The Art Of Thinking In Systems: Improve Your Logic, Think More Critically, And Use Proven Systems To Solve Your Problems - Strategic Planning For Everyday Life by Steven Schuster

Author:Steven Schuster [Schuster, Steven]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Published: 2018-01-10T16:00:00+00:00

Why do policy changes seem to be stuck at one place?

Balancing feedback loops are the stabilizing force in systems. When they are at work, you should notice very few changes, and even though outside forces are impacting the system, the typical behavior patterns should still be in place. While there are many examples of when maintaining the status quo is a good thing, unfortunately, there are also times when this is not the case. Much like someone who has had the exact same hairdo since the 1980s and has no desire to ever change it, sometimes the behavior patterns of a system can get stuck in a real rut. This is often called “policy resistance.” It happens when, despite efforts to come up with innovative solutions or policy “fixes,” the system’s behavior patterns remain unchanged.[xxxi]

In the United States, the public education system offers a prime example of policy resistance. As any society would, the United States government hopes to improve its public education system and increase student achievement. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson with the primary goal of adequately funding public education so that all students, regardless of their socioeconomic status, would have access to an excellent education, and schools would need to meet high standards of accountability. In 2001, President George W. Bush signed into law the No Child Left Behind Act, and its primary focus was to use annual assessments in grades 3-8, and once in high school, to ensure that all students were meeting high standards in their academic achievement. School funding became tied to how schools performed on these tests. President Barack Obama signed the Every Student Succeeds Act into law in 2015. This law kept much of the No Child Left Behind Act in place, but shifted some of the control over standards and accountability from the federal government to individual states.

Despite the efforts of multiple presidents, many members of Congress, education policymakers, more school choice, increased testing and accountability, and changes to funding public education, many problems and obstacles still exist in the United States’ public education system, and the systemic behavior patterns largely still persist. This is policy resistance at work. Unfortunately, the same can be said as we try to reform the criminal justice system, break people’s addiction to drugs, decrease poverty, and provide affordable healthcare for all. Even though a substantial amount of time, effort, and money have been spent trying to resolve these problems, the results that have been hoped for simply have not been attained.

Keep in mind that within each of the systems mentioned, there are many subsystems as well as individual actors which each view the behavior patterns and systemic problems through their own unique lens. Each has their own goals they want to achieve, which may or may not be fully aligned with the system as a whole. Policy resistance arises when the goals of the subsystems do not match. If the goals are inconsistent, they often

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