Concluding Thoughts
'Finality is not the language of politics.' - Benjamin Disraeli
The Unravelling Complexity course is drawing to a close and it is time to tie up the loose ends. It has been a pleasure to take this course and the group research project was the icing on top of a dense and multi-layered cake. It is time to test whether the course has provided a useful toolkit for politicians to deal with complexity. There have been several significant and recurrent themes throughout this portfolio and these can be taken as principles which politicians and anyone who hopes to deal with complexity must remember.
The first and most important of these principles is just to have an awareness of complexity. There are many coping mechanisms which we can employ to avoid acknowledging the intricacy and unpredictability of the Australian policy climate.. It is comforting to focus on small, achievable goals, or to assume that a traditional narrative arc will save the day. However, any good scientist will tell you that you must at least account for all variables, even if you can’t control them, unless you want the results of your experiment to run wild.
The second principle is that of balance and integration. Politicians are likely to be overwhelmed by the many subjects of policy and competing perspectives with which they are faced. It is important that they do not always make decisions on the basis of what is easy or most popular. They must remember to consider the impact of policy on all Australians, whether in the majority or minority; on the broader progress of Australia; and on our future capacity.
Finally, the third principle for unravelling complexity is that of flexibility. A balanced awareness of complexity requires an admission that we cannot control the future. The study of history can tell us just how contingent the outcomes of human events can be. Politicians ought to give up fighting uncertainty and do their best to accommodate the unpredicted outcomes of complexity into their work. While they need to give up strict narrative approaches to policy, they ought to hold onto a very firm set of principles to lead them in the right direction.