Walls and Wicked Problems: The Role of Complexity in Politics

Politics is about solving our world's most complex problems. Solving “wicked problems” like climate change or migration involves myriad actors, contested priorities, uncertain outcomes, and interdependent processes. In the face of such complexity, policymakers sometimes propose simple solutions. US President Donald Trump proposed building a wall to “solve” immigration. British Conservatives proposed cutting all ties with the EU in a “hard Brexit”. Both won elections on these simple narratives. Conversely, the lack of a similarly simple idea to address climate change seems to hinder global progress. Each of these events is a story of a contest between complex and simple ideas. Yet political science lacks clear theories about the nature and strategic uses of complexity, focusing mostly on text complexity measures like readability. Without a theory of idea complexity, scholars cannot explain why Trump proposed a wall, nor why the idea was popular with voters. If we understand political complexity better—if we make it explicit instead of implicit in our theories—we also understand our current moment better.COMPLEXPOL will build new theories of and evidence for the role of complexity in politics. It does so through three work packages that rely on multiple methods, including quantitative modelling, survey, experimental, and computational methods, and novel data on voters and political leaders in three countries. In WP1, I will develop new, multidimensional measures of complexity, particularly of ideas. In WP2, I will explore the social and psychological determinants of individual attitudes toward complexity. And in WP3, I will investigate the strategic use of complexity by leaders and the public's reactions. In so doing, COMPLEXPOL will provide fresh insights into why some problems get solved with walls while others are left as wicked problems.