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Full-Text Articles in Law
Designing Law To Enable Adaptive Governance Of Modern Wicked Problems, J. B. Ruhl, Barbara A. Cosens A. Cosens, Niko Soininen, Lance Gunderson
Designing Law To Enable Adaptive Governance Of Modern Wicked Problems, J. B. Ruhl, Barbara A. Cosens A. Cosens, Niko Soininen, Lance Gunderson
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
This Article contributes to the development of adaptive governance theory by articulating and situating the role of formal law and government as the facilitator, but not central controller, of adaptive governance. To advance the understanding of adaptive governance, we argue that it can be understood in the broader context of scholarship covering the observed emergence of new governance, the efforts to develop theoretical understandings through decentered theory, and the refinement of constitutional understanding through democratic experimentalism. Synthesis of these three themes in turn informs the role of law and government in working with emergent governance responses to complexity to manage …
Beyond Wickedness: Managing Complex Systems And Climate Change, Michael P. Vandenbergh, Jonathan M. Gilligan
Beyond Wickedness: Managing Complex Systems And Climate Change, Michael P. Vandenbergh, Jonathan M. Gilligan
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
This Article examines the argument that climate change is a "super wicked" problem. It concludes that the wicked problem concept is best viewed as a rhetorical device that served a valuable function in arguing against technocratic hubris in the early 1970s but is unhelpful and possibly counterproductive as a tool for modern climate policy analysis. Richard Lazarus improved on this analysis by emphasizing the urgency of a climate response in his characterization of the climate problem as "super wicked." We suggest another approach based on Charles Lindblom's "science of muddling through." The muddling through approach supports the rhetorical points for …