Wellbeing as a Wicked Problem: Navigating the Arguments for the Role of Government

In the UK, the connection between wellbeing and public policy is sufficiently advanced to have provoked concern that the government is developing a ‘happiness index’ (in reality a dashboard of indicators) that will become a focal point for policy. Scholars, commentators and political activists have engaged in fierce debate about the appropriate role for governments and many have responded with hostility to suggestions that the UK government – amongst others – is seeking to elevate happiness or wellbeing as an explicit policy goal.

In a new paper in press with the Journal of Happiness Studies, Ian Bache and Louise Reardon (University of Sheffield) and Paul Anand (OU) seek to steer a course through the debates by taking Rittel and Webber’s seminal discussion of the distinction between ‘wicked’ and ‘tame’ problems as a reference point.

In 1973, Rittel and Webber discussed the growing crisis of confidence in rational planning models – the dilemma of ‘where and how to intervene even if we do happen to know what aims we seek’. They argued that wicked problems were by nature ill defined, ‘rely[ing] upon elusive political judgement for resolution’. Although tame problems can be solved because it is possible to formulate the information required for their understanding, wicked problems never really are. At best they are simply resolved – over and over again.

Such arguments resonate with issues over the definition and direction of causality of wellbeing, the domains – such as health – that are seen to constitute it, and the appropriate policy mix for its promotion. Bache et al argue that understanding wellbeing as a wicked problem steers us towards deliberation and scrutiny and cautions us against expecting a panacea. Such understanding can then lead beyond irresolvable disputes by pointing to the need for pragmatic and legitimate government action.

Read Wellbeing as a Wicked Problem: Navigating the Arguments for the Role of Government.