comments:
In 1974, noted economist Kenneth Boulding identified 12 "hap-hazard"
propositions about planning as it relates (and fails to relate) to
decision making. As we evaluate the new NFMA regulation proposal
(ECO-WATCH 3/8), contrasting the "deliberative" style of the
proposal to the "rational, comprehensive" style of the older
regulation, it would be well to keep in Boulding's advice in mind.
Two pages follow...Dve.
-------========X========-------
ECO-WATCH
3/22/91
REFLECTIONS ON PLANNING: The Value of Uncertainty
Kenneth E. Boulding
I have been involved lately in a committee which is thinking about
planning for my university, so I have been forced to think about planning
myself. Planning is a good or a bad word depending to a considerable degree, I
suspect, on whether one is doing the planning or whether one is being planned.
My reflections on the subject have taken the form of twelve rather hap-hazard
propositions, none of which I put forward as being necessarily true, but which
are perhaps plausible enough to be worth investigating.
1. The world moves into the future as a result of decisions, not as a
result of plans. Plans are significant only in so far as they affect decisions.
Planning may be defined in such a way that it is part of the total
decision-making process; but if it is not part of a decision-making process,
it is a bag of wind, a piece of paper, and worthless diagrams.
2. Planning as part of the decision-making process may be defined as any
conscious intellectual activity resulting in communications to decision-makers
which is considered successful if future decisions are improved.
3. It is by no means easy to say what we mean by improving future
decisions, although the concept does not seem to be meaningless. This is because
the "goodness" of a decision is hard to evaluate, and still harder to measure.
Thus, unless we can have some measure of the "goodness" of decisions, it is very
hard to know which direction constitutes improvement--that is, which way is up.
One possible measure is the amount of regret which is generated by looking back
on past decisions. In this sense, the success of planning might be measured by
the extent to which it diminishes regret, especially considered and carefully
examined regret. This is something about which busybody social scientists might
conceivably ask people, and so it is hypothetically measurable.
4. All decisions involve the evaluation of alternative images of the
future, and the selection of the most highly valued feasible alternatives.
Decisions, therefore, involve two elements: An agenda consisting of alternative
images of the future with degrees of uncertainty applied to each and an image
of the relation between present action and the future trajectory. Then, in
addition, there must be a valuation scheme from which comes a preference
ordering at least sufficient to identify the best elements of the agenda, which
is presumably what is chosen.
5. Both agendas and valuation schemes are mainly learned by the
decision-maker from past information input. What is usually called "planning"
is an activity which produces the product of planners, which takes the form of
some kind of communication. This is usually only a small part of the total
information input of decision-makers, and there is no certainty that its impact
is positive for producing better decisions rather than worse. The study of the
effects of the planner-product has been much neglected.
6. Evaluation and decision strategy, and the quality of decisions in
general, depend very much on the degree of uncertainty of the items on the
agenda. The greater the uncertainty of the agenda, the higher the value which
should be placed on decisions which leave future options open--that is, on
"liquidity" and noncommitment. Decision-making under high degrees of uncertainty
is a very different kind of beast from decision-making under low degrees of
uncertainty. Decision-making under conditions of absolute certainty is unknown
in the real world.
7. An important source of bad decisions is illusions of certainty, which
often lead to decisive action which zeros in on disaster. The great danger is
that the product of planning frequently produces illusions of certainty simply
because it is dressed up so prettily. Planners often dislike uncertainty, and
decision-makers dislike uncertainty even more and so tend to neglect the
uncertainty which may be in small print in the planner-product.
8. Computerized and numerical models, especially those with fancy
diagrams and print-outs, are almost certain to produce illusions of certainty
and may therefore easily lead to bad decisions. A study of computer-induced
disasters, from bankruptcies to wars, is much overdue; we do not seem to have
techniques for understanding uncertainty in the context of computerized models.
9. From the point of view of the quality of the total decision-making
process, as measured by how much in general things go from bad to better rather
than from bad to worse, there are optimum degrees of inefficiency and ignorance,
and an optimum degree of decentralization. When efficiency leads to a loss of
adaptability, and information leads to illusions of certainty, and
centralization leads to both of these, we have a magnificent design for
extinction. Under some circumstances the reports of planners may increase the
chance of extinction in these ways.
10. But the product of planning could be quite consciously designed to increase
the chance of making better decisions. The most valuable products might be:
- The widening of agendas--that is, helping the decision-maker to
think of things not already thought of; narrowing of agendas is often an
important source of bad decisions. If anybody says, "I have no alternative," you
know something has gone wrong.
- The examination of values and the critique of
value-indicators--that is objective functions. Planner-product might be able to
help decision-makers who ask "Do I really want X?" (X may mean getting bigger,
or richer, or more noticeable, etc.).
11. Planner-product might improve decision-making also if it included some
things which are not now usually included--such as the study of past bad
decisions, early-warning signals, the failure of past predictions, etc.--which
might improve the cue system of the decision-maker. Not enough thought has been
given to the question of what planner-product would be most helpful.
12. Planning is probably most useful in organizations with rather simple
objectives such as making money. The only thing that prevents planning from
being disastrous in government is that it is not usually believed, governments
being multi-purpose, multi-objective organizations. Indeed, planning is likely
to be particularly disastrous in universities where the optimum degree of
inefficiency and decentralization is very large and where the objectives cannot
be expressed by any single algorithm. Quantification and computerization can
lead to general decay in this situation.
From: Technology Review, Oct/Nov 1974
Kenneth Boulding was then
Program Director: General,
Social, and Economic Dynamics,
University of Colorado